by Katie Cross
“Things didn’t improve from there. Mama went right into foster care. By the age of five, she’d been in three different homes. Can’t imagine a five-year-old knowing three different mothers. Can you imagine Shane in anyone else’s arms but ours?”
The thought made me quake from the inside. My body felt sluggish, my throat thick. “No,” I whispered fiercely. I pushed off the floor, papers in my hands.
Bethany kept going. “By fifteen, she’d been in seven different homes and arrested twice for various minor charges. Petty theft. Some graffiti. That kind of attention-getting stuff. Apparently, and of no surprise to anyone in this room, she was a lot to handle.
“This is where things get interesting. Men from two of the foster homes she’d lived in—the one when she was five, and one when she was eight—were arrested on charges of sexual misconduct with minors after she was sent away. I’ll let you fill in the blanks. The horrifying unknowns of her story. Can you imagine what she must have gone through at five years old?”
“Bethie,” I whispered, chin trembling, “why are you telling me all this?”
Perhaps I’d always assumed Mama had no history. Or perhaps I’d just been too horrified by the possibilities to let myself think about them. I knew she’d grown up in foster care, but she’d never spoken in specifics of her time in the system. Never allowed questions about it.
Bethany watched me steadily. “Because we only knew Mama as the adult who was supposed to protect us and didn’t. We saw only the survivor. The desperate one. The one so broken she broke everything else. Really, she was just a little girl looking for love. Like you. Like me. Like Ellie. Lizbeth, romance was what got her through. She was giving you a gift when she gave it to you. The only gift she had to give.”
I sobbed. I couldn’t help it. Bethany reached out and grabbed me by the shoulders. The puzzle pieces fit together a little too well.
“She broke me,” I cried. “She shoved romance and love into my world and told me to believe in them. Now look at me!”
“Yes, let’s look at you.” She stood back, holding me at arm’s length. “You are a beautiful, functioning college graduate. You can code faster than I think, and you have a successful future ahead of you. You have a family that loves you and will do anything to make sure you’re fed and safe.”
My lips trembled. “I didn’t get the Pinnable job.”
“Good.”
“Good?”
“Yes. That was too far away. You’d have been miserable. I selfishly just wanted to keep you close, too, but that wasn’t why I didn’t want you to get the job. You struggled with homesickness so much in college. You never wanted to be far away from us.”
“That’s true.” I sniffled. “You’re right.”
“It’s been quite a month. Your car is gone, so is your home and all the books you loved. That really sucks. You’ve lost what you thought was your dream job, and even after working at an impressive hourly wage, still have to pay down some debt. So you don’t have enough money to buy some reliable independence back. Am I still on the right track?”
“Yes.” Another tear trickled down my cheek. My voice cracked as I sucked in a deep breath. “I loved working for Mark. I loved Adventura. I want to go back. Bethie, what if I’ve messed everything up?”
“It’s not too late for love. Which is fortunate, because you’re in love with JJ Bailey.”
I scoffed.
She glared at me, one finger raised. “Hey! Don’t turn cynic on me now, Lizbeth. You didn’t grow up your entire life believing in love just to let it go the first time it tests you. Don’t you dare try to deny it. You love him, Lizbeth. You always have. That lovesick expression on your face has only gotten worse.”
She was right. Brutally right. For all my declarations of being a romantic, I’d given up on it the moment the darkness descended. And I did love him, which made this even worse.
“You’re right,” I mumbled. “I do love him.”
“Things have been tough for you lately, and I’m sorry that you’ve lost so much. But can you see it?” she asked. “Can you see how loved and blessed you are?”
It took the rest of my courage to meet her eyes. How hadn’t I seen it? How could I have been such a fool? I had so much that Mama had never had.
I nodded.
“Good.” She dropped her arms back to her side. “Now, get all the ugly out. Tell me the hard stuff with JJ.”
