Page 35 of Broken By It

So much more.

Is she ready for that?

THIRTEEN

MARITZA

Eveningson the porch sipping tea with Hollis and Dillon are peaceful. I’m comfortable.

More than I care to admit.

I keep telling myself to stop this. We are all getting into a routine and it’s not going to be healthy for Hollis when the time comes to find a new normal.

Alas, all good things must come to an end. As much as playing house seems nice in theory, it is not helping any of us for the long term. I’ve been staying here most nights until Hollis goes to bed since we returned from Florida. He is coping with the loss of his mother and the trauma of watching so much unfold. He can’t seem to sleep unless he knows I’m here and still alive. Once he’s sleeping heavy, I intend to go home. The thing is I keep falling asleep on the futon in his room. Dillon doesn’t want to wake me, so I end up spending the night.

I wish I could take the pain away for Hollis and Dillon. Watching his son struggle I can see the hurt in Dillon’s eyes that he can’t fix this. There is nothing any of us can do but give it time and be a support system. I found a therapist for Hollis that specializes in childhood grief counseling. It seems to be helping for him to have this outlet to release everything he feels from theguilt of my injury to the betrayal of his mother and ultimately her death. If only there was a magic wand to wipe away the hurt he feels. I would give anything for that, but I can’t and as much as Dillon wants to fix it, he can’t either.

Dillon is a temptation. The way he cares for his son and me, it’s easy to stay around. The more I’m in Dillon’s personal space, the more I crave the small touches. They happen more often the longer I’m around. Little things, a hug from behind if I’m in the kitchen, draping his arm over my shoulders if we are on the couch beside each other. Like now, he lifts his beer, takes a pull, all with his right hand. His left is firmly resting on my thigh.

Casual.

Comfortable.

Dangerous to my heart. The man beside me is hard to read at times, but loyal to a fault. He never left me once he arrived in Florida. As I lay in the dingy hotel bed having a stranger dig out the bullet, the fragments, and eventually removing a section of my intestine, he stayed right outside the door with Hollis. I didn’t know it at the time, obviously. My dad made it down with some other brothers by the time I really came to after surgery. Dillon could have taken Hollis back here and left me with my dad. I was stable, just needed to run the course of heavy antibiotics and get checked as the staples healed.

He didn’t.

Instead, he sent my dad back home to help my mom who really doesn’t travel much as she is still easily fatigued.

Dillon stayed.

Until I was healthy enough for him to bring me home, he remained firmly where I was.

Was the hotel room an ideal place for surgery? No, but I had lost too much blood, and the doctor was concerned about the internal damage. With any break down of the intestinal wall there is a huge risk for sepsis. The heavy antibiotics pumpedinto me kept me in Florida for an additional two weeks beyond what Dia or Emmalee needed. Dillon refused to leave me. While I expected him to take Hollis home, it was like everything stood still for us until I was in the clear.

Healing is an interesting thing.

Not the physical, but the emotional.

Never did I think Anna Jacoby would shoot me. Not for one second did I ever feel like my life would in any way be in danger around her. In fact, I actually cared for the woman. We had a unique dynamic. She was a part of my world whether either of us truly claimed it as so or not.

She wasn’t a friend. Not like Dia, Kylee, Karsci, Diem, or any of the crew, but she was close in a different way. She mattered. Maybe I fell short of expressing that, but she did. I felt like Anna was greatly misunderstood.

By everyone … including herself.

Even with everything that happened, I struggle with my feelings about her. While I am angry with her for taking Hollis and subjecting him to everything that happened, I also find myself feeling sympathetic for the emptiness she left this world having. I don’t think she ever made peace with the woman inside her. Somewhere along life’s path, she became trapped within herself. Whether it was insecurity, chemical imbalance in her brain, hormonal, or trauma related, I don’t think any of us had the joy and experience of really knowing Anna, even for herself. I’m not sure how she became so disconnected from everyone including herself, but she did.

When I look in the mirror, the woman staring back at me is beautiful, yet broken.

Yes, I’m broken.

I care too much.

Always have.

In those moments in that hotel room, I felt Hollis’ fears. I embraced Dia’s boldness, and I fed off of Emmalee’s intensity. If I could go back in time, maybe focus my own emotions, the outcome may have been different. The battlefield of a mind filled with guilt is a torment I can’t explain. Logically, I know I didn’t deserve to be shot. I know none of this is my fault as much as I will scream it to the end of times to Hollis that he isn’t to blame either. However, the should have and could have, and maybes plague me because in the end, the boy I have come to love as my very own child lost his actual mother. No matter the bond we share, or the way I love him or will do for him, I cannot and will never be his mother.

The fact that I can’t ease the burden Hollis may carry with him shatters my very soul.

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