Page 77 of Home to Me

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Lauren heard a knock at her front door and shouted, “Go away!” into her pillow. She knew it wasn't going to do any good. Her bedroom was far enough from the front door that she could’ve screamed it at the top of her lungs and the Jehovah's Witnesses or Avon lady or vacuum cleaner salesman or whoever it was at the door wouldn't hear her.

Her face crumpled. Vacuum cleaner salesman. Ben used to be a vacuum cleaner salesman.

She buried her face in her pillow, collapsing into a fresh torrent of tears, and sobbed quietly.

The knock came again, more forcefully.

“Leave me alone!” she wailed into the air, knowing full well that whoever was at the door had no idea she was saying it. It just felt good to say.

A third knock followed on the heels of the first, this one bordering on pounding. God, who is that? She thought angrily.

She sat bolt upright.

What if it was Ben?

Oh, God.

He couldn't see her like this.

She’d been awake all night long, sobbing for the better part of it. She could tell from the raw, itchy way her eyeballs felt that they were bloodshot and red.

She put her fingers to her face, exploring the skin around her eyes. Yep. Puffy, and almost certainly fire-engine red as well. Which, she knew herself well enough to know, meant that so was her nose.

She continued the exploratory mission of her hands up to her hair. Oh no. Ratted strands were coming loose from a sloppy topknot—just as she had feared.

She looked down at her body. Her vague memory of what she’d thrown on the night before was proved correct. Mismatched flannel pajama bottoms and top paired with—purely for the sake of emotional comfort—her ratty, old, terrycloth bathrobe and bunny slippers from high school.

In short, she was a damn hot mess.

Before she could wrestle her brain into coming up with a solution for this problem, she heard a key turn in the lock and the front door opening. What the... Ben didn't have a key.

She heard the alarm code being disarmed. He also didn't know her code.

So it wasn't Ben.

She knew she should feel relief, considering her appearance, but what she actually felt was soul-crushing disappointment.

Helping her appearance not at all, this disappointment triggered a new bout of tears, which she buried her face back into her pillow and indulged.

She heard someone step into her bedroom, but she couldn't summon up enough interest to even lift her head and see who it was.

“What in the holy hell is this?”

“Go away, Karina!” Lauren moaned through her tears.

Lauren heard another set of footsteps coming in behind Karina and then a shocked gasp.

“Oh, my God, Lauren! What's the matter? Are you hurt?” Amanda cried, rushing across the room and jumping into bed with her, wrapping her arms around Lauren and stroking her hair.

“Yeah, are you hurt?” Karina asked. “Like, did something injure your eyes before you got dressed for bed last night, for instance?”

“Hush!” Amanda said indignantly. “Who cares what she's wearing? She's obviously in pain!”

“I am,” Lauren agreed through tears, raising her head just in time to see Sam walk in, take in the scene, and walk right back out again.

“I'm making the coffee,” she announced over her shoulder.

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