Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 99723 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 499(@200wpm)___ 399(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99723 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 499(@200wpm)___ 399(@250wpm)___ 332(@300wpm)
“That’s terrifying,” I admit. I’m not sure which is worse, the idea of having a casual fling with Dominic and then going back to my humdrum life when he moves on, or letting myself take that big leap and falling into a void of nothingness when he’s gone. On the other hand, I could just . . . not. Stay alone, keep my heart protected, and stay steady for Harley. That definitely sounds like the safer option and I like safe. It settles my scarred soul.
“You think this is what I thought my life would end up like?” Shaking her head, Trina says, “No way. Hell no. I thought I’d end up dead before twenty-five, and there was a better than fifty-fifty chance that’s exactly how it was gonna play out. But look at me now. My son is about to be twenty-five years old himself, and that’s some wild shit. Comparatively, this thing with you and Dominic seems pretty normal. Pretty girl, hot guy, meet at a bar and end up falling in love. There’s like a million songs about it.”
She makes it sound reasonable. She makes it sound possible. She makes this little hope inside my heart start to glow a bit brighter.
“You really don’t think this is crazy?”
“I think you’d be crazy if you let this opportunity pass you by,” she sasses. More earnestly, she says, “Don’t let the life you had or the one you have keep you from discovering a completely new and unexpected one that might be everything you’ve ever dreamed of. I could’ve stayed stuck in my addiction and been six feet under years ago. I could’ve told Frank no when he asked me for a cigarette, and I’d still be working at that gas station. But I risked it all . . . on me, on him, and on us. And look at me now.” Her smile is bracketed by lines that show the hard life she lived in her younger days as well as the easy one she’s enjoyed since then.
“You do look great,” I tell her honestly. “Happy, which is what matters.”
“Exactly.” She peers at me like she’s reading my mind. “What else is holding you back? Hit me with it.” She waves her hand in a gimme motion.
“I’m scared.” The confession is ripped from my soul, a weakness I’d rather not have at all, but definitely don’t want to admit.
“Of what?”
“Everything.” I sigh. “Myself, him, Tyler. All of it. Of getting my heart broken again.”
Trina presses her lips together, disappointment written in the smoker’s lines around her mouth. “You survived,” she says. Then she repeats it. “You survived.”
I shake my head because she makes it sound like I went through something awful with Tyler, and while yes, he messed up my head, it wasn’t that bad. It could’ve been worse. I’ve always been thankful it wasn’t because getting out of the crap he put me through was hard enough.
“You didn’t deserve any of Tyler’s bullshittery, but you survived,” she says again, not letting me step away from that. “And since then, you’ve done well for yourself, living in the ‘after’ of everything, the pocket of time where you shut down, protect yourself, and try to process what you’ve been through.” She dips down, forcing me to meet her eyes. “It’s time to leave that mental fortress, babe. It’s time to live. Not in the after, just in your life. Taking a chance on Dominic is gonna bring up all that hurt, like bubbles in your belly that make you feel like it’s all happening again even though it’s not. You’ve got to push past that fear. Your life is on the other side of the reflexive panic. Maybe with Dominic, maybe with someone else, maybe just on your own, but the risk is worth it. For your own growth.”
I stare at the lettuce in my hands, letting her words soak into my brain. I don’t know if I’m strong enough to listen to her, much less to actually do what she’s suggesting. Finally I ask, “How’d you get to be so smart?”
She huffs out a humorless laugh. “Therapy. Loads of it in rehab. It was actually really helpful then, and sometimes, it comes back to me when I need it.”
Trina is quiet, letting me process, waiting to see what other roadblocks I can come up with to stop what’s inevitable. Because the truth is, I do want to try with Dominic. As fear-filled as I am, I think I’m at a point to at least one pinkie-toe, baby step try.
“You’re right. I’m gonna go for it. I’m gonna do it.” I’m not sure who said that, but given the way Trina is staring open-mouthed at me, I think it was . . . me?
“Do him, you mean,” she teases, instantly lightening the mood from the heaviness of our conversation so I don’t fall back into the abyss that’s always there, ready to take me into the dark.