Page 80 of Promise Me Nothing
Makes me wonder what else she’s endured in life that the physical pain isn’t the main threat.
You hear stories about kids in foster care. What they endure. And when I first found out about Hannah, I just… didn’t know. I was too young to really understand and I didn’t think everything through.
Now I’m wishing I had.
Maybe a lot of things could be different.
But there’s another part of me that will not be ignored. And that’s the one that knows too much.
There is a very real part of me that sees her as the problem, not the solution.
So what do I do when my brain feels like a fucking mess? When I can’t seem to make up my mind about what I’m supposed to do?
Apparently I stalk people.
That’s a great thing to learn about myself.
I can see in the distance that we’re nearing the end of The Strand. Beyond Manhattan, a bike trail continues for miles and miles, stretching up into Playa Del Rey before crossing Ballona Creek and continuing into Venice and Santa Monica.
I’ve ridden that distance a few times in my life. On a bike. The idea of potentially running it is mortifying.
But I can tell Hannah is slowing as we near 45th Street. Hopefully she’s gearing up to turn around, because I can’t keep going. And if she does continue, I’ll have to admit defeat and hobble home.
I glance around, wondering where would be a good place for me to step off the trail so she can turn around and just keep…
But before I can do that, Hannah comes to a complete stop and spins around, putting her hands behind her head and stretching, taking deep breaths.
Her eyes connect with mine.
She blinks. I blink.
And it feels like my only choice is to keep running so I don’t look like the crazy person who just followed her for almost four miles.
But she grins at me, a soft, sweet thing that splits my chest wide open.
Not at all what I’m expecting.
She drops her arms and rests her hands on her hips.
“Hey,” she says, still panting as I slow down and approach her.
“Hi.” It’s all I can manage since I can barely catch my own breath.
“Are you still stalking me?”
I’m fairly certain that I stop breathing for a few seconds before Hannah starts to laugh. Wheeze really, since she’s still trying to suck oxygen into her lungs.
And that’s when I remember. We had the stalker joke from the night we met and Mary’s and the yacht club.
A perfect distraction since I don’t know what else to say.
“Always,” is what I manage in response.
It’s a flirty thing to say, and the part of me that sees Hannah as a problem wants to kick myself. But something deeper inside of me likes the way her cheeks pink even more than they already are after her run.
“I didn’t think you were a runner,” she says. “I mean, I don’t really know anything about you, so it makes sense I wouldn’t know that, I guess. But when you were practically dying the other day at the dunes, I just assumed that you weren’t a cardio person. Though, in complete honesty, I was dying by the time I got to the top, too.”
I chuckle, though I’m still trying to catch my breath. “It’s a new thing,” I lie. “Trying to get into it.”
