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“How…”
“Babe,” I cut her off, shaking my head. “I might not be fucking in touch with my inner child or have my Qi aligned or whatever the fuck other shit Coach spouts off about, but I’m not fucking blind. You’ve been beaming since you started those classes. Figure that when someone finds something that makes them that happy, they are going to try to find a way to turn that passion into a job.”
“Well, way to blow my news,” she said, making fake angry eyes at me as she fetched her notebook and came to the bed, sitting crois-cross, but with a serious face. “But yes. That’s actually totally what I was thinking. And it might seem absolutely batshit of me, but I was thinking of maybe renting out the—“
“Building where you were attacked,” I said, nodding.
“Did you read my notebook?” she asked, eyeing me suspiciously.
“No, babe. I just know you,” I reminded her.
This character arc of hers, from traumatized and terrified to go anywhere alone, to strong and fierce and skilled, had been kind of mesmerizing to watch.
I’d enjoyed watching her growth, seeing her find her passion, and, yeah, the endorphins she got from working out made her come home and want to fuck for hours. So I wasn’t exactly bitching about that either.
“Do you think it’s batshit?” she asked.
“Yeah. But in a good way,” I said, shrugging. “That place needs work, but I think it’s structurally sound.”
“I’ve been crunching the numbers,” she said, flipping through her pages.
“Fuck the numbers,” I said, putting my hand over hers to stop the flipping. “It doesn’t matter what it costs.”
“Except, you know, that it totally does matter,” she said, rolling her eyes at me. “You grew up poor like I did. You know the money matters.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “But once you get to a certain level of stability, it doesn’t matter as much anymore.”
“Yeah, but that’s your—“ she started.
“I’m gonna stop you right there. You’re with me, right?” I asked.
“Right,” she said.
“You plan on staying with me?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Then it’s your money too.”
“That’s not how it—“
“It is,” I cut her off. “Look, I get it, babe. You’ve only ever had yourself to rely on. And your independence is hot. But it’s not necessary anymore. What did Coach call it…” I said, trailing off, trying to think of the word.
“He said that hyper-independence is a trauma response,” she said.
“Exactly. You don’t need that trauma response anymore. We have the money. Use however much of it you need to build a business.”
“You make it sound so easy.”
“It won’t be,” I said, shrugging. “Renovating is a fucking nightmare,” I said, waving a hand around the warehouse, saying I knew from experience. “And there’s jackshit I can do to make that part easier. But the money? The money is easy.”
She was silent for a moment, then flipped through more of her notebook pages.
“So what you’re saying is that this five-year plan to replace the money that I spentweeksworking on was—“
“A complete fucking waste of time?” I asked. “Yeah, pretty much.”
“Do you have any idea how much I hate math?” she asked, shooting me small eyes.
