Page 72 of Filthy Little Secret

“Not really.”

“You like this boy. You’ve been sulking around the past few days. I know you think I don’t notice things, but I notice more than you think, and to see you torn about this, it hurts me. Because you deserve to be happy, and I don’t know that you ever have been.”

“I don’t think so either,” I admit. “But that’s not the only issue here, Nanna. It’s just…I don’t want to ruin his life too.”

“Now you know how I feel every day about you. And if I could have, I would have gotten rid of you a long time ago, but you keep on staying here, helping me out, and I’m more than grateful for that, but I would be so appreciative knowing you’d allowed yourself something—something that made you happy.”

“He doesn’t want some bouncer”—I’m using the word because that’s what she thinks I do at night—“who doesn’t have anything to offer him in the world. He’s going to have a real job and a real life. I don’t want to get in the way of his success.”

“How would you be standing in the way of his success? By being there for him? Encouraging him? Loving him? Let me tell you something, as an old woman who’s made a lot of mistakes, it’s not worth you giving up anything that you want without a fight…not in a world where the good things don’t come easily and the good times even less so. From a woman who’s almost lost her life, I can tell you that the worst thing you can do is keep yourself another day from the things that matter.”

I remember going to those appointments with her. I remember how scared we both were and the terror in her eyes as she felt like each day might have been her last. And I remember my own fear that she might have been right.

That experience opened my eyes—forced me to realize how short life is. And that it can be taken from us at any point.

“Do you like him, Timmy?”

I nod, tears starting down my face. “A whole fucking lot. I think I’m falling in love with him.”

“Love’s a scary thing. I never had it in my life. I liked Henry a lot, but I didn’t love him. I like the idea of it, but I’ve just had to dream about it, and if you’re gonna tell me you can feel something like that and keep it from yourself, then I’m telling you you’re an idiot. And that I’m kicking you out of my house until you go get your man back.”

She smirks.

“The house I pay the mortgage for?” I ask.

“You’re damn right,” she says. And it’s the first time I’ve heard her swear since she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

She’s fucking right.

I know she is.

“But what if I end up hurting him?” I ask. “That would kill me, Nanna.”

“You think you’re not going to hurt him by walking away now?”

“I think it’ll hurt less now than if something happens later. I just don’t think my life is one that he fits into.”

“Then make your life one where he does.”

It’s such a simple solution. Naïve even.

But she’s right.

That’s what it all comes down to.

If I want him in my life, I need to find a way to change my life, not throw him out of it.

To walk away from the dealing and do something that can actually matter.

A spark goes off, and I don’t know what I’m going to do, but I know he’s worth it.

And that I’ll find a way.

26

MARK

Idon’t like being mad at Tim, but he was such a dick last weekend.

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