With a wobbly voice, I obeyed her command. From start to finish, we stood in the wreckage while I laid every moment out. All the time with JJ at Adventura. The small touches. His warm gaze. The sense of betrayal in his eyes when I tried unsuccessfully to explain why I wasn’t good for him. My fear of being like Mama. Of turning JJ into Dad.
And finally, I heard myself say it.
“I don’t want to end up alone, Bethie,” I whispered. Fat, hot tears dropped down my cheeks. “If I end up like Mama, I’ll be alone. I just want someone to love me. I just want to know they’ll always love me.” A sob broke through my words. “That’s what I’m most afraid of. That’s what Grace meant.”
Bethie wrapped me tight in her arms, so tight I couldn’t breathe, and I still tried to hold her tighter. Then I sobbed, venting all the ugly that had built up inside. She held me as I cried. Deep, cleansing sobs wrenched out from a painful place I didn’t know existed. The pain, so encompassing, shook my very core. I held onto Bethany for fear I’d drown. All the fear of being Mama. All the terror of never knowing love. All the years of fearing that I’d end up alone, unloved.
Just the way Mama had entered the world. The way she’d lived most of her life. And the way she’d left it. She’d died alone in her car after revealing her plan to leave her second husband for another man. That wasn’t real love.
Bethany’s strength didn’t falter. She held me through it all. At the end of my emotional venting, I pulled away. Her thumbs wiped the tears off my cheeks.
“Wow, Lizbeth,” she said softly. “You needed that.”
A pause swelled between us. I felt thickheaded, like too much emotion had come out of me at once and left an empty shell behind.
Tears shone in her eyes. “You will never be alone,” she whispered huskily. “You will never, ever be unloved. Not ever. So tell that frightened little girl inside you that she is safe, loved, and at home. There is nothing for her to fear again. You hear me? You. Are. Loved.”
I nodded and whispered, “I love you, too, Bethie.”
“Can we get something straight?” she asked, hands on my cheeks. I braced myself, because she’d switched to her sister-mama voice.
“Yes?”
“In an effort to keep from breaking JJ’s heart, you decided to never give the two of you a chance to see what amazingness you could be. You left just as he was starting to do exactly what you wanted. Just as you started to feel something real.”
Her explanation, stated so clearly, froze me.
“Oh no.”
“Yeah. Do you see it?”
“I did it.” I looked at her in horror. “I did just what Mama would have done. I ran away and broke his heart.”
“When you fear something so much, Lizbeth, you end up creating it. Can you see that you’re already bringing about your own destruction this way?”
The sobering reality hit like a slap.
“Yes,” I whispered.
“Mama did her best, imperfect as she was. Can you see it that way? Can you see her offering for what she meant it as? Desperate love. Wild love. Love she didn’t understand and had never experienced. When Mama gave you romance, she gave you the only gift she had—hope for a better life. She knew her best wasn’t good enough, that you’d need a place to hide. That’s why she gave you storybook love. She wanted better for you. If you hold onto your anger against her”—Bethany pressed her forehead to mine—“it’s going to destroy you.”
“What if I destroy others? What if I do to the people I love exactly what she’s done to us? I could never forgive myself.”<
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“You won’t.”
Tears obscured my view of her bright eyes when I pulled away. “How do you know that?”
“Because I know you, Lizbeth.” She tucked a piece of hair away from my face with a soulful, loving gaze. “You have advantages Mama never had, goodness Mama never had. You’re stronger than her. You’re willing to go through the dark times and come out the other side. She wasn’t. She didn’t have anyone. You do. Even if Mama did nothing else for us, she gave us each other, didn’t she?”
Bethany ran her hands through my hair with a warm, gentle smile. “Let her go, Lizbeth. Thank her for everything she gave you, then leave her in the past. Don’t let her break you from the grave the same way she broke herself in real life. Can you do that?”
I nodded, unable to form the words.
“Good. Because I know you can, too. And honestly?” She sighed, a weary hand rubbing her face. “Just these past few weeks with Shane have made me realize the burden Mama really did carry. Sometimes, I think it’s a miracle we’re alive.”
