Losing Him (Mitchell Family #8)(15)

I looked into those blue eyes of his and tried my best to smile. “I don’t want you to leave.” I grabbed his hand and turned to face my mother again. “She always liked you.”

“She was a nice woman. I think she liked everyone.”

I shook my head, but never took my eyes away from my mom. “No, she didn’t like everyone. You were the first. She said you were the fresh start that I needed. She said I needed to get far away from this town to be happy. She was right.”

He squeezed my hand, forcing me to look his way. A half smile formed on his mouth as he tried to get me to smile. “I’ve always loved you, Heather.”

“But like you said before, it’s not enough, right?”

Chapter 8


Jessie


Heather had me in a corner, asking me something like that when we were standing there in that situation. How could I hurt her feelings as she was standing next to her dead mother’s body? I wasn’t that much of a douche.

Sure, I was confused about my feelings toward her. One day I knew her and the next she was someone completely different. That wasn’t even touching on the surface of her involvement with Rick. That’s why I wanted to hear the truth from someone else. I felt like in order to give it another go, or call it quits forever, the truth was going to give me that answer. I’d spent too much time already deliberating with myself on what to do. Loving Heather came with complications from the beginning, but I wasn’t about to have my whole life revolve around lies that I was unable to wrap my head around.

So apparently, that girl Van had suffered from cancer. At some point, Heather had given her advice and it had helped her.

Good for Heather.

Van was a kind and attractive woman, it’d be a damn shame if she was taken away too soon from her family and friends. I could see the twinkle in Heather’s eyes when Van showed up at that funeral home. I think she’d given up on having any peaceful interactions with the people from her hometown.

Once we got to the church, after a ten minute ride of Jacob asking all about dead people, which I might add did not go over with his mother, Heather seemed to be in better shape. She said that she was happy so many people showed up and she was finally able to walk up and say her goodbyes. Of course, I saw how hard it was for her. Imagining that it was my own mother made me sad too. My aunt may not have been my real mother, but in my heart she was the only one I had.

Miss Kat was Heather’s lifeline. She kept her daughter safe, no matter what she’d done. She guided her to be a better person and then she became a grandmother, providing the guidance that Heather needed to be a good mother herself. Now, she didn’t have that person to call when she was upset or worried about her son, which meant, like it or not, she was going to rely on me more.

As sneaky as it was, I had to know the truth about her. I had to know that she was someone that I could trust with my heart and my life. Right now, I just felt like I’d been kept in the dark when all I really wanted was the truth.

The church filled quickly with many of the same people that attended the viewing. Right on time they brought in the closed casket and put it up at the alter. Heather and I sat in the front pew. Jacob was being on his best behavior because we stopped on the way and got him chicken nuggets and fries. He swung his feet, seated next me, nibbling on them quietly.

In the years that I’d been with Heather, I’d never come to church with her and her mother since Heather never wanted to go. When we visited we stayed at her mother’s house, never going out to dinner or to shop. The pastor was an older man. He seemed kind enough and his wife and kids were the same way; super friendly and generous. They were making sure the downstairs was set up for the wake while the pastor was doing the service. It already felt like a long day, but it was really just beginning.

Heather had made it through the first difficult step. Now she just needed to get through the rest of the day. Trying as it may be, I knew she could do it. If anyone was strong willed, it was going to be her.

After sitting for more than fifteen minutes, the organist started playing a song and everyone got quiet. I reached over and held Heather’s hand through the service. She needed the support. There was no way I could be a dick to her when she was going through such a trying time.

A couple people that she knew stood up and said something nice. I never expected to see Heather stand, but she did. She walked up to the podium and closed her eyes for a second before beginning to speak.

“Thank you all for coming. I’m sure my mom would be pleased with how many people cared about her.” She paused for a moment and I could tell she was choking up. “My mom was my best friend; my only friend at times. When I was a little girl, she worked two jobs to give me and my brother a good life. I remember one Christmas, when I was five years old, that I can never forget. You see, we’d had to move into my grandmother’s house, after losing ours. My mother was wreck. We did everything we could to behave to try to make her smile, but again, I was five and my brother was seven. Neither of us knew the meaning of a dollar, or what bills were. So one night she sat us down, while in tears herself, and told us that she wasn’t going to be able to give us a Christmas. She said that one of her jobs had fired her and she couldn’t afford to buy us presents.”

Heather smiled through her tears. “Of course, my grandmother bought us a few gifts, but she was living off of my grandfather’s social security. We didn’t have any other family, so it wasn’t like they could make up for what my mother couldn’t do. She cried for weeks leading up to that day, but when we woke up Christmas morning, there were presents from Santa under the tree.”