33. Hannah

THIRTY-THREE

The hired car slows to a stop in front of my house.

"Here we are, ma'am." The driver makes to unbuckle himself like he's going to come around and open my door.

"Please, don't get out of the car." I undo my seat belt and start to open my purse to give him a tip.

He holds up a hand. "No need for extras. Mr. Lovelace took care of it."

Of course he did.

Of course he's a generous tipper.

Of course everyone fucking loves him.

I give the driver a tight smile and climb out.

My feet throb with every step, but the pain has nothing on the ache between my thighs.

Or the one in my chest.

After what happened in my office, I got off on a random floor on my way down to the lobby. I didn't allow myself to break down because there wasn't time for that, but I did clean myself up as best I could.

The inside of my nose starts to tingle as I climb the steps to my house.

Not. Yet.

Not yet. Not yet. Not yet.

Putting a blank expression on my face, I open the front door.

Mom and Chelsea are in the living room, with an open pizza box on the coffee table.

"She's home!" Mom calls, like I've been gone for days, not just the day.

"How was the party?" Chelsea asks, looking away from the TV screen.

"Fun," I reply, then make a show of prying my shoes off. "But remind me never to wear these again."

"I'll take them."

Mom snorts at Chelsea's excitement. "Pretty sure it'll be three years before your feet are big enough to wear Hannah's shoes."

"That's about how long it'll be before I'm willing to wear them again." I wiggle my toes and sigh.

"The price of conventional beauty standards is often pain." Mom repeats a phrase we've all heard before. She's not wrong. "Did you eat? There are a few slices of Hawaiian left."

I place my hand on my stomach. "The food at the party was actually pretty good, and I ate plenty. I'm gonna go take a shower and give the toes a little pampering, then I'll come back out and veg with you guys."

"Sounds like a good plan." Mom lifts her mug, which I know is filled with peppermint tea.

I head down my little hallway and into my bedroom to grab my comfiest pair of sweatpants and my softest T-shirt. Then I cross the hall to my bathroom.

I don't let myself think about Maddox as I strip.

I don't let myself think about what we did as I pull back the shower curtain.

I don't let myself remember how eager I was, how much I wanted to please him, as I turn the water on.

I don't let myself think about how good he felt as I open the music app on my phone and select my shower playlist.

But when I set my phone on the edge of the sink and step into the shower, and the noise of music and running water fills the room, then I remember.

Lowering myself to sit in the tub, I remember the way Maddox called me his Little Bunny.

I remember the way heat filled my belly when he called me his good girl.

I remember the feeling of his hand on my throat. The control he took. The relief I felt giving it to him.

I remember wanting to let the past go. Wanting to take what he was offering.

But then I remember what he said.

It's the least you owe me.

I remember the way I felt hollow as soon as he said that.

I remember how the stickiness between my thighs suddenly felt dirty.

I remember feeling cold.

And that's when the tears start.

They mix with the streams of water running over my body, disappearing as soon as they fall.

Maddox was so intense, the way he touched me, the way he commanded me.

And he was just as serious when he said that. The heat of desire was gone, and he was left staring at me like I was the one who'd wronged him.

I press the heels of my palms into my eyes and try to rub the vision of him from my brain.

But it doesn't work. And it doesn't stop the tears.

Tears of frustration. Tears of anger. Tears of self-pity.

It wasn't my fault my mom had a stroke.

It wasn't my fault we couldn't afford to live if someone wasn't running the shop.

Wasn't my fault life is so disgustingly unfair.

A hiccuped sob gets locked in my lungs.

It wasn't my fault he never fucking called.

Owe me.

I never really expected him to show up one day and save me.

Never truly thought he would.

But it didn't stop me from dreaming, from hoping for a different outcome.

For a happily ever after. For some light in the dark.

For someone to choose me.

I tip my head down.

I hoped for something that would never happen.

And now, all these years later, I can admit that after we kissed, after that day when he hugged me in the middle of the street… I hoped all over again.

