With All My Heart - Emilia Finn Page 0,40

coming here to lie to you. You’d never have to know I was racing. You’d never have to worry.”

Opening my eyes, I stop on her smile. “I worry about you every single day, Bry. Every single time you drive out in that car, even if it’s just to work, I worry. I know you were coming to lie, because you suck at lying almost as much as I sucked at pretending Shane Tosky was my boyfriend. I can feel you.” She scrunches my shirt in her hand. “I can feel everything you do. When you’re right here, right in front of me. When you’re gone, at work, with Geo, wherever, I can still feel you. It’s like…” She shakes her head. “I dunno. It’s weird. It’s like, my heart is in your chest. And yours is in mine. I can feel you, because you take my heart wherever you go. And you can feel me, because I walk around with yours. I know you’ve been mad. I know you’ve been sneaky. I know you’re unhappy here.” Her gaze beats into mine. “I know that even with how hard you worked back in our old town, you still came home so unbelievably happy. But you’re different here. It’s different.”

“Do you wanna move back?”

She shakes her head. “No. I wanna stay in this town. This town doesn’t make you unhappy, Bry. Sharing an apartment does. But I worked an apartment into our eighteen-month plan, too. We need to get out of Geo’s place. We need to get out on our own again. That’s when you’re happiest. Even if it costs more.”

“I don’t wanna share you with him.”

She nods. “And it hurts me when the wrong man walks through the door in the evenings. Bobby gets up and screams ‘Daddy’, then he sits down again, because it’s the wrong man. We want you back, Bry. So I made the plan to make it work. We can afford an apartment, but twice a week we eat beans and rice. Only beans and rice. We can afford the baby, the delivery. We’ll reuse the cloth diapers. I’ll breastfeed, and if that doesn’t work, I’ll take on an extra student per week to cover the cost of formula.” She brings my fist to her lips. “I’d eat rice and beans every day for the rest of my life if you say yes. If we stick to the plan, we can make it. If we stick to the plan, we can make it on our own.”

I close my eyes and thank whatever God is up there for giving her to me. “You think you’re so smart, huh? You think you’ve got it all figured out.”

Hesitantly, she nods. “Don’t race, Bry. You told me a long time ago that if I gave you the yes, then I can demand you quit. You said I’d have all the power. I’m asking you not to race tonight. Or any night. Ever. For the rest of our lives.” She squeezes my hand. “Don’t race. Sell the car. Throw it in a ditch. I don’t care. I’m begging you to stay with us instead, because every time you get in that car, I worry it’s the last time I’ll ever see you. I can’t lose you, and I can’t live without you. So I’m asking you not to go.”

I bring her fists to my lips and breathe her in. “Even if we’re poor?”

“Money doesn’t buy my happiness.” She moves in closer and tangles her legs in mine. “You’re my happiness, Bry. You and B and the baby are the only things that mean something to me. If you remove yourself, if you risk yourself, it’s like the stars don’t shine as bright anymore.” She lets out a shaky breath. “It’s not worth it. Choose us, Bry. Stay with us.”

Now

“We lay on that floor. A family of four. My face still bruised. Scratches in my skin. My belly growing each and every day with the baby that would be Aiden.” I look up and smile. “My second baby was nothing like the first. The universe had tested us. It knew we couldn’t handle another Bobby… yet.” I grin at my granddaughters. “We got another one just like him… perhaps even wilder, in Jimmy, but that was a few years away, and by that point, I’d had a couple years rest with my sweet Aiden. By that point, your Poppy had successfully pulled us out of the hole, and we never fell back in