Page 93 of Late Bloomer
I wake up hours later with a jolt, my heart thrumming as my mom’s sharp voice echoes in my head. It takes me a long time to process that I’m not fighting with her, listening to her smart jabs and cruel words.
I’m in a hotel room with Opal curled against my back, lips against my shoulder, breath soft against my skin.
I’m okay.
Well, that’s not exactly true. I’m wrung out and sad and every scabbed-over wound feels cracked open.
But I feel… content. Comfortable. Understood by the peculiar woman who’s choosing to wrap herself around me. I’m filled with a hope that maybe she’ll want to stay there. And that’s terrifying. I’m plunged in the middle of an ocean of feelings, wave after wave cresting over my head. All I want is for my feet to touch the ground.
Carefully, I pull away from her warmth and get out of bed.I look back at Opal, and my breath catches in my throat. She’s so lovely—white sheets wrapped around her, cheeks rosy and body relaxed in sleep—and I want nothing more than to crawl back into bed. But I turn instead. That way lies danger and hurt feelings and being let down. It feels too good to be trusted.
Unzipping the outer pocket of my bag, I pull out the small rectangle, dragging the pad of my thumb along the edge as I stare at the painting of me and Grandma Lou that Opal made. It fills me with a sense of peace I’m not sure I deserve.
“You brought that with you?” Opal’s voice is soft, and I turn to see her propped up on her elbow, eyes heavy with sleep as she looks at me.
I swallow. She’s so beautiful, it’s almost painful. “I take it with me everywhere.”
“I didn’t know that.”
I shrug. It’s small enough to fit perfectly in the front pocket of my overalls or the back pocket of my jeans. I don’t take it out when I’m working—I’d hate to get it dirty—but the light weight of it on my person now feels as vital as breathing.
Opal shifts, sliding off the bed and kneeling beside me on the floor. I fix my eyes on the painting, pressing my fingers into its corners.
“I wish you could have met her.” I curl my lips into my mouth, trying to fight the tears steadily rolling down my cheeks.
“Me too.” Opal loops her arms around me, gently tucking my head under her chin. “But I’m glad I was lucky enough to meetyou.”
My heart stutters, then beats in double time. I turn in Opal’s arms, giving her a look that’s painfully, terrifyingly hopeful. “You are?”
Opal grins, threading her fingers through my hair and pressing a kiss to my temple. “If it’s not mortifyingly obvious, I really like you, Pepper. Like, massive, draw-your-name-in-hearts-all-over-my-notebook kind of like you. I thought me telling you as much in the greenhouse would kind of solidify the point.”
“I…” My throat knots up. I want to be brave. I want to be honest. I want to tiptoe out onto that tightrope and join her in the vulnerability. But the risk of it snapping and breaking, that free fall before the crash, makes me shake my head and pull away. “People hyperbolize all the time,” I say, plucking at the hem of my T-shirt. “So much of what you’re feeling could just be good sex hormones. The high of the moment. It’s human nature. It won’t last.”
Opal shifts, facing me. She reaches for my hands but I pretend not to notice. She leaves hers extended anyway. “I can’t predict the future,” she says, tilting her head, a soft smile on her lips. “But I don’t think that’s what this is. Not for me.”
I shake my head harder. Her words sound too enticing, too lovely and beautiful and far too good to belong to me. “Don’t say that. People wake up every day and decide to leave someone behind; decide you’re too much to carry; break promises they swear they’ll keep without a second thought.”
Opal lurches forward, eyes fierce, hands somehow gentle as she cups my cheeks, tilting my face until I have to look at her.
“Listen to me,” she whispers, breath ghosting across my mouth. “You were dealt a shitty hand, Pepper, there’s no denying that. And I’ll never be able to wipe away that pain. I’ll never want to. It’s yours to feel as you need. But you’ve made do for way too long with the person that was supposed to love you hurting you instead. But that stops now. Fuck anything and anyone that made you have to survive instead of live. You deserve a life so peaceful it feels deliciously boring. A life filled with flowers and sunny days and people who show you all the time that you’re valued and worthy. You deserve it all.”
A sharp sob rips from me, and I fall into her, clutching her close to me. Opal rocks me as I cry and it’s too much all at once yet somehow exactly right.
Eventually, I calm down enough to take a breath, and Opal leads me to the bed, lying next to me. She doesn’t stop touching me even for a second.
“You scare me,” I murmur, my heart aching as it reaches for her.
Opal snorts, nose scrunching. “Pepper, I’m a five-two human disaster with green hair. What part of me could be scary?”
I let out a shuddering breath. “You make me want to hope. And that’s terrifying. Because hope lets you down. Hope hurts you.”
Opal smooths back my hair, then brushes the tears off my cheeks with her thumbs, fixing me with a devastatingly soft smile.
“Hope doesn’t hurt you, Pepper,” she whispers. “People do. Hope lightens you and lifts you and expands more room inyour heart than you know what to do with. And sharing that hope with someone that will care for it and tend to it like it deserves only lets it grow more and more.”
She pulls in a deep breath. Holds it. Lets it trace across my lips with soft warmth.
“I want your hope, Pepper. I’ll do everything in my power to protect that hope if you let me. Put it all on me.”
