I left.

Left him sleeping while I took everything I could stuff into the trunk of my car and ran away.

But before I did, I cleaned up my mess. Stuffed charred canvas and melted plastic into a garbage bag and hauled it downstairs. Somewhere in there was a check for a million dollars.

I tried not to think about it. What I could’ve done with that kind of money. Pay off my student loans. My parents' house. Send my little sister to college.

Stay.

Because that’s what I wanted to do. When I woke up in the dark, Patrick wrapped around me—his soft, even breath against my neck. His arm hooked around my waist—I wanted to stay. More than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life.

And if I didn’t leave before he woke up, that’s exactly what I would’ve done.

So, I cleaned up my mess and packed my car. I stood in the doorway and watched him sleep for as long as I could.

The last thing I did was hang that painting. The first one I ever did of him. The night we met.

The moment I fell in love with him.

I tucked the note behind the wood-stretched canvas—it said what I couldn’t.

I love you, too.

I hope it’s enough, and then I walk away.

When I pull into their driveway, my parents rushed out to meet me. I called them from the road as planned, telling them that I’m moving back for a while and that I’ll explain when I get there.

Now that I’m here, they want their explanation.

My sister stands on the front porch. Grace is four years younger and at least a decade older than I am. The reason is soon to be three-years-old and currently pealing across the patchy front yard, screeching my name. Gracie was eighteen when she got pregnant, nineteen when she had Molly. Everything she’s been through since floors me, every time I think about it.

“AUNT CAAARRRRI!” Molly flings herself at me, and I drop my bag and crouch, just in time to catch her. On the porch, Grace smiles at me before going back into the house. She’s just as anxious as our parents to know why I’m back. Unlike them, she can wait.

“Hey, monkey-face,” I say, covering Molly’s face with noisy kisses, loving the way she dissolves into a helpless giggle fit against me. I avoid looking at my parents. They’re hovering over us, waiting for me to tell them why I left Boston. My face and neck are a mess from what happened with James, both last night and the day in his office. I don’t want them to see me. Don’t want them to worry about things that can’t be changed.

Unable to stall any longer I stand up, letting Molly climb me like a jungle gym. “It looks a lot worse than it actually is,” I say over my mom’s audible gasp and my father’s outraged roar.

“Who?” He’s rooted in place, anger rolling off him in waves while my mother clucks and flutters around me like a mother hen. “Who was it?”

I give them a sanitized version of the truth. That an ex-boyfriend, who wasn’t so happy about being an ex, started making trouble. Showed up at the apartment and attacked me. I didn’t tell them about the video. That James had tried to blackmail me. Stalked me.

“Where was Patrick while all of this was happening?” my father demanded.

“Doug.” My mom admonishes him quietly.

“Don’t Doug me, Ellen,” he tells her. “What’s the use of having a male roommate if he can’t stop things like this from happening?”

“He was at work, Dad.” I smile. “I broke James’s nose all by myself—and then Patrick came home, beat the snot out of him some more and threw him down the stairs.”

“Patrick threw him down the stairs?” My mom presses her fingertips to her mouth to suppress a smile while my Dad grunts his approval. “I knew I liked that boy.”

“That why you’re home?” My dad says. “Because... of what happened?”

I tell them about Miranda wanting to show my work. That I moved back home so I can focus on painting full-time. That it’s temporary, just until my opening. “I’ve got savings,” I tell them, suddenly worried about the fact that they can barely afford to feed the bellies they’ve got without me, throwing myself on the pile. “Not much, but it’ll go a lot farther here than Boston.” I think about Patrick’s offer. That maybe it would’ve been better, easier if I’d taken him up on it. Then I think about the check I burned. Probably best not to tell my parents about that either.

My mom waves her hand at me, her way of telling me to be quiet. She hates talking about money. Probably because it reminds her that we’ve never had any. “I’m going in to finish up supper,” she says. “Won’t be long now—don’t stand out here yappin’ too long.” She heads back into the house, leaving my dad and me alone, Molly clambering for attention between us. I know what’s coming. All I can do is stand here and wait for it.

“You should’ve called, Cari,” my dad lectures me while swinging Molly up in the air, her high-pitched squeals punctuating his stern words.

“I did call,” I say, collecting my bag off the ground and slinging it over my shoulder.

“Don’t get cute, little girl.” He tries to glare at me but doesn’t quite pull it off. Between the two of them, Mom is the one with the iron fist. But dad has his moments. “You know what I mean.”

I do know what he means. If I’d called and told them I was coming, he would’ve insisted on taking a bus to Boston and driving back with me. It would’ve taken days neither one of us could afford. “You can’t take that kind of time off work, Dad.” I say it as gently as I can. He’s always been sensitive about his job. Almost bitter about the fact that he has to work so hard, even with my mom’s job at the post office, to make ends meet.

He glares at me again, and this time he manages it just fine. “I’ve got some vacation time saved up.”

“And I want you to use it when you, Mom and Gracie come to Boston for my show,” I smile at him until he finally lets it go.

Swinging Molly onto his back, he gives me a rueful grin while she climbs onto his shoulders. “Well, at least you had sense enough to put new tires on that hunk of junk before you drove it to hell and gone.”

To hell and gone.

The same thing Patrick said to me last night.

You can run to hell and gone—I’m still going to be here, and I’m still going to love you.

I look at my tires. They’re brand new. I hadn’t even noticed.

He must be able to tell from the look on my face that I had nothing to do with putting new tires on my car. He laughs at me while Molly uses her sticky, chubby fingers to smoosh his hair into a mohawk. “I suppose I have your fella to thank for that,” he says, shaking his head at me. He’s met Patrick a few times over the years and likes him. Who wouldn’t?

“I don’t have a fella.” It’s a knee-jerk reaction that has my dad laughing.

“He beat-up the sack of shit who put hands on you and put new tires on your car,” he says. Anchoring Molly’s legs to his chest with one arm, he throws the other around my shoulder and walks me across the yard, toward the house. “Sorry to be the one to break it to you, little girl—but you’ve got yourself a fella.”