I barked with laughter. “Girl, you know you can always call me. Always. Hold on, let me get our milkshakes ordered.”
“Could I get some fries, too?”
“Uh, duh,” I said as I rolled down my window. “One second.”
I placed our order for two large chocolate banana milkshakes and two large animal style fries. Then, after debating on a burger for us to split, I got us a double bacon cheeseburger to slice into if we were hungrier than we figured. I stacked all of the food into the car before I got back on the road, and as I drew in a deep breath I watched as the shelter came into view.
“Is there anything you’d like to say before I come inside?” I asked as I eased into a parking space on the side of the road.
Nadia grumbled. “Is it bad that I regret ever breaking up with him in the first place?”
“What do you mean?”
She clicked her tongue. “I loved Joshua, don’t get me wrong. I still love him. I will always love him and miss him. But I have moments where I sit here and I contemplate what my life has become, and there’s the smallest part of me that regrets ever walking away from him in the first place. Is that fucked up or what?”
I eased back into my chair. “It’s not fucked up at all. Sometimes, we can’t control what our hearts want.”
“I wish I would have just made it work with him. Maybe that robber would’ve been the dead one had I—”
“Don’t you dare do that,” I said flatly.
“I know, I know, it’s just—”
“What happened to Joshua wasn’t your fault. You didn’t kill him. That robber did. And the only reason that robber killed him was because Joshua protected you.”
Tears flooded her voice. “Then, why would I wish to be with someone else when Joshua was so wonderful at protecting me? What kind of person does that make me?”
I snatched all of our food up. “I’m coming inside. You need a hug.”
I grabbed everything that I could, including my phone, then I stormed my way through those front doors. I didn’t stop moving until I charged into her office, then I dropped everything down onto the desk and pulled my sister up from the floor. I wrapped her up as tightly as I could hold her while she sobbed against my shoulder. It was rare that we talked about what happened that evening.
The night that her husband died protecting her.
“Why-hy-hy-hyyyyy?” she choked out through her sobs.
I peppered kisses against her temple. “I gotcha. I’m right here. It’s okay. I’m right here, Nadia.”
“Love hurts so fucking much.”
I blinked back my own tears. “Yeah. I know.”
“I just wish I could tell him how I feel. How I’ve always felt. I wish I could work through the bullshit I still carry on my back from our childhood so that I could have a productive relationship with this man because I want that. I want that more than anything. I want my insecurities and my worries to not hold me back so much in life.”
I ran my fingers through her hair. “Then, why don’t you? Why don’t you tell him all of this? Why don’t you fight for it?”
She cried harder. “Because what if he doesn’t love me baaaaaa-ha-ha-haaaack?”
I rocked her softly side to side, trying my best to soothe her. But the truth of the matter was that I understood. What was more important: protecting ourselves from their morally gray existence so we don’t get hurt any longer or allowing ourselves to love the men that we had fallen for.
Jesus Christ, I’m in love with Bender.
“I gotcha,” I whispered as we both sank to the floor. “I’m right here, and I’m not going anywhere.”
And as we sat in that small, darkened corner of her office—with our food growing cold on her desk—I thought about what we had just talked about. The feelings she admitted to having. Hell, the feelings I had just admitted to myself to having. And I realized something.
Nadia was right.
If Bender and I could figure out how in the world to make things work, then what the hell was stopping us from living the lives we wanted for ourselves?
