Our Favorite Days (My Favorite Mistake #3) (10 page)

H
unter’s second week of seeing the counselor went even better than the first. He seemed to be getting control of his nightmares, which was a huge relief. I was dealing with my own demons.

I’d picked up some extra hours at the crisis center and it was wearing me out. Not physically. Emotionally. When I got home I just felt like all of my wells had been drained. I had nothing left. My own problems were so insignificant compared to what some of these people were going through. The guy who had an abusive boyfriend. The mom who was having trouble with her daughter. The husband who was scared his wife was going to kill herself when he wasn’t watching.

The stories filled my head until it was hard to see anything good in the world. Going home to Hunter helped, though. It helped so much. Seeing the joy in his face when I walked through the door took some of that weight away.

But it wasn’t all gone. It stayed with me. Permanently welded to my shoulders. If I wasn’t careful, I was going to totally burn myself out before I even got started. I couldn’t let that happen.

I thought I was hiding my stress well, but one night when Hunter was at Steiners practice and everyone else seemed to have something to do, Darah tapped me on the shoulder.

“Are you doing okay?” she asked, her dark eyes serious underneath her blunt-cut bangs. She was a total goddess and I wished I had her cheekbones. It was no wonder Mase had been struck dumb the first time he saw her.

“Uh, yeah, why?” I asked, trying to play it off. She put her hand on my shoulder, guided me to the dining room table and pushed me into one of the chairs.

“I’m just worried about you. You’ve just seemed so low these past few weeks.” I wanted to kick myself. Guess I hadn’t been hiding it as well as I thought.

“I’m fine,” I said, with one more attempt to brush her off.

Darah just made a face that told me that she didn’t believe me one bit.

“You know you can talk to me about anything. Anything.” I knew that. She, Renee and Jos were like my surrogate sisters. I’d never tell Tawny that, but they were. Not sisters of my blood, but sisters of my heart.

“I know,” I said, sighing. I slouched on the table. “I don’t know if I can do it,” I mumbled, not looking at her.

“Do what?” Her voice was soft and soothing. There was something about Darah that just put you at ease. She was the steady hand, the calm foundation of our little family. Consistent. Reliable. Unshakeable.

“Everything. School is crazy and Hunter wants to get married ASAP and working at the Crisis Center is harder than I thought and I just feel like I’m failing at everything.” The words came out in a rush, as if they’d been lined up and waiting for me to speak them for ages.

Darah laughed.

“Okay, thanks,” I said, starting to get up, but she grabbed my hand to stop me.

“I’m not laughing at you. I swear. I’m laughing because none of us has any idea what we’re doing. We all feel like we’re failing.” I gave her a look. I found it hard to believe that Darah ever met a problem she couldn’t handle. She kept herself together, Mase together and the rest of us together. Darah was fucking glue.

“Uh huh,” I said in a tone that told her I was skeptical.

She shook her head and pushed her bangs out of her eyes.

“I know I seem like I have everything together, but I really don’t. I broke down and cried in the middle of the Union the other day.” I gaped at her because I’d had no idea.

“Why?”

She laughed a little and waved her hand.

“Honestly? I think I was just really tired and had too much homework and I realized that my bank account was almost out of money and then I got an email about an assignment I had missed and it was all too much. I lost it. Right in front of the pizza place. Fortunately, Mase was with me and he took me outside and helped me calm down, but it was still totally embarrassing. He forced me to skip class for the rest of the day and come home and nap with him. Well, we tried napping.” She gave me a little wink. Darah was more close-lipped about her sex life than me or Renee, but you didn’t have to see into their bedroom to know that Mase and Darah were all over each other every chance they got.

“Wow,” I said. “Just… wow.” I sat back in my chair, totally flabbergasted.

“So. You’re not the only one who can’t seem to keep her shit together.” I snorted. Darah didn’t swear very often, so when she did, it was kind of amusing.

“Well, that does make me feel a little better, I guess,” I said.

“See? We’re all a mess. Every single one of us. None of us knows what we’re doing at any given moment and we’re all just doing our best.” She squeezed my hand and I found myself giving her a hug.

“Thanks, Dare. That means a lot. And anytime you want to cry, you let me know.” I sniffed a little and wiped my eyes. Knowing I had people around me that would do whatever they could to make sure I was happy was just the best feeling.

“I love you,” I said. She smacked a kiss on my cheek.

“Love you too, doll.”

A
fter my chat with Darah, I noticed that Mase was watching me a lot more. I’d catch him giving me this searching look, as if he was trying to see into my brain. I finally confronted him about it two days after I talked with Darah.

“Hey, Mase, can we have a chat?” I asked sweetly, pointing to the door to the basement. I figured he’d feel most comfortable surrounded by all his workout equipment.

“Uh, so, what is this about?” he asked, crossing his massive arms. He was about twice my size. But I could tell he was nervous. Ha.