She glanced around one more time, then kissed my cheek and gave me one last hug. “Take your time here. You have lots of things to say goodbye to. Just remember that Ellie, Mav, Shane, and I are always home for you.”
With that, she disappeared. I sank to the floor, Mama’s paperwork still in my hand, and stared at the burned bookshelves. There was something oddly cathartic about the destruction. As I hiccuped and contemplated all those pages burning away, my thoughts turned decidedly less pessimistic.
When my thoughts turned to Mama, the darkness of her memory had ebbed slightly. In the midst of the wreckage, and with thoughts of JJ dancing in the back of my mind, I whispered, “Thank you, Mama. Thank you for giving me everything.”
Outside, the lonely wind whistled in response.
An hour of quiet contemplation later, I finally stood back up. My legs felt stiff and wobbly in the cold. Outside, the howl of the storm made my bones shudder. This was a blizzard, worse than the one weeks ago. My eyes burned from all the emotion, and my cheeks stung with tears.
The attic looked different, although nothing had changed. I couldn’t wait to get away. This wasn’t my home anymore.
Nothing waited for me here.
Despite my stiff limbs, I hurried down the spiral stairs and into Leslie’s truck. Snow fluttered everywhere, thick in the sky. It raced down my neck with an indecent tickle that set my teeth chattering. Cold air blasted into the interior of the cab as I cranked the heat all the way up. My thoughts were clear and crisp as a fresh day.
I was not Mama, nor would I ever be.
So I’d do what she never did: the hard thing.
Seconds later, I crept out of the parking lot and onto the main road. Wind tossed the snow with careless violence. It slammed into the truck. Ice shaped the roads into harsh white ribbons that disappeared in the storm. For two seconds, my tires skidded down Main Street. A flash of fear—and the swift memory of my car slamming to the rocks, of myself seconds away from death—caught me by surprise.
I gripped the steering wheel, grinding it in my hands as the truck came out of the skid.
JJ was worth it.
“Sweet baby pineapple,” I whispered and braced myself. No one else could save me from this thing I’d been avoiding. Storm or not, I was going to Adventura to let JJ know exactly how I felt.
Love gave me wings.
My knuckles squeezed the steering wheel so hard they blanched white. An all-too-familiar mantra repeated in my head: I won’t slide off the canyon road. I won’t plunge into the icy river below. I won’t die tonight. I won’t slide off the canyon road . . .
Thankfully, the canyon remained open, though other cars were few and far between. The snowplows had been out, but the falling storm had quickly replaced the snow. Packed ice escorted me past the steep mountain walls. The thought of JJ’s touch on my face carried me through the storm.
Finally, what felt like an eternity later, I let out a squeak of surprise. The turnoff to Adventura loomed to the right. Though tempted, I didn’t let my gaze drop to the frothing river below. It had claimed plenty of cars by now.
With a careful foot, I pumped the brakes to test the road, then slowed. My heart skipped a beat when the tires skidded, sliding to the left on their own. With a smooth motion, I counter-turned and lifted off the brakes. The movement slowed.
“I’ve got this,” I whispered.
Memories of impending doom slipped through my mind as I eased into the turn. A snowy, dark bridge awaited. The truck ambled onto it without a problem. A long breath later, I’d crossed the whole thing, finding packed ground on the far side.
Shiny coconuts, but that was scary.
This road hadn’t been plowed yet, and six inches had fallen in the last few hours. The truck barreled through it as I kept my attention on Adventura. The snowy conditions robbed my mind of the space to think, so I had no idea what I would say to JJ. There was so much to explain.
Instead, I focused on getting there.
The road wound deeper into the canyon crevice until a familiar building appeared in the snowfall. The truck crunched to a stop as I parked not far from the Zombie Mobile, which was buried under inches of snow.
For five minutes, I sat there and stared at Adventura. A mixture of relief and trepidation filled me. For courage, I thought of my favorite books. The power the women showed at the end. The bravery in the face of uncertainty.
