Total pages in book: 196
Estimated words: 186555 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 933(@200wpm)___ 746(@250wpm)___ 622(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 186555 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 933(@200wpm)___ 746(@250wpm)___ 622(@300wpm)
“Hey,” he said. “Some days you pick up eagles like they’re chickens, and some days you run screaming away from innocent bats. I like you both ways, angel. All ways.”
A choke that was a mixture of pain and laughter exploded out of me, and I’d swear his arms got even tighter.
I couldn’t help but hug him tight right back. “I just… I really just wish… I hope she knows how much I love her. How much I wish she was here. But also, that if all these shitty things were supposed to happen… I’m glad they brought me here.” My fingers curled around his forearm. “I’m glad you’re here, Rhodes. I’m so glad you’re in my life. Thank you for being so good to me.”
His hand stroked my hair, and his pulse beat under my cheek, and I could barely hear him as he said, “Any time you need me, I’m here. Right here.”
I clung to him and lowered my voice, “Don’t tell Yuki, but you’re my best best friend now.”
His throat bobbed against me, and I didn’t imagine how hoarse his voice came out as he said, “You’re my best best friend too, sweetheart.” His next swallow was just as harsh, his voice even more rough, but his words were the softest, most genuine thing I’d ever heard. “I really missed hearing you talk, you know that?”
And it was then, with my face against his throat, his body warm beneath and around mine that I told him about some of my fondest memories of my mom. Of how beautiful she was. Of how funny she could be. Of how she hadn’t been scared of anything, or at least it had seemed that way to me.
I talked and I talked and I talked, and he listened and listened and listened.
And I cried a little more, but it was okay.
Because he had to be right. Grief was the final way we had to tell our loved ones that they’d impacted our lives. That we missed them so, so much. And there was nothing wrong with me mourning my mom for the rest of mine, even as I carried her love and her life in my heart. I had to live, but I could also remember along the way.
The people we lose take a part of us with them… but they leave a part of themselves with us too.
* * *
In the days that followed, with my grief still curling around my heart but with a knowledge and strength that I’d pulled from the bottom of my soul, I tried my best to keep my chin up. Even if it wasn’t easy. But every time I started to feel that drag pulling me down to a place I’d been at before, I tried to remind myself I was my mother’s daughter.
Maybe I was a little cursed, but it could be worse. In some ways, I was one of the lucky ones. And I tried not to let myself forget it.
The people I cared about and loved didn’t let me forget it either, and I was pretty sure that’s what helped me the most.
When the time came, I had my mom’s remains cremated and spent a lot of time thinking about what to do with them. I wanted to do something to really honor her spirit.
And that came in two forms.
The idea to turn her ashes into a living tree had been Amos’s idea. He’d come up to me one day and slid a printout of a biodegradable urn across the table and headed back into his room as quietly as he’d left it. And it had felt right. My mom would have loved being a tree, and when I’d told Rhodes about it, he’d agreed we could easily find somewhere to plant her. We made plans to pick somewhere during the summer and do it.
The second idea had come from Yuki the very next day. She found a company that would send a family member’s ashes into space. And I knew without a doubt that my fearless mom would have absolutely loved it. I figured my blood money couldn’t have been spent any better than on that. I could even go see the launch.
My heart and my soul ached, but there couldn’t have been two more perfect ways to say goodbye to my mom’s physical body.
So I hadn’t been expecting to get home from work one day to find a bunch of cars parked in front of the main house. At least seven of them, and other than Rhodes’s, I only recognized Clara and Johnny’s. She had left early and let me close, claiming she had to do something with her dad. I’d taken off almost two weeks of work after finding out about my mom and would have managed the shop by myself all day every day, I’d felt so guilty for leaving her with that kind of load. I hadn’t thought twice about it.