“Your sister is coming home and moving in with you.”
We’re in the hotel’s restaurant having dinner, and I wince and stare at my mom, waiting for her to tell me she’s kidding.
She doesn’t, and I take that as my cue to chug my wine.
“I’m sorry, what?” I ask, setting the empty glass down.
“Heather agreed to divorce Joey and move home.”
My mother’s face lights up in happiness, and I feel bad that I’m about to burst that bubble.
“Mom, that’s not a good idea.”
“Heather doesn’t want to be thirty, living with her parents—”
“Thirty and living with her sister is better?”
“Jesus, have some compassion. She was shot!”
That’s all I’m going to hear about for years.
Anytime Heather wants something from me, they’ll throw that in my face.
She recovered quickly, and we found out the bullet had barely grazed her. She’s in pain but walking with the assistance of crutches.
We’ve been here for a week, and I’m going home tomorrow.
Apparently, Heather is coming home with me.
I’m not trying to be a bitch, but my parents have more patience with her than I do, and the old Heather—the heartless Heather—is returning with each day we visit.
“I have plenty of compassion for her, but you know we don’t get along,” I say. “She’d do much better with you and Dad helping her get her life in order.”
A wrinkle forms on my mother’s forehead as she scrunches up her face. “I already told her yes. She’s not asking for much, Jamie. Give her this. Give your father and me this.”
“Mom—”
“We already told her yes.”
“You can’t approve someone to move into my home without asking me.”
My mom delivers a skeptic look. “We didn’t think it’d be an issue.” She sighs. “Heather also plans to reach out to Cohen about Noah. She thought staying with you would be a great way to ease him into it, make him feel more comfortable.”
“That’s not a good idea.” I refuse to be used as a stepping stool for Heather.
My mom pats my hand. “Heather is finally growing up, sweetie.”
I pick at my chicken. “That’s nice, given she’s in her thirties.”
“Not everyone is as responsible as you,” my dad inputs, staring down at me over his newspaper. It’s not an insult; it’s a compliment.
“You need to quit bailing her out,” I argue. “Let her move home—move in with you. She doesn’t always have to get her way.”
“No one is bailing her out, honey,” my mom continues. “She’s moving home and needs a helping hand.”
“Will she get a job? Sit around my place all day? What’s the plan here?”
“She plans to work, yes.”
I stay quiet.
“This isn’t a yes or no thing,” my father finally chimes in. “Do this for your sister. Give it a month, and we’ll find her an apartment.”
“Fine.” I stand from the table. “I need to pack my bags.”
I leave the restaurant and take the elevator to my room. I fish my phone from my pocket, curses flying in the process, and go to my call log. That’s when I notice a FaceTime call from Noah from a few days ago.
It’s not a missed call, and I haven’t talked to them since Cohen hung up on me.
I FaceTime Noah first.
No answer.
With a nervous breath, I FaceTime Cohen next.
Declined.
Seconds later, he calls through with a normal voice call.
“You want to tell me why Heather answered a FaceTime call with Noah the other day?” is what he says after I answer.
Whoa.
It’s a smack in the face.
Heather never told me that.
Sure, I left my phone in her room a few times when I ran to the restroom or the vending machines, and I let her borrow it to make calls.
I grab my suitcase and start packing. “I had no idea that happened. I’m sorry, Cohen.”
“Not to be a dick, but I don’t want you FaceTiming Noah until you’re home and she’s not around.”
Oh no.
Cohen will take this worse than I did.
I bite into my lip. “I need to tell you something.”
“What’s up?”
“Heather is moving home.”
“Goddammit,” he hisses. “Tell her to stay away from us. We live in a different town, so it shouldn’t be an issue.”
Wait, there’s more.
“She’s moving in with me.” I hold my breath, waiting for a reaction I know won’t be pretty.
“Oh, is she?”
“I had no choice in the matter. I tried to say no, but my parents insisted and put me on a guilt trip.”
“I get it. Heather has a way of always getting what she wants,” he scoffs. “I’m not trying to sound like an asshole, but I’m frustrated.”
I plop down on my bed next to my suitcase. “I don’t want this to stop me from seeing Noah.”
“No way am I letting him around her.”
“What if he comes over when she’s gone?” It’s not like the three of us can hang out now without it being weird anyway. I chew on my nails while waiting for his answer.
“She can pop up at any time.”
I chomp into one extra hard and spit it out, taking my Heather anger out on my manicure. “Looks like I’ll go back to doing visits at your house with Georgia.”
“We’ve really fucked this up, haven’t we? You were right. We shouldn’t have crossed that line. It was a mistake.”
A mistake.
God, it hurts when he says that.
Did it stab a knife through his heart the same way when I said them to him?
“Is that Jamie?” I hear Noah ask in the background.