I could do this. This was real. Terrifying. Utterly unknown. My makeup was gone, eyes reddened, face blotchy, hair a mess. I smelled like lasagna and probably looked like I’d been in a car wreck. There was positively, absolutely, not a thing romantic about this day or the way I looked.
But I’d never felt more certain. More giddy. More terrified.
I could do this.
“I got this,” I murmured. “I’m fine. This is fine. Everything is fine.”
Then I shoved the door open.
There was no sound as I waded through the fresh snow and up to the office door that I knew so well. My hand paused. Home waited inside. Warmth. Familiarity. Safety.
JJ.
Or maybe none of those things. This could flop, go utterly awry. He could tell me that he was never interested, that I had dreamed the whole thing up. That could happen.
And it would still be worth it.
I knocked.
Footfalls came to the door as my heart pounded, matching their rhythm. Then, all at once, it opened and JJ stared at me. He blinked once. Twice. Mark descended halfway down the ladder, stopped, saw my face, then slowly turned around and climbed back up with a goofy grin.
JJ opened the door wider. “Come in,” he said.
I licked my lips but stayed rooted to the spot. The words flew out of my mouth in the midst of snow and surprise.
“No. First, I just need to say something. I’m in love with you.”
JJ’s expression fell. I rushed into what I had to say, because there was no other way.
Love was, or it wasn’t.
“I’m the Queen of Romance, right? Read all the books. Watched all the movies. Absorbed all the possible scenarios. And I had it all wrong. I thought love was just the good stuff. The happiness. But love is that and so much more. It has a dark side. There are stretches of tough days, of heartbreak, of . . . routine. Those are the things that make the love so strong. So I was wrong. Romance and love don’t exist the way I thought they did. It’s different, but I think the real version is better.”
He leaned against the door. I felt the weight of his whole attention all the way in my soul. My fingers fidgeted with the end of my sleeve as I kept going.
“I really believe that romance and love can change the world. That it makes people and things better. It . . . it got me through a lot, and I’m grateful for it. Mama, she . . . made a lot of mistakes, but the hope of love and romance wasn’t one of them. I see that now. But I thought that if I let myself love you, I’d become like her and then I’d destroy
you and whatever happiness we found.”
His expression wrinkled, but he didn’t say anything. His silence allowed me to use up the rest of my courage and finish my very unrehearsed, anticlimactic speech with a little sniffle.
“I’ve loved you since the first moment I saw you walk into the Frolicking Moose. You have always been the hero in my dreams. In my books. Then you stepped into my life, and you were the hero there, too.” Tears filled my eyes. “But it wasn’t just saving me from going off the cliff with my car. That wasn’t the most romantic thing you did for me.”
“Then what was?” he asked quietly.
“Listening to me. Taking me to buy books. Putting your arms around me. Convincing Mark to hire me.”
His eyes widened, and I smiled.
“Yeah, I know that this whole thing was your idea,” I said. “Thanks to you, I see the truth now. You rearranged the way I look at the world until I feel almost like a new person. A better one. If that isn’t love, then I don’t know what love is.”
We stood there, cold air whipping into the house from behind me, for a long pause. How would he respond? Was he about to thank me and then say he didn’t feel the same way? Pressure built up in my chest until I thought I’d explode.
Finally, he reached out, grabbed my arm, and tugged me inside. His chest brushed against mine as he reached for the door and pulled it closed.
“C’mere,” he whispered, his fingers braiding into mine. His breath was a warm caress on my cheek. “I want to show you something.”
He led me through the office and out the back door. We sifted through the snow to my cabin. Although I couldn’t tell what was going on, JJ was clearly on a mission. He had a determined expression in his eyes, as if he’d finally decided something. When we stepped inside, he flipped the light on. Nothing had changed except for a dozen books lying on the bed, spaced out evenly. He shut the door behind us but didn’t let go of my hand.
“What is this?” I asked.
“There are twelve romance novels here.” He drew in a deep breath and grabbed the closest one. “Each a different subgenre of romance. Can’t believe there are that many, but that’s a topic for another day.”