Fallen Woman(57)
Keep Jase close. He’s a good man…and Gianna, he loves you. He loves you the way you want to be loved. Let him show you.
As for the money you continued to leave for me, it’s all here, a little safety net of sorts. I wish I’d had more to give you, but I offered in my life the greatest gifts I could—my time and most importantly, my love. You were like a daughter to me, and I treasure the time I had with you and your children.
Don’t shed tears over my departure; we’ll meet again in the light of the Father, and I promise until then I’ll be rejoicing in His name and basking in His glory. I need for you to find a way to do the same.
With all the love my heart can muster, until we meet again on the other side of eternity, I love you!
Mama Pearl
I couldn’t breathe. My chest ached, my heart beat too fast. God, how I missed her, and it’d only been a few days. I wouldn’t be able to stand to be without her for the rest of my life. It was agony. I didn’t want her beautiful words or the money; I wanted the woman I loved to walk through the door and chastise me for worrying. I wanted her to smack my hand for snooping through her things. I wanted to hear her call me “girl” or say “ya hear” one more time. I desperately needed more time with her. What I’d gotten hadn’t been enough. Selfishly, I wanted more. Not just one more day, or one more year—I wanted a lifetime with her…to rewrite history so I’d met her sooner and kept her longer, had her at my wedding, the births of my children. I needed her to read more of my story, but no matter how angry I was or how much I pleaded with the God she worshiped…she wasn’t coming back. Miss Pearl was gone, and all these things were just that…mementos of her life.
But nothing compared to who she was.
Chapter Twelve
Jase didn’t give me any reprieve. He was adamant he didn’t want me or the kids in The Village any longer and insisted I start looking for another place to live. He didn’t want to accept that it wasn’t finding another place to live that was an issue—it was paying for it. I had never admitted the depth of the debt, and I was afraid to commit to anything more than I was paying until I was more secure. I needed a car, I wanted to have money in savings, and the medical bills paid off, but every time I got close to having one thing taken care of, something else hit.
We were debating for at least the hundredth time why it wasn’t the right time to leave The Village.
“I’m starting to think it’s just you being nostalgic, Gia.”
I rolled my eyes at that idiotic notion. “You’re kidding me, right?” We were walking back from the park with the kids. It was the first day in ages I’d seen Emmy acting like Emmy. The twins were amped up for their fifth birthday tomorrow, and everyone was excited they were starting kindergarten and Emmy was starting preschool. This was a huge step for me, but Jase didn’t see it as such.
“I can’t figure out why you won’t leave.”
“I have to be able to pay for a new place, Jase.” I pointed over to the mailbox. “Let me stop and grab the mail on our way in.”
“You can pay for it, and if you can’t, tell me what you need and I’ll make sure you get it.”
We’d been down this road countless times, too. He either wanted to give me money outright to get me away from here, or he wanted to raise my salary to say I’d done it on my own. He didn’t comprehend my reasons for not wanting handouts, and I’d started to question them myself.
I unlocked the mailbox and pulled out a stack of envelopes. I handed it to Jase to hold while I pried a large catalog from the confines of the metal compartment. “I’m not taking anything else from you.”
“You haven’t taken anything. So let me do this.”
Once I’d freed the magazine, I passed that over my shoulder too before closing the door to lock it back. “You paid for Miss Pearl’s funeral.”
“That wasn’t for…” His voice trailed off, and I turned to look at him to see what had caught his attention. In his hand was an envelope, a bill from Memorial Hospital. It dawned on me what was in it as realization flooded him as well. “You never told me why you were at the hospital the day she was taken in by ambulance.” He stopped walking and waited for me to respond.
“This isn’t the time or the place.”
“When is?”
“Not in a parking lot and not where the kids are in earshot. It’s not a big deal, Jase.” I had decided definitively after losing Pearl, I didn’t want to pursue pressing charges. I didn’t know what happened that night, and I hadn’t talked to Holland since. What I remembered was feeling warm and not rejecting his advances, even though I didn’t remember him making any. That wasn’t enough for me to accuse him of something that detrimental. I knew something happened, but I couldn’t say by whom or what it was, and I wasn’t willing to destroy anyone over that.
“If it’s not a big deal, you wouldn’t need the kids to be away, and it wouldn’t matter if we were in a parking lot or a church. You’re hiding something, and whatever it is, you’re afraid of my response.”
I tugged his arm, pulling him toward the apartment. As we walked in the door, he threw the mail down on the counter and asked the kids if they wanted to go home with him and Derrick. With a resounding yes, they all scrambled to get clothes for bed and tomorrow.