“Yes,” Cohen answers. “Would you like to talk to her?”
Seconds later, Noah speaks through the speaker, “Hi, Jamie!”
“Hi, honey,” I say, his voice relaxing me.
“Can I come over and hang out? Can we get cupcakes?”
I laugh. “I’m actually out of town right now, but what about when I get back?”
“Yes! Can Dad come too?” The call goes quiet for a moment, and I can hear low whispers. “Dad said I need to get ready for bed. Good night!”
“Good night,” I whisper with a twinge of loneliness.
I miss them.
I wait for Cohen to take over the call, but he hangs up.
“Honey, I’m home!”
A stiffness forms in my jaw.
My head aches, and I roll my eyes before anyone comes into view.
Heather crutches herself into my house like she already owns it with my parents behind her. She does a once-over of the place. “Kinda small.” Her eyes flash to me. “Tell me my bedroom is a decent size.”
My attention snaps to my mother, and she mouths, “Be patient,” to me.
“Mom will show you your bedroom,” I reply flatly from the couch.
Her hand flicks in the air as she follows my mom to the guest bedroom. I washed all the bedding, set up the features on the smart TV, and added a few candles, hoping to at least make it homey for her.
Also hoping she’ll find her bedroom comfortable enough to spend all her time in there.
“Are you sure Jamie won’t let me have the master?” I hear Heather ask.
My father sits down in a chair, concern etched into his forehead when he looks at me. “Thank you, Jamie. I know this will be hard, and I’ll try to get her out of here as soon as I can, but this is for your mother.”
I nod. “The faster, the better.” I groan when I hear Heather complaining about the size of her TV next. I lean forward and lower my voice. “Her apartment was a hellhole compared to my house. What’s her deal?”
My father lifts his arms and then drops them back onto the armrests in frustration. “I know just as much as you do.”
“Can I have some money to get clothes until Pat mails mine?” Heather asks when they return to the living room.
“What about borrowing some from your sister?” my dad asks, shooting me an apologetic look.
Heather pays a glance at me before scrunching up her nose. “Jamie and I don’t exactly have the same style.”
I glance from the scrubs I’m wearing to her tight jeans, low-cut top, and crutches. While she was in the hospital, she complained that her crutches would ruin her outfits.
Definitely a different style.
Not that I’m judging her style, but I don’t like the way she’s judging mine.
Heather sits on the arm of a chair—an expensive chair that doesn’t carry a sturdy arm—and I grit my teeth to stop myself from yelling at her.
“I’ll also need toiletries and a phone. Joey paid all our bills and shut mine off.”
My dad pulls himself up from the chair with a groan. “I need to run to my office. Your mother will take you out for things tomorrow, and until then, you can borrow Jamie’s phone when needed.”
Another apologetic look from him is shot my way.
The look I shoot his way is annoyed.
I hug them good-bye and kiss their cheeks before they leave.
Heather doesn’t.
She mutters a good-bye, heads to the kitchen, and rummages through my fridge. “A little help in here please.”
When I walk into the kitchen, she has a Coke in her hand, and there’s a bag of chips and a bottle of wine on the counter.
My favorite wine.
“Pour that into a glass and carry those for me, will ya?” she asks, heading back into the living room without waiting for my response.
I roll my eyes, release a breath, and open the wine bottle. When I return with the glass of wine and chips, she’s on the couch. I take a seat in a chair and cringe as she loudly starts chomping on the chips while double-fisting her drinks as if the Coke is the chaser to the wine.
I sit up straight and focus on the news playing on the TV.
“Can I use your phone?”
I peek at Heather, taking in her expectant expression. “Sure. Do you need to make a call?”
Since the FaceTime call with Noah, I’m reluctant to let her use my phone.
Crumbs fall onto her shirt and the chair as she talks with chips in her mouth, “I want to check Facebook.”
I stand. “You can use my laptop.”
She shakes her head, more chomping. “I also want to call Pat. I heard asshole Joey already has a new girlfriend.”
How tragic.
“Should you care about that?” I ask, grabbing my laptop that’s charging on an end table.
“He was my husband,” she snaps. “Obviously, I should. You’d know that if you had a husband.”
I roll my eyes, fighting back the urge to fling the phone at her head.
She wiggles her fingers. “I also need to call Mom to ask when she’s picking me up tomorrow.”
I hesitate a moment before handing her my phone. As she takes it, my eyes stay on her hand, and I feel like a cheating spouse as she uses her greasy chip fingers to scroll down the screen.
Please, Cohen, don’t call or text.
It might be wrong, being all secretive, but what else am I supposed to do?
Heather calls Pat and spends thirty minutes interrogating her about Joey’s every move.
“Can you do me a favor?” she asks me, my phone in her hand after she ends her Joey drama.
“Depends on what it is,” I answer, not catering to her like my parents do.
