Page 18 of Endlessly Yours
And there wasn’t enough space in the world for me to figure out what to do with that.
CHAPTER FOUR
RORY
How could the world end and rebuild so many times in only a month?
Time lied.
Grief lied.
And those who said grief could calm after time lied.
It was as if grief were the slow movements of a clock. As if each tick of the minute hand, each swipe of the hour hand would forever slow to a crawl because you were the one who wanted it to move.
Those people had never found themselves a caretaker to two children who wanted nothing to do with you.
Because time didn’t slow to a crawl. It slapped you in the face with reality, wondering where the hell you had been this entire time. Then, it would freeze in place. It didn’t even have the decency to crawl.
It had been a month since my world had rocked on its axis one more time. And I didn’t think I had anything left in me for it to rock again.
One month since my sister and brother-in-law had died. One month since I had dropped everything to pick up the girls from the only home they had ever known and ripped them away from it.
One month since I’d only had one option when it came to those girls: take them home, away from the community that wanted nothing to do with them now that their parents were gone, and never ask for more.
One month, and I didn’t even know if grief had a name because I was too busy drowning in everything else.
“I hate it here. You can’t make me stay here.”
I didn’t say anything. Didn’t nod or explain to the child in front of me that yelling wasn’t going to accomplish anything. In fact, the only thing that yelling did was give me a headache. And I wasn’t even allowed to yell back.
Part of me wanted to go back in time and apologize to my parents for every time I had rolled my eyes, sneered, and told my parents I hated them. Because I had been a brat. Maybe not as much of a brat as others were, but I hadn’t cared for my parents as much as I had needed to, especially in the face of a twelve-year-old’s inarguable hatred.
“I don’t know why we couldn’t have stayed home. Then I could be with my friends. Not here with you. Mom didn’t even like you. Where were you all these years?”
Cameron, my beautiful, ferocious, and brilliant twelve-year-old niece continued to lob insults at me as if she weren’t cutting me with a blade with each and every spoken word.
“I hate it here. There’s nothing to do. It’s all brown and gross, and I don’t have any friends here. I hate it here. And I hate you.”
“Cameron. I’m so sorry that we had to move here. That everything has changed so quickly. I know it’s not easy, but I’m doing everything in my power to make sure the transition is at least something we can bear together.”
I wasn’t good with words. I drew pictures having to do with books and other people’s words. How was I supposed to find a way to aid Cameron’s grief when I couldn’t even focus on what would make sense. What would help.
Cameron might be twelve years old, but she was nearly as tall as me. My sister had always been tall, it hadn’t mattered that we were twins, we were fraternal. Meaning though we looked identical in our facial features, she had sprouted four inches compared to me. And my brother-in-law was well over six feet. In fact, he was about the size of a Wilder. I pushed the idea that I would use a Wilder as a comparison from my mind. Because while the Wilders had dropped everything to help me, I couldn’t focus on them right then. I had to focus on the little girl who was breaking in front of me.
“I hate you,” Cameron spat again.
“That’s fine. You can hate me right now, but I can’t change certain things. I want to. I want to go back in time and fix this, but I can’t. But we’re all in this together, Cameron. You’re not alone. You’re going to start school soon, and you can find new people.”
“I don’t want new friends. I had them. Until you took me away.”
How was I supposed to tell her that if I hadn’t, I would’ve had some form of a custody battle on my hands? It didn’t matter that I was the one in the will; the community had far-reaching lawyers and friends themselves. I had done what I thought was best, and that was bringing them to my family that I had created with Ava and the others.
I was even in Brooks’s spare home. Because somehow he had had a space for me when I hadn’t had any space for these little girls.
Cameron pulled back her shoulder-length blonde hair and tugged on it. “I just want to go home.”
“We are home now, dummy,” Alice said from my side. Her bright strawberry-blonde hair fell to the middle of her back in glorious curls. She had freckles on her nose and probably would never be as tall as Cameron. No, she had gotten her height from my side of the family, specifically my mother’s. She also had rosy cheeks and looked like a little angel.
