I thought I had something here. A good thing. The guys, the house, Alex, but it’s all gone up in a puff of smoke.

The betrayal cuts deep, and I’m raw. If he had taken a knife and filleted me, it wouldn’t have hurt as bad.

The regret was in his eyes, deep, as well as pain, but I couldn’t let it move me as I shut the door in his face and locked it.

I get that Alex thought he was trying to help me, but all it did was make matters worse. And, he didn’t ask. He just took something that was mine. Something he knew was so important to me, and handed it over to my daughter’s mother.

My stomach twists and churns, bile rises to my throat. All those letters. My heart poured out onto the pages. My private thoughts, dreams and wishes for Brandy can never be replaced. Even if I started writing now I could never duplicate the one I wrote the day they took her from me, or the one I wrote on her first birthday, wondering if she was walking yet. Holidays and birthdays and letters just because she was on my mind. Letters written for six years. Gone, never to be replaced.

Worse, they may be ash now.

I cover my mouth and run to the bathroom, but I don’t puke, even though my body feels like it could at any moment.

Sliding down to the tiled floor, I lean my face against the cold bathtub.

This is what I get. Every time I let myself get sucked into something good, it always goes to crap. When will I ever learn?

I wish I would have never gone in to get a tattoo. I wish I would have never let Alex bring me here. I wish I would have never reacquainted myself with the guys. I wish I hadn’t moved in here. If I wouldn’t have done any of those things, I’d still be at my apartment, with two bitches and Mary.

Except, I wouldn’t have met Brandy. I wouldn’t have had that small opportunity in the elevator to look at her and talk with her or to know she has Brandon’s eyes.

The mistake wasn’t in getting the tattoo. It was becoming comfortable and starting to rely on others. A mistake I won’t make again. As soon as I can find a place, I’m out of here. I’ll miss the guys, but this is their home, and Alex lives here. Even if we don’t share a room, I don’t think I can look at him again. At least not right now, and the only way I’m going to get back on my feet, and take care of myself as I’ve always done, is to find a place of my own.

Pulling myself from the floor, I wander back into my room and grab my laptop. Time to find the cheapest place I can. There’s got to be something out there. I don’t need much. Just a place to put my bed and call home until June.