But I already knew that. I’d known it from the moment I was five and my mother came home from work, blood covering the front of her scrubs. She hadn’t known I was there watching and listening from the hallway, but what she told my Aunt Rhonda would probably stay with me until the day I died: “He was just a baby,” she’d sobbed. “Just a baby no older than Dakota. What’s the point of being born if some asshole can just take it away in the blink of an eye?”
I never found out what happened to that little boy, but many weeks later, I remember asking my mother what she thought “the point” was. Why were we here? I recalled her warm blue eyes as she smiled and brushed her hand over the top of my head. “To live. And if we’re lucky, to love.”
From then on, “living” felt like a sacred mission, an unattainable state of perfection, some obscure mountain I would someday climb if I were good enough. It became a mild obsession. I constantly thought about what my future would be like when I started “to live.” I wanted to be one of those perfect people in the TV commercials who laughed and ran on the beach, holding hands with someone she loved, who was equally perfect. Silently sitting with Santiago in the car, I realized that was my hang-up. The source of all my dysfunction. That picture-perfect life and picture-perfect person I’d dreamt of being didn’t exist, nor would she ever. Yet I chastised myself for every flaw, every mistake. I called myself a loser. Queen Loser. The older I got, and the more I grew to know myself, the more I realized how imperfect I was. And the more imperfect I was, and the farther I got from my goal of “living” that perfect life, the more I hated myself.
What an idiot.
I’d spent so much time thinking about the future and about becoming someone I could never be that I’d simply missed the point: I was alive. Now. This very moment. And that’s all there was. It could be messy and horrible and consist of the most improbable circumstances, but that was all any of us truly had. One blink, and it could all be gone. Just like Christy.
So what should I do?
Brace yourself. Whatever answers were coming, and whoever would be giving the answers, I knew they were going to bulldoze over a lifetime of sandcastles. And I had to decide right then and there whether I’d let it ruin me.
Santiago turned off the engine. “We’re here.”
He led me inside and flipped on a lonely lamp in the entryway. “I’m renting this place,” he said quietly. “But you’re safe here.”
I nodded. Safe. Safe. Safe...What did that mean? Did I want safe anymore? Wasn’t it just another illusion?
He walked me down a long, dark hall into a bedroom. I was too fried to notice anything other than Santiago and the bed.
“Sit,” he said.
I did, and he left for a moment and returned with a tall glass of water.
“Drink,” he instructed.
I once again obeyed.
“You okay?” he asked.
I nodded, staring at the floor.
“Why don’t you lie down? Try to get some sleep.”
I looked up at his beautifully masculine face. “Don’t leave. Okay?”
The corner of his mouth twisted a bit, as if he was uncomfortable with my request. Then he smiled. “Okay. But keep your hands off my ass.”
I flopped back into the bed, exploding with laughter until my cheeks hurt. When my chuckle died, I glanced at Santiago, standing to my side, arms crossed, smiling. “I like your laugh. You should do it more often.”
I sighed. “Thanks.”
We stared at each other for a moment before he jarred himself from my gaze. “I’ll go make you a sandwich. I hope you like grilled cheese.”
“Love grilled cheese.”
“Be back in a few. Stay put.” He disappeared down the hall, and I sat staring at the ceiling, thinking about all of the pieces I’d been trying to force-fit into my perfect little puzzle.
It was time to let it all go. Whatever was coming, it sure as hell wouldn’t be perfect, and now it was up to me to find a way to live. Come what may.
~ ~ ~
I didn’t know the time, but it was still dark out when I woke up to Santiago’s mumbling, his arms wrapped around my waist, his face nuzzled in my hair. An uneaten sandwich sat on the nightstand by my head, and the lamp had been left on.
“You’re safe. I promise,” he whispered. “Just don’t give up.”
Was he dreaming?
“Why did you say that?” I asked.
“I’ll probably die for you, and it has to mean something.”
What? I turned my head and looked at him. He was sound asleep.
Who knows what he was dreaming about, but I couldn’t help noticing how lying in his arms made me feel safe. Tormented. Safe. Insane. Alive.