I believed in something that didn't deserve to be believed in.

But this time, there's no one to blame but myself.

And it makes me so goddamn angry.

Opening my mouth, I let out the most forceful silent scream I can manage.

I ball my hands into fists, and I lean into it.

I suck in another full breath and let it out again.

I pretend he's in front of me, and I pretend I'm screaming loud enough to shatter the windows around us.

I pretend I have a different past.

I pretend I never met Maddox.

Picturing it, a week at HOP U, having never met Maddox, the pressure inside me finally pops, and I sag forward.

Another tear gets washed away down the drain as a thin layer of sadness settles over my jagged pieces, dulling the pain. Because I don't want that either. I don't want to lose those good memories.

I just need to find a way to keep those memories in the past. Because in the present, there's no more thinking about Maddox Lovelace.

No more hoping for translucent dreams.

No more thinking with my vagina.

No more.

Reaching down, I massage my feet before I finally get up and finish my shower.

With towel-dried hair, I enter the living room.

Chelsea has a movie up on the screen, ready to play.

Mom is in her chair, and Chelsea is sprawled across the couch, so I take my usual spot in the creaky leather chair that's so old it looks like it came from the side of the road but is actually perfectly molded to my butt.

The movie starts, and I prop my feet up on the footrest.

We don't watch movies together every weekend, but we do it often enough that I've used it as an excuse not to date.

I look over at my niece.

The older she gets, the more she looks like her mom. And the more I'm reminded just how fragile life is.

How fragile everything is.

And it's the perfect reminder of why I can't get caught up in Maddox and lose my job.

Silently, I take a long, slow breath.

If I really think about it, taking emotions out of the equation, it doesn't matter that Maddox never called. It never would have worked anyway.

I couldn't go back to HOP U. I had to work full time— more than full time— at Petals. And even if he wanted to try a long-distance relationship, we never would've seen each other. Between his football schedule and my working and taking care of Mom, there was no time.

And then Maddox moved across the country and became a professional football player, becoming more and more famous as each year passed.

My heart squeezes.

And while he was doing that, my life changed again. Because my cousin passed away, and then Chelsea came to live with us.

I was twenty-five, supporting my mom, and suddenly, we had custody of a child.

It was ten years ago, but I still remember that day like it just happened. The call that Chelsea's mom had passed away unexpectedly. And the news that she left her two-year-old daughter in our care, guardianship split between me and my mom.

My cousin was smart doing it that way. My mom wasn't in a position to take full-time care of a toddler. And neither was I.

I cried so much that first week.

Feeling anguish over losing the cousin I loved. Feeling terror over being in charge of a child's life. Feeling selfish for not wanting the responsibility. Feeling the crushing weight of knowing I had no choice, and that I wouldn't want it any other way.

Chelsea was too young to remember her mother, but we made sure to tell her stories and show her pictures as she grew up. I was always Aunt Hannah, and Mom was always Grandma to her.

And so, for the past decade, it's been us. The rest of the family is gone, either from old age or from freak illness or accidents.

The family curse.

A sad smile pulls across my lips.

Chelsea started calling it that. And sometimes it does feel like a curse. Like we're doomed to only have one another.

But that's more than some people have. And I'd choose these two over anyone else.

"What are you thinking about?" Chelsea's question has me raising my eyes.

"Hmm?"

"You're smiling weird."

"Oh, just thinking about… popcorn." I lie, not wanting to tell her I'm thinking about the curse.

"Sure." She rolls her eyes.

"I'd take some popcorn," Mom chimes in, lifting her eyes to the clock on the wall. "And it's my birthday in two hours, so I feel like someone else should make it."

Chelsea quickly puts her finger to her nose, the universal sign for not it.

Making a scene of sighing loudly, I push out of my chair and head to the kitchen.

While the bag expands with popping noises in the microwave, I open the laptop I left on the counter and click through the tabs that I still have open, checking the status of each job application I submitted this week.