“But you might lose it all.”
Her chest tensed afresh at the thought.She might just lose it all, and the overwhelm of that combined with all her other pressures had been enough to make her snap and huddle in bed these last two days, trying to escape it all.Trying to pretend it wasn’t real.Trying to sleep and dream of being a Disney princess who could sleep for a thousand years and wake up and discover everything was magically wonderful.Trying to avoid all her worries and stresses and questions about her career and finances and Kyle and Bella and God and her future and Mom and money and all these bills she still had to somehow pay.
Until Kyle had shown up.
She leaned her forehead against the shower tiles and tried to stir up fresh anger, but maybe she had already used up too much energy and anger because she had none now.Instead, she could only feel the slightest mite of gratitude that he had bothered to come and force her to live again.
She took her time rinsing then toweling dry her hair, before using the hair dryer.She rarely blow-dried her hair but she needed to feel as strong as possible before facing him again.And if he was going to insist on cleaning then she wouldn’t stop him.She barely had energy enough to hold up the hair dryer, let alone give the house the clean it desperately needed.She wondered what he’d do if she didn’t come out, whether he’d insist on barging in here, too.
Eventually, though, she knew she would have to go and face the music, so she got changed then did some light makeup—not to make it look like she tried, just so she didn’t look so tired—and finally unlatched the bathroom door and exited to the hall.
Her heart caught at her bedroom.The bed linen had been stripped and replaced, and the pile of bills she’d been too stressed over to deal with had been cleared away.Oh, she hoped it didn’t mean he—
She hurried to the living area, found it had been straightened, too.
“Mommy!”Bella rushed over, wrapped her arms around Gen, nearly toppling her over in the process.
Kyle looked up from where he sat at the dining table.She ducked her head.She couldn’t look at him.
“Bella, honey, are you responsible for cleaning all this up?”
She nodded.“Me and Kyle.Well, he did most of it, and I helped.We had a race to see how much we could get done, and we did a lot, didn’t we?”
“You did amazingly well.Thank you.”She kissed her head.Peeked up.“Thanks,” she muttered to Kyle.
“You’re welcome.”
Bella squeezed tighter.“You smell better now.”
Kyle coughed, and she glared at him, catching him smoothing away a smile.
Then she realized what he was doing.“Excuse me, Bella.”She stomped over to where he had the envelopes open and from what it looked like, with his phone open, was paying the bills.
She snatched them away.“Don’t you know it’s a crime to look at somebody else’s mail?”
“Hey, they were open, lying on the floor in a huge pile.I didn’t think you cared.”
“Well, I do.”She held them to her chest.“What do you think you are doing?”
“Paying for things I would’ve done if I’d known I had a daughter.”
He’d said it evenly, with no heat, but she felt the sting all the same.
“I don’t want you to,” she insisted.
“Well, that’s a shame.At the risk of incurring more Wrath of Gen, I’ve already sorted out your electricity and rent for the year.”
“What?”How dare he?“Why?”
“Because I haven’t had the opportunity to do this for the past ten years, that’s why.If we’d been a family I would have been paying the bills, but I haven’t, so this is my way of trying to make up for things.”
“But you don’t have to.I didn’t tell you.That makes it my fault, my responsibility.”
He pointed to Bella.“And she is my child, and my responsibility.”His face, his voice softened.“Let me pay it, Gen.Let me help you.”
She shook her head as years of her mother’s lectures rolled through her head.We Rivas women don’t need help.If we say yes to help now then we’re always in someone else’s debt.The only reason they had accepted Gen’s scholarships was because there had literally been no other way she would be able to study medicine.But even that had a catch, the mentoring she was obliged to do as part of her “giving back.”Which was why being barred from it as part of a suspension from practicing medicine for two weeks had cut her to the core.She wasn’t meeting her obligations.She’d failed on this front too.
“Gen.”
