loners, much like I am.
The lawyer insists on doing the reading of the will today. He has somewhere to be. That’s the thing. Everyone wants to sell you something, and they promise the world when you’re alive, but when you die, they forget the promises they made.
“You don’t have to meet with the attorney today. I can reschedule,” Sam whispers.
I shake my head. “Let’s get it over with. There is no use in postponing the inevitable. If it isn’t today, it’ll be tomorrow or the day after.”
Sam nods. “I am still here, baby girl. And I’m not going anywhere.”
I love Sam. She’s amazing as far as aunts go. She’s my mother's twin sister, and we've always been close. She’s been more like a sister to me than an aunt, and I am grateful for her love. Her presence makes it easier to breathe, but she’s not Mama. She doesn’t have the same sparkle in her eyes when she looks at me. She doesn’t know that I wanted Hermione to be with Harry instead of Ron. Sam doesn’t know that I don’t hate Cal from Titanic, but that Rose annoys me the most. Those are things Mama knew and related to. I walk to the fireplace and look at the last picture I took of my parents. They didn’t know I was watching them dance. I framed it for their anniversary. I wonder why of all the cars on that road, theirs had to be hit by that truck. What if they’d decided to stay a little longer at the restaurant or not go at all? What if I’d insisted that they go away for the weekend like they usually did, that it didn’t matter that I was leaving for college?
What if? We plague ourselves with those two words. But it never changes the outcome or the reality. No. “What if” is the curse we will never break free of.
Present Day
The weeks that followed that incident are a blur of drunk nights, parties, and Sam cleaning up after me. I was lost, wandering through the world like a nomad. I belonged to nowhere and no one until Tate Herrington. I was in my second year of medical school, and he was my humanities professor. Tall, dark, and handsome with a whole lot of charm. He paid attention to me in class, hanging on every word I said. There was nothing I could say that could bore him. “You know he’s like that with everyone,” my friends would tell me, but I was convinced it wasn’t the case. They were jealous. It’s all those things you say to yourself to make you feel better.
And when he made a move, I reciprocated. He could be fired, so we kept it a secret.
I did everything I could to make him happy, including investing in all of his research projects. A young woman in love is dangerous. I absorbed all his pathetic stories about wanting to change the world. I should have known better when he wouldn’t stay over or when he only saw me occasionally over the weekends. I told myself it was because he was working on his research so much.
I used to be the kind of girl that laughed at people who said love was blind. I always thought I was the kind of person who could see through any farce. It turns out I wasn’t. He bled me financially dry, and then I ran into him and his wife while I was out with friends one night. I let myself be fooled by a married man—my teacher. Maybe I should have reported him, but I knew I let him take advantage of me.
A few months after, I dropped out of medical school, sinking back into the dark hole of depression, trying and failing to claw myself out. The binge-drinking continued, and I moved onto heavier stuff. I didn’t tell Sam. I felt ashamed. But she found out, convinced me to study again. I enrolled in nursing college because it felt right at the time.
Sam never asked, never judged, just silently stepped in, and kept me afloat. I made a mess of my life, made some shit choices, and Sam was my saving grace.
I wipe a tear from my cheek, looking around the colorful living room. Her paintings hang on the wall, pictures of my parents and me on the mantel above the fireplace. I haven’t changed anything. “God, I miss you, Sam.” She left this house to me in her will.