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Amber closed the back of her jeep. “Pretty much. You’ll see.”
* * *
Amber poked her head into the spare room, which had now become my room. “Can I help you with anything?”
“I’m good, thanks. You’ve already done so much.”
She walked over and sat on the queen-sized bed. “What are friends for?”
Friends.That’s what Holden had said we’d always be, and he’d truly gone out of his way to prove it. Right up until the end, when he pretty much stated that’s all it wouldeverbe.
A familiar dull ache returned to tighten its grip around my heart.
“If you ever want to talk about what happened back home, I’m all ears. You were pretty vague, and only said you needed a fresh start.”
I owed her that much after all she’d done for me.
“Well…”
Slowly, I unzipped the larger suitcase and placed a few things into the nearby dresser as I tried to find the best words to use. None came to mind. It was spill it or seal it shut.
“Brock cheated on me.”
Amber’s face fell and her shoulders rolled inward. “Some men aren’t worth the air they breathe. They’re filthy, disgusting pigs.”
I snorted because it was true. Some men were. “But that’s not the worst of it. My so-called friends,” and I air-quoted the word friends, “every single one of them knew what he was doing, and no one bothered to tell me. When the truth surfaced, they figured I already knew and didn’t care, or they didn’t know how to tell me. Some friends, right?”
I stood at the foot of my bed, holding a small stack of sweaters.
Amber rose and grabbed a few hangers, passing one to me. “Damn, that really sucks. Weren’t you living with him, too?”
“I was, and then I moved back into my car. Homeless again. But it only worked for a little while until I snapped at work and lost my job.” I placed a hanger through the neck of my favourite sweater. It had been a great find at the thrift store.
“Jesus. Homeless and jobless? I didn’t know it was so bad. I’m so sorry.”
I shrugged, the bitter memories of that week flashing back. So raw and so new… and yet, somehow it seemed like a lifetime ago.
“Then it happened, the catalyst of life change, as the hospital psychiatrist mentioned. I downed a bottle of Fireball, drove around, and crashed my car into a tree in the ditch.” I was beyond grateful to not have injured anyone else in my stupidity. “Maybe in hindsight, it was a suicide attempt, I can’t recall as I really wasn’t in the right state of mind. But the shattered glass on my lap helped it to become one – the easiest way to end the misery of being friendless, jobless, and homeless. I slashed my wrists real good.” I pulled up the sleeve for a little show and tell. “But I passed out before I could finish the job properly.”
Amber covered her mouth. “Oh, Iris.”
I put another hanger through a sweater and hung it in the closet. A numbness vined its way around my heart. “I spent four days in the hospital, but it gave me time to think.”
There wasn’t anything else to do. I wasn’t entertaining company as I had no visitors, and I was in a private room with no other roommates and a television that only picked up the free channels. Thinking was the only thing Icoulddo.
“That’s when you reached out to me.”
One week ago.
“I took it as a sign. A chance to start fresh. Where no one knows what an utter, unlovable failure I am, until now.” The numbness washed away and, in its wake, left my heart slashed wide open; I was no longer in control of my feelings. Tears burst forth, like a damn breaking. Even saying it was like a knife chopping up the remnants of my heart.
Amber tore the clothes from my hand and wrapped me in the biggest hug I’ve ever had. “You are not a failure, and you are loved. I love you, and trust me, I wouldn’t have offered my place if I didn’t. My friends, who don’t even know you, love you already.”
“How’s that even possible?”
“Because they’re the kind of people who are good right to their core, and kindness radiates out of them like sunlight through the clouds.” She wiped away my tears. “Lily especially. She has a checkered past, and she came here to start fresh, much like you. She found her people here, and I trust you will too. Back in Toronto, those weren’t your people, because true friends would never have treated you the way they did. Never. And Brock? I have half a mind to fly there and kick his sorry ass until he’s black and blue and begging for mercy.”
I laughed as the hot river of loneliness streamed down my cheeks. I couldn’t imagine my tiny friend kicking Brock’s ass. He was a hulking tower of a man.
