“Yeah, he texted me a little while ago. He’s on a quick house call for one of his patients and then he’ll be here.”
My friend slides her arms into her coat. “Richard sounds like a good one.”
I nod, unable to find the strength to take off my own jacket.
A hand curls over my shoulder. “You okay?”
My eyes won’t leave Mom.It’s okay to not be okay.
“I did it.” The words are barely there. Maybe I said them, maybe I didn’t.
“Did what?” She closes the gap between us when I don’t answer. “Hannah?”
I meet her gaze, wobbly but honest. “I reported it.”
Her face falls into a knowing frown for one…two…three beats before she yanks me forward, clutching me tight in a hug.
“You wanna talk about it?”
I shake my head and shift back, glance at my sleeping mother. “I just want my mom.”
“Of course. I’ll leave you two alone.”
The door opens behind me and I spin around. “Kris?” Her brows lift. “I promise I’ll talk about it with you soon.”
“Oh, Hannah, if you don’t want to?—”
“I do though. I wanna tell you what happened and I will. Soon.”
A single nod. “Love you.”
“Love you too.”
After Kristen leaves, the house goes quiet.Still.My gaze pans the room.
Where Mom’s bed is now, there’s a patch of damaged woodunderneath where Maddy and I spilled a bottle of nail polish remover when we were twelve. We panicked and tried to hide it by pulling the living room rug and everything on it back a few feet thinking my mom wouldn’t notice. When she discovered what we’d done, which was instantly, she wasn’t even mad.“Accidents give a home its character,”she’d said right before she helped us move everything back to its original spot.
Pencil hashes marking my height over the years line the archway to the main hall.
The sharp corner of the kitchen peninsula still has the foam pad Mom duct taped into place when I was five. I kept bumping my head on it when I’d barrel into the kitchen like a, as Mom used to say,“bat outta hell.”If you asked her why she never removed the protective barrier after I outgrew the countertops she’d tell you it was because looking at it reminded her how quickly time passed.
And she never wanted to forget how fleeting time was.
God, I don’t want to forget anything. I want to remember it all.
I trudge to the bed, kick off my boots, and toss my coat over the footboard. The wood squeaks as I climb to the middle of the mattress and burrow up next to Mom.
Her eyes are closed, chest rising slightly every several seconds. I tuck my hand under hers, weaving our fingers together.
“Hi, Mom.” No response. “I did something tonight, and I really wanna tell you about it. Everything I’ve read says you can probably still hear me so…” I watch her face, looking for a sign—an eyelid flutter, a wince, anything. But nothing.
I take a breath and start at the beginning. Not Daniel.Rowan.Until now, I’ve gotten by with the bullet points. But time is running out and I want my mother to know everything.
The parts she already knows and the parts I’ve left out, I tell her our love story. I even tell hersomeof the sexy bits because, well, this is Lydia James we’re talking to after all.
And I tell her what Daniel did. About the blind date, the parking lot. About how I fought him off, screamed and screamed before help arrived. About how Rowan saved me that night in more ways than one.
And the grocery store where I ran into him again. How I panicked but Rowan was there and he was so patient with me.