“Talk to Cohen for me.”
“For what?” I play dumb.
“I want to see Noah.”
“That isn’t going to happen.”
“Why not?” she snarls.
“Cohen hates you, for one.”
“We can talk and work things out. He always loved our make-up sex.” She shimmies her shoulders. “I’m sure I could still do a good job. He loved it when I did this thing with my tongue—”
I cut her off, “I’d rather not hear about that.”
She sighs. “We had our ups and downs—”
I interrupt her again, “Downs? You left your family.”
She narrows her green eyes at me and swipes her straight brown hair off her shoulder. “Whose side are you on? I’m your sister. He’s nothing to you.”
“That’s enough.” I hold out my hand. “Give me my phone back. I have shit to do.”
“Am I right? Is he nothing to you?” She eyes me skeptically. “You don’t seem very open to the idea of me seeing Cohen. Is it because you want to be the only woman in their lives? You want to be Noah’s mother. You want my life?”
I clench my fist, holding myself back from pouring that wine over her head. “That’s not your life. Never was. Never will be.”
She sets all her kitchen shit on the floor, relaxes in her chair, and plays with my phone, bouncing it from one hand to the other. “Wow, your little high school crush hasn’t stopped, has it? You know you’re not Cohen’s type, right?”
“I’m not doing this with you,” I grind out.
“Why? Have you slept with him?” She scoffs when my eyes widen. “You have, haven’t you?”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” I jump to my feet. “Give me my phone.”
She smiles when it beeps with a text. “Oh, looky here. A message from Cohen.” She reads it out loud. “Let me know when you want to come over, and we can talk.” She taps one finger against her mouth while she starts to scroll through something on my phone. “Hmm … look at all these text messages.”
I stand in front of her and hold out my hand. “Give me my phone.” When she goes to stuff it under her armpit, I’m faster from her and snatch it from her hold. “You need to go to Mom and Dad’s. I don’t want you staying here.”
“Why? Do you want me gone so you can keep fucking the father of my child?” A giggle leaves her. “How do you like my sloppy seconds? You probably couldn’t wait to have him, could you?” She thrusts her finger into her chest. “Remember, he was mine first. He chose me first.”
The string to my patience snaps. “I was too young for him then.”
“You think that’s it. Your age? You’ve always wanted my life, my looks.” She peeks over her shoulder in a suggestive, smug way. “My friends, my boyfriends, my sex life. You think because you’re a doctor, because the braces are gone, because you’re somewhat attractive that Cohen will want anything to do with you?” She snorts. “You’re pathetic. Out of all the guys out there, you ho yourself out to him.”
I grab my keys and purse. “I’m leaving.”
“Run away from facing the facts that Cohen will never want anything to do with you beyond sex.”
I lean down and get in her face. “I’m running away from slapping you in the face. After what you’ve gone through, I want to be a decent person and not do that.”
Her face is still, her eyes buggy, and she doesn’t talk shit again until I pull away to leave. “Now, you have morals? You can’t hit me but have no problem fucking my man?”
“He’s not your man!” I scream. “He stopped being your man when you left him for another man. He’s not yours. He doesn’t want you. Get over it and move on—like you did when you left him and his newborn.”
“Our newborn.”
“Says the woman who signed over her rights.”
With that, I turn around and leave, slamming the door behind me.
“Mom, I want her out,” I cry into the phone.
I managed to hold the tears in until I got to my car. I broke down and cried, slamming my hand against the steering wheel while fighting to forget Heather’s insults.
“What?” my mother asks.
“Heather,” I burst out. “I want her out of my house before I put her belongings on the curb.”
“Honey, I asked you to be patient with her. She went through something traumatic.”
I clench my jaw and fist at the same time, inhaling the scream I want to release.
If I have to hear my mother use that as her excuse one more time, I’ll lose it.
I don’t blame my mother. It’s not her being mean. She has a heart, one that’s too big at times, and has missed my sister. She cried for months after she left.
“I understand and hate what happened to her, but we didn’t even last one night before our first fight. We can’t live together.”
She clears her throat. “Does this have anything to do with you and Cohen having a romantic relationship?”
“What?” I croak out.
“Heather called a few minutes ago—”
“She called? How did she call? She doesn’t have a phone.”
“I’m not one for technology, but she said she was calling me on her iPad.”
I grind my teeth.
She only wanted my phone to look through my shit.
To play games with me.
“She said you admitted to sleeping with Cohen?” She drags out a low breath. “Jamie, how could you do that to her? To our family?”
“I never admitted anything to her!” I scream.
“Is she lying?”
“I have to go. I love you.”
“Jamie—”
“I have to go, Mom!”
I hang up and start my car, and with tears in my eyes, I go to him.
Not Ashley.
Not my parents.
Cohen.