He struggles to speak, choking, “I should have stayed with you, Boss.”
Throwing open my arms, he falls into them for a big hug and I whisper to him, “Please don’t. Please erase that guilt away from your heart forever. It’s not your fault. He was a bad guy and it’s his fault. Not yours. Not mine. Okay?” He nods and rises up, looking from me to Brendan with hope for forgiveness in his eyes. To change to a happier subject, I ask, “Manny…your momma?”
He gives a lopsided grin, wiping his eyes. “When we were waiting to hear if they found you, she said she was sorry. Family has to stay together, and we all waited at my parent’s house today together for the news. It was a hard day. They invited my girl!”
“That’s so great,” I smile, resting against Brendan’s arm.
“Can I get you anything?” Manny asks.
Thinking on it a second, I nod. “Maybe some hot chocolate?” He rushes off and Brendan kisses me. Looking down at the baby with him, I say in a quiet voice meant just for him, “Look what we did.”
Brendan chuckles. “Oh, we did this now? I didn’t do this to you?”
Pursing my lips, I shrug. “When he lies here looking like a little angel, we did it. When he’s a teenager and he gets all surly and we catch him smoking for the first time, and hiding some girl in his room, you did it”
Brendan cocks an eyebrow at me, his dark blue eyes skeptical. “When is it that you did it?”
A corner of my mouth tugs up. “When he talks back to his pre-school teacher in front of the whole class, I’m afraid that’s all me.”
Brendan smiles at Jacob and touches his little cheek. “Fair enough.”
It’s funny to harken back to the days when I felt like a rebel just because I was angry all the time and thought cynicism made me smarter than everyone else. I used to think birthdays and holidays were dumb. People made a fuss about nonsense. But it turns out that time flies and we need to mark it or years pass without us celebrating our lives, the fact that we’re breathing.
But when I felt so alone I couldn’t see that people love us if we just take down our walls and give them a chance.
It’s scary. But what’s the alternative? A life alone? Even if some of the people we think we want, don’t want us, there are wonderful people who do. And sometimes, when we find our own happiness and become who we really are — unique and perfect even with our flaws — doors that were closed before, open.
I’m glad I loved Brendan as much as I did, even when he couldn’t see me. It made me change into a woman I love.
God, can you imagine the old me saying I loved myself without gagging?
But what the fuck?
How is self love vomit-worthy?
I’ve seen the darkness.
It’s not fun.
Give me light over shadows every day, to pass onto my son, onto my husband.
Oh, I’ve changed alright.
Into who I was meant to be.
THE END.
Also By Faleena Hopkins
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About the Author
Faleena Hopkins is an American best selling author, actress, and award-winning filmmaker whose novels have sold over a million copies worldwide. Her movie Just One More Kiss launched in theaters Feb. 2020 after it won Best Feature Film at BAFF in 2019. The novel launched at the same time, her first in hardback. Faleena currently resides in California with her oh-so-gentle senior rescue dog, Sophia, where she drinks too much coffee and not enough wine. Sophia prefers water. Lots of water.
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This is a work of fiction, an imaginary world set in the real city of San Francisco for the purpose of entertainment only. People and circumstances have been made up by the author and are in no way associated to real people.
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