Total pages in book: 73
Estimated words: 71768 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 287(@250wpm)___ 239(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71768 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 287(@250wpm)___ 239(@300wpm)
God, I’d lived such a carefully constructed life, and what had that gotten me? Misery. Math equations. And Banks, no offense to Banks.
Colby hadn’t destroyed me.
She’d freed me.
I wanted to say it.
Say the three words. But over text? Was that lame? Why was I always overthinking things with the one person who probably wouldn’t care if I said it via email?
I saw a few dots pop up and then get deleted on her end, only to have her finally just send a heart emoji, which nearly made mine stop.
I put my phone down and wiped my hands down my face. I had too many feelings and wanted to express them, but I wasn’t free like her, I wasn’t like her at all, so instead I just fixated on them.
What would Monica have said?
I laughed when I realized she’d probably smack me as per usual, then call me an idiot and walk off.
“Pretty accurate,” I said to myself as I popped on my laptop really quickly and ordered Colby roses.
I might do things differently, but flowers always said I’m thinking of you, and she deserved to know that she occupied my thoughts, not just a few, but all of them, and I never wanted that to change again.
TWENTY-FIVE
Rip
I checked my watch again and then looked out the window. Colby still wasn’t home with Ben. Things had been going so much better lately—hell, who was I kidding? Things had gone from a nightmare to perfection, making me wonder why I had been so hard on her to begin with. I’d let my own fears get the best of me, with her, with us, with everything.
Having a family was fucking terrifying, like giving up your heart every day and watching it walk out the door without protection. Add a girl you loved on top of two kids and I suddenly realized why so many parents were a hot mess. Warmth spread throughout my chest as I looked at Colby’s shoes by the door.
Pink Nikes that used to drive me insane now made me smile and wonder why I was such a prick before. I mean, I knew why I had been a prick, it was to keep the one person whom I knew I wanted, who would challenge me and scare me. Out.
It was easier, wasn’t it?
To walk through a carefully planned life where I didn’t have to worry about serious relationships, love, things that could be taken away from me just like my parents had been, just like Brooks and Monica.
With a sigh I walked by the family picture of Monica, Brooks, and the kids.
It was the first time I was able to really look at the photo without getting angry, without feeling sorry for myself, without asking the universe why.
I could have sworn in that moment, as my sister smiled down at me, that she’d known. She had actually known that one day I’d be standing there staring at her photo and saying thank you.
Thank you for Colby.
Thank you for the kids.
Thank you for giving me the family I’ve always wanted but never dreamed I would have. And certainly never wanted to get this way.
I missed my sister and Brooks so much, but I wanted to believe they were watching over us. I wanted to believe what Colby told the kids. I wanted to believe that Monica and Brooks were looking down on us, wishing us well, thanking us.
I turned and eyed the picture that Viera had drawn, with her parents as angels.
I wanted to believe that there was more after death, that there was life, there was hope.
And that they watched us with annoyance as we stumbled around this darkness, this new life, and went, Get it together, guys.
“When you see a butterfly, think of me,” Monica said with tears in her eyes on her wedding day, referencing our little agreement from when we were kids. “Butterflies mean that the world is shifting, by a simple flap of their wings they create ripples in the universe.” She turned to me, her smile wide. “I’m not saying that anything will ever happen to me, but you need to know—I will always be by your side, ride or die, your little sister, forever. Regardless of my marriage or what happens in my future, know that I’m with you. It’s us against the world. And if you ever doubt it, I’m manifesting this right now.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “You’ll know because you’ll see a blue butterfly, all right?”
“Do I still get to be yellow?” I asked.
She laughed. “You remember.”
“Always,” I said. “How could I forget?”
She held out her pinkie to me. “So it’s still a deal?”
“It’s still a deal, baby sis.”
I snorted because how ridiculous and whimsical could she still be? But also, I wanted in that moment to think that maybe there was hope, maybe our parents were looking down on us, maybe there was an afterlife where things were perfect. Where they weren’t hard or sad.