“Just wanted to ask why you’re watching me like a hawk and if it has anything to do with my fiancée or your girlfriend asking you to keep an eye on me?” I said. His eyes widened in terror and he held his hands up as if I was going to attack him.

“Whoa, slow your roll, Tay. I was just doing the big brother thing. You know, looking out for my future sister.” I didn’t believe that for a second.

“Uh huh, sure,” I said. Now I was the one crossing my arms.

He caved in two seconds.

“Okay, fine. Dare told me that you were having a hard time and to look out for you. But I was doing that anyway. Because I love you. You know that, right? Even though you and Hunter aren’t married yet, I already consider you my sister.” Well, damn. Now I was going to get choked up again.

“Dammit, Mase,” I said, wiping my eyes.

“Aw, shit, don’t cry,” he said, wrapping his huge arms around me, but not enough to suffocate me in his chest as he gave me a hug.

“That wasn’t supposed to make you cry. I was hoping that would make you feel better. Dare is gonna kill me.” I laughed through a sniffle.

“It’s okay. I seem to be sorta emotional right now,” I said, wiping my eyes with my sleeve.

Mase rubbed his hand over his hair.

“So, yeah. I’m here for you. Okay?” His face got a little red and then he stepped away from me.

“You’re such a dork,” I said.

“Takes one to know one,” he replied with a wink.

“M
el, do you have a minute?” I said the next time I was at the center. I’d made sure to approach her when she wasn’t too busy and it was a relatively quiet night.

She looked up from her computer and pushed her glasses up on her nose. Her curly hair was still in its ponytail, which would get wilder and wilder as the night wore on, but it was subdued right now.

“Sure, what can I do for you?” She shoved some papers and folders aside and then pointed to one of the chairs in front of her desk.

“Yeah, I just…” I twisted my fingers together and screwed up all my courage.

“I’ve just been having a hard time lately. When I go home and everything. It’s like, I hear all these stories from all these people who are hurting and in these awful situations and it’s hard to turn that off when I go back to my regular life. I can’t stop thinking about them and what else I should have done or could have done.” I stopped myself there so I didn’t start rambling.

Mel sat back in her chair and smiled.

“You remind me so much of myself when I was your age.” It couldn’t have been that long ago; Mel was only in her late thirties, or early forties.

“I know exactly what you’re going through. But if you want to do this job, you have to learn how to shut off that switch when you walk out the door. Or else everything here is going to bleed into your other life. I know it’s hard. What we do isn’t for everyone, and a lot of people burn out after a few years.” She leaned forward and rested her hands on her desk.

“I’m here anytime you need to talk, and if you need to cut back your hours on the phone so that you can take care of yourself, that’s absolutely fine. And if you decide you can’t take calls, that’s also fine. There are plenty of other things to do here.” She gestured around the room, which was overflowing with files and cabinets and boxes of various items. It wasn’t messy, exactly. Just crowded.

We both laughed.

“Are you propositioning me to clean your office?” I asked.

“If I did, would you?” she asked.

I shrugged one shoulder.

“If you asked nice enough.” I’d worked with her long enough to know that I could banter with her like this. Not so much with my boss at the library. That was a more subdued environment.

“Ah, well, as much as I would love to have a clean office, I can’t make you do something that I should be doing myself. But, if you could do me a favor and take those donations and put them in the back room, that would definitely help with the space issue in here.” The boxes were full of clothing items that were donated from local stores. It wasn’t much, but every little bit helped.

I got up feeling a little bit better. Mel patted me on the shoulder and we both picked up a box to drag back to where the donations were sorted. Some things we got were, ah, less than desirable so we had to go through everything first.

For the next hour, Mel and I sorted, chatting about this and that. The night ended with me and two other volunteers working on a design for a fundraising campaign. I hadn’t talked to any victims, and I did have some guilt about that, but it was nice to have a night where I didn’t feel like my heart was being ripped out of my chest.

“Have a good night?” Hunter asked when I got home. He was already in bed and reading. I slipped off my clothes and got in, just in my bra and panties. He quickly put the book aside.

“Yeah. I talked to Mel about everything. How I have a hard time being on the phone and so forth. She was really nice. I think I’m going to take less hours on the phone if I can. Until I build up a tolerance to it, maybe? I’m not sure. I just need to learn how to separate my work there from my life here,” I said, kissing the spot on his chest where his heart beat.

“That’s good. I’ve been worried about you, Missy.” He took my hand and kissed it, then placed it back on his heart.

“Thanks, but I need to figure this one out on my own, I think.” I thought he was going to argue, but he nodded.

“I can understand that. But you let me know if there’s anything I can do, any way I can support you.” This. This was why I loved him. Because he took care of me and let me do my own thing when I needed it.

“I really, really love you,” I said.

“I really, really, really love you,” he said with a smirk. He was trying to outdo me.