Page 133 of This Could Be Us

My heart is not split in two. My heart is whole. When I’m with Jason, he has all of it. When I’m with Bray, he accepts nothing less than everything, so as much as I want him, our time has passed. He cannot come around anymore because his eyes betray him, and he is the kind of man who makes you burn your life to the ground. I won’t do that to Jason, and I won’t do that to my daughters and I won’t do that to myself. Not even for him, the one who tutored my soul in passion.

I never thought I would forgive Bray for cheating on me, and there is a part of me that maybe never will. We were too young for all that emotion. It was like wrapping yourself around dynamite, reckless and exhilarating. We exploded, hurting everyone in our blast zone.

Lola is so much like him. Her heart is big and her spirit is free. Maybe that’s why we clash. It crushed me to see her leave, but she is with Mami. It is best for now.

There are so many ways to break a woman’s heart. Her children. Her lover. Her body when it betrays her. Life is clever that way, devising plans for our demise from the moment we’re born. Death by a million heartbreaks, a thousand regrets, a hundred goodbyes.

When I dropped Lola off on the island, Mami asked who my one true love was. I knew what she meant. Was it Jason or was it Bray? I told her I am the love of my life. I have learned to love myself without judgment or condition. It’s the only way I have enough love for everyone who needs it—to love myself. No one can love me like I do. No one knows me like I know myself.

I read that Richard Bach book everyone at the library was raving about. He said what the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly. I know what he meant. When we havehard times, huge changes that seem to be the end of the world as we know it, it’s actually an incubator for metamorphosis. For a new beginning.

To me he misses the point, as men so often do. When you hurt the way we women sometimes have to, when you lose so much, when the world ends over and over and over again, we are no longer butterflies. Those wings are much too fragile to carry us on and through.

I’m a hornet. I can love. And I can sting.

I close the journal, retying the string that guarded Mami’s inner life. I will show Lola and Nay. They need to know these facets of Mami revealed in crinkled pages and fading ink. Our mother, the librarian who preferred books over parties and game shows over just about everything else, saw herself as a hornet. Loved herself fiercely enough that if no one else ever saw her, ever loved her fully, she would love herself enough to have some left over for everyone else.

And it seems bold. That feels brave. A woman who knew and loved herself well enough to rely on no one, choosing to risk her heart with more than one. Choosing to make room for love in all its varied forms. In a way, I think she was talking about contentment, and it gets to the core of what I’ve been wrestling with.

Alone or lonely? Single or in a relationship? Can I love myself unconditionally? Accept myself, creating a foundation, a model, for how I want to love everyone else? Maybe it’s notAm I ready for love again?butAm I ready to love myself that fiercely no matter what?It brings me back to the question I keep circling in my head.

Can I be the love of my own life?

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

JUDAH

Have you heard the news?”

I glance up from last quarter’s financial report and suppress my annoyance. Why is Delores Callahan darkening my door on a Friday afternoon? I need to leave in a few minutes to pick up Aaron from school.

“What news?” I ask, keeping my voice disinterested, even though she walks farther into my office and takes a seat.

I give her my full attention, sharpening my gaze on her face. Something’s changed about her, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.

“What’s different?” I finally ask.

“It’s the eyebrows,” she says, obviously pleased to have stumped me. “They really make a difference. I got them waxed. Soledad’s got a place she recommended.”

At the mention of Soledad’s name, my teeth clench. As much as I’ve tried to convince myself that I just miss fucking her, I know it isn’t true. I miss everything about her. The scent of jasmine oil. Seeing her small shoes kicked off in her she shed and watching her walk around barefoot. Her laugh. The feel of her under me, on my lap, in my arms. I haven’t even allowed myself to watch her on social media. I think I’m going through withdrawal.

“You asked if I’d heard the news,” I remind Delores without acknowledging her comment about Soledad. “What is it?”

“That hotshot lawyer of Edward’s has managed to get him out earlier than expected.”

“What the hell?” I take off my glasses and toss them onto the desk. “How is that possible?”

“He’s a first-offender white male who committed a white-collar crime and cooperated with authorities,” Delores says wryly. “Do the math.”

“When did you hear this?”

“Pop told me a few minutes ago. The FBI wanted to make sure he knew.”

“Is your father pissed? Does he think we should push for him to stay longer?”

My wheels start turning on ways I might be able to keep him in prison. Additional evidence that may have been overlooked. I feel myself tensing for battle, searching for what to do so that miserable motherfucker doesn’t make life harder for Soledad.

“I don’t think Pop much cares anymore.” Delores shrugs. “Edward did his time, or at least most of it. He gave the money back and won’t ever work in a corporate setting because this will follow him all of his days.”

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