There were no home-cooked meals. Instead, it was eating beans cold from a can. Sitting around the table was replaced withmy parents and their friends passed out on top of it, face down in a pile of powder.
It was days of feeling unwanted and unworthy when I was around other kids at school who had parents who dropped them off with a kiss on the cheek. It was feeling unsafe and confused when I got home at night to strange people in our house; loud and leering. Not understanding why my parents didn’t care more about me. Did they even like me? Every time my hope would die almost to the point of no return, my mother would have one of those moments where she decided she wanted to get clean again. It would last a few months, enough for me to forget the bad times, long enough to string me along for a different future, hanging my dreams on the end of a hook, only for the cycle to snatch her back again.
For so long, the only family I’ve ever known is the one I made with Aurora.
***
I accept another dish from Chev, drying it with a tea towel before placing it on the bench. We watch in silence through the kitchen window overlooking the backyard where Chris, Westley, and Aurora stand beside the shed. Westley is inspecting a set of shelves.
“How long have you and Chris been together?” I ask.
“Feels like a lifetime.” Chev wears a gentle smile as she stares out the window. “We dated in high school. He was my first love. But life decided we weren’t ready for each other at that time. We stayed friends, dated other people. In fact, I was engaged to someone else.”
“Really?” I accept the washed mug she offers me. “And your engagement fell through?”
“I called it off,” Chev says. “It was about five years after Chris and I had split. I was planning my wedding, meeting withpotential photographers, and Chris had just started working with the business I wanted to use.”
I turn, leaning my back against the bench, giving her my full attention.
“We got to talking and—” She stops, a dreamy sigh pushing from her lips. “The chemistry was still so undeniable between us. He was nothing like the man I was going to marry, who was very dutiful and sensible. Christopher was fun and sweet. He had a wonderful way of making me laugh. I realised that’s what I wanted for the rest of my life—laughter. ”
“So how did you break it off with the other guy?”
“I was honest with him. Told him I cared for him, but I couldn’t deny that my heart belonged to another, and in all the years that had passed, I didn’t think it had ever stopped.”
I’ve never been a person to find myself swept up in love, but I think my heart may be swooning hearing the way Chev talks about her husband. “Sounds like you were meant to be all along.”
“Yep. Just had to wait for the stars to align.”
Her words make my pulse stutter. “The stars?”
“The stars being Chris and me. It’s like when anything in life goes right, all the right people are in the right place, wanting the same things at the same time… It all feels so right that there’s no way it wasn’t meant to be.”
It sounds so simple when she puts it like that. So easy and obvious. That perfect picture she creates in my head. And all my mind does is float straight back to Westley.
“He’s good with her,” Chev says, drying her hands over her apron.
My thoughts scatter as I rejoin the present and follow where Chev watches. Aurora laughs up at West, head thrown back while he grins at her, locking an arm around her shoulder. She leans into him, so slightly, but enough that I can see it from here.
“He’s really good to us. My daughter is definitely a little smitten.”
“And you?”
I look her straight in the eyes when I spill the truth that’s been growing over the last few months. “I think he’s becoming someone I could want for the rest of my life.” I chew on my lip as I look back out the window. “I’ve never had that kind of feeling before, or let someone in like this.”
“You never know what you’re looking for until you open your eyes to all the possibilities.” She lays a hand against my cheek. “Be brave, darling girl.”
If you want something, chase it.
If you want better, change the stars.
To be found…stop hiding.
37
TRICKSTER:
I’m on my way over with Aurora. Please say yes…
