Page 106 of Sweet Shots

He stares at me carefully, then nods. “I’ll look into it.” He pulls out his notepad. “Give me your info.”

I do, feeling numb the entire time. I can’t believe this ishappening.

Before I know it, I’m standing in my driveway, absolutely alone.

Mikah left me and it seems he doesn’t have any intention of coming back. He left me and now I’m alone.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Mikah

“It’s been a month, Mikah. I can’t take this anymore.”

“You should be grateful I’m here, Zach.”

“Under normal circumstances, I would be,” he says snarkily. “I appreciate you helping with the kids and letting me work more, but this—” He gestures around at me. “I can’t take the moping. The constant sad and sour mood. And that cat. God, he’s got to go. He’s worse than you, and that’s saying a lot.”

“Don’t be rude to Captain Fluffy Paws,” I mutter, reaching over to pet him. He hisses and swats at me, so I yank my hand back.

“See! This is what I’m talking about. He’s a menace, and you are fucking depressedanddepressing. You’re making me miserable, and that’s hard to do.”

He’s right. It is hard to do. Zach is one of those glass half full kind of guys. Sees the best in things. He’s happy just living his life, and since I’ve been here, well, he definitely seems a little off.

“Don’t you think it’s time to go home?” he suggests.

“How the hell can I go home when I live next door tohim?”

“If I didn’t think you were absolutely head over heels in love with the guy, even though you keep denying it, I’d suggest selling your house and buying another, but that would be a bad idea.”

I’d considered it. Every day, honestly, I thought of selling my house and buying another far away. Like on the other side of the country. I’ll hide away in the mountains of Vermont or Maine. But every time I seriously consider it, my chest hurts. Aches like I’m having a damn heart attack.

“You need to talk to him, Mikah.” Zach sighs. I know he’s trying to help, but this isn’t the kind of help I need.

“I’m not talking to him.”

“You are so fucking stubborn,” he mutters, looking upwards with his hands on his hips. Shaking his head, he turns his attention on me, glaring. “Mikah, I’m sorry to do this, but it’s for your own good. If you don’t talk to him by the end of the day, I will go there and do it for you.”

“No, you won’t,” I mutter, blindly reaching for the blankets to pull up to my chin. I basically live in this bed nowadays.

“Try me,” he seethes, then walks out of his room.

His tiny room that he can barely fit in, never mind the both of us who are squishing in here now. We’ve been sharing his double bed, which is awful, by the way. Zach gets way too hot when he sleeps, and even though we keep distance—as much as we can in a double bed—he heats theentire room.

He’s nothing like Dominic. Which is good, I guess, since I’m avoiding him at all costs.

I don’t miss living in a trailer, I’ll tell you that. Even this double-wide, which has a good amount of room, is terrible when eight people are living in it.

Zach has the smallest room since he has a room to himself. Well, not now, but normally he’s alone.

The four younger boys share a room with two sets of bunk beds. You got a bunk on each side, with just enough space to walk between them. The other bedroom is his mother’s and sister’s, though since his sister is a teenager now, she’s been sleeping on the pullout couch in the living room. She offered it to me when I got here, but I wouldn’t take that from her. I’m helping every way I can, mostly by watching the kids when Zach works, or dropping them off at school or whatever after school stuff they have. I paid their rent for the month I’ve been here and bought them a ton of food. Even ordered pizza a few times. His siblings love that I’m here. They don’t care that there isn’t much space, they just like that I’m spoiling them.

I haven’t been in any kind of mood to make new content, so I paused my page. I let my boss at BTL know I needed to take some time off due to personal issues, and she told me it was fine for now, but to keep her updated on what was going on and when I’d be back. They won’t keep handling my website stuff if I’m not working for them, which is fair, so I’m on a time limit.

I got all my identity stuff handled, opened a new account, and updated the info everywhere it needed. I thought doingthat would make me feel better, but it didn’t. I felt… nothing, which is strange because handling things like that used to make me feel accomplished. Like a bit of weight was pulled from me, but everything is so heavy that I guess something small won’t make a difference. Like taking a pound of bricks off when there’s already a semi-truck on top of you. That’s what it feels like lately. I’m drowning and being crushed all at the same time.

I curl up on the bed, scooting closer to the wall. There’s nowhere to hang out in this trailer that doesn’t require socializing and I’m not up for that. I’m nearly asleep when I hear Zach say he’s leaving for work, though I don’t remember him having to work today since it’s Sunday and he doesn’t work on Sundays, but maybe he picked up an extra shift I lost track of. Wouldn’t be the first time.

I wake up some time later to my phone going off. I blindly reach for it, but can’t get it, so I ignore it. Until it goes off again. Rolling over, I find it on the floor. Not sure how that happened, but whatever. I scoop it up, squinting my eyes to see it’s Zach. I answer because maybe he needs something, and since he’s letting me stay here, I can’t tell him no.

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