Folk Around and Find Out (Good Folk: Modern Folktales #2)(105)
Dear Lord in heaven, why did you make me so stupid? So reckless? Why do I not see the world as others do? Why can I not see others for who they are? Why am I constantly blindsided by cruelty? Why does it always surprise me? Why am I built this way? Give me wisdom, God. Or tell me what I’m supposed to do. And please, please, please don’t let that worthless, scum-bucket motherfucker steal my babies. Amen.
I loved myself. But sometimes, I didn’t like myself very much. Especially the part of me that insisted on walking the train tracks, yet couldn’t be bothered to look up in time to see or hear the train bearing down on me.
When the doorbell rang in the late afternoon, I yelped, nearly jumping out of my skin.
“I’ll get it!” Joshua called just before I heard his little feet sprint to the foyer. I suspected he hoped it was Hank coming back and that made my heart hurt all over again.
As I approached the door, I heard him say, “Oh. Hi. Is Ben with you?”
“Not this time, pumpkin.” Sienna Diaz’s melodic voice carried to me as I rounded the corner. “But if it’s okay with your mom, Ms. Ashley is here to take you all up to her house on the lake.”
I drew even with the door, catching a glimpse of Sienna’s magnetic smile before she turned over her shoulder and gestured to where Ashley Winston appeared to be removing the car seats from my SUV and putting them in her van.
A small, disbelieving laugh spilled from my lips. “What is going on?”
“Hey, beautiful.” Sienna stepped into the house, her lovely brown eyes soft with sympathy, and pulled me into a hug. “Come on, let’s get the kids ready to go.”
I stared at her, completely bemused. “What?”
She leaned close and whispered, “Hank sent us over. He said you needed me?”
I flinched, startled by her words. But the surprise and her sudden presence shook something loose inside me, something I’d been burying and suppressing since this morning, and I nodded. Then I erupted into tears.
“Oh no. Charlotte.” She embraced me again. “Honey, I’m here. I’m here. We’ll figure it out. It’ll all be fine, we’ll figure it out. I promise.”
I clung to her, and I hoped like hell she was telling the truth.
CHAPTER 28
CHARLOTTE
“It’s difficult to analyze love when you’re in it.”
JOHN STEINBECK, TRAVELS WITH CHARLEY: IN SEARCH OF AMERICA
The several minutes that followed Sienna’s arrival were a blur. Ashley appeared and peeled me off Sienna. The Winston sister took my temperature and checked my ears while—presumably—Sienna packed up my kids in Ashley’s car. Ashley left me tucked under a throw blanket on the couch with a glass of the electrolyte drink she’d brought by last night along with an order to ‘drink all of it.’
After hugs and kisses and hurried farewells, the kids were gone, leaving Sienna and me alone in my living room.
After a beat of silence, Sienna held my hand, squeezed it, and said, “Why don’t you tell me what happened?”
And then—much like I’d done with Hannah so many weeks ago at The Pony—I told her everything about Hank, our entire history and all the ways my wishes were giving me whiplash. Sienna listened with quiet grace, her features infinitely compassionate.
But this time, unlike all those weeks ago with Hannah, the story ended with my mother busting into my bedroom, clutching her pearls, and then informing me that my vile ex-husband would be suing for custody of the kids.
“I feel so stupid.” I set aside the glass, the contents still untouched. “My mother warned me, but I wouldn’t listen.”
“You’re brave.”
“According my mother, me working at The Pony didn’t make any difference. Heather turned herself in down in Florida, and my aunt and uncle are tearing themselves apart with worry about her going to jail.” I grimaced. “Why do stupidity and bravery often look like the same thing in retrospect?”
Her smile was sympathetic. “Let me put it this way, no matter how things worked out with your cousin, thank goodness you did work at the club. Now you and Hank have found each other.”
I barely heard her, lost as I was in self-reproach. “Why am I this way, Sienna? It’s like I never want to believe the truth about people. I should know better by now, right? After all those years with Kevin and the Buckleys, I should’ve seen this coming.”
“You’re not stupid. You think the best of people. Drink this.” Sienna picked up the glass I’d discarded and placed it back in my grip. “It’s what I love the most about you and why I think we're going to be good friends for a long, long time.”
“Why? Because I’m na?ve, and too trusting, and let people blindside me with their evilness?” Dutifully, I drank a gulp of the sickly-sweet liquid.
“I’m not talking about your ex-husband.” Sienna gave my shoulder a tiny shove. “I’m talking about Hank. You don't seem to care how a person is perceived by others, you only care about who they are. You never gossip.”
“I don't know if that's true,” I mumbled, uncomfortable with her praise and hiding behind my glass. Specifically, I was thinking about Jackson James and how I’d sought out gossip about his past before agreeing to date him.