Chapter 23 G.E.M. is a P.O.S.
g.e.m. is a p.o.s.
Rowan
Hannah’s already here by the time I return from running errands.
She sits on the porch swing, hair thrown into a messy knot and wearing a fitted cotton tank top with athletic shorts.
“You’re early,” I say, walking up the steps.
“If you’re not early, you’re late.” Her eyes widen when she takes in the cardboard box in my hands. “What’s that?”
“I grabbed some pastries in case you were hungry.”
She ambles over, eyes slitted like a con artist plotting her next shenanigan. “That’s a big box, Rowan.”
I offer a proud grin and open the lid.
“Is that—” A pause, then a beaming smile that sends my heart straight up my throat. “One of everything?”
“Wasn’t sure which one you’d like.”
Her hand hovers over the box until she decides on the lemon bar. “You guessed right, big guy.”
“That’s probably a safe choice. Would hate for you to ruin another outfit.”
She stares, I lift a brow. Undeterred, Hannah stuffs the entire pastry into her mouth.
“Cute,” she attempts through full cheeks, sending a mist of crumbs flying, dowsing my shirt.
I look down at the white clouds of powdered sugar clinging to my chest, brush some of it away. Not nearly as cute as the mustard mishap at the gas station. “So only mine then. Cool.”
A deep, beautiful laugh bursts out of her like a cannon. One second of that sound and I couldn’t care less about the stain.
She swallows down the last of the lemon bar, her chuckle fading into a yawn. “Sorry. Didn’t sleep well last night.”
My eyes catch on her wrist where the faint bruises from the other night are still visible.
“Everything okay?” I try to sound casual. Except, I’ve spent enough time in therapy working through the haunting memories that kept me up at night during my time in the military to know a trauma response when I see one.
Lydia told me her daughter masks. Everyone does to an extent. Sometimes the only way past the I’m fines is to have someone who sees through the armor and patiently walks alongside you until you’re ready to take it off.
Hannah’s reply comes as expected, easy-go-lucky expression locked in. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just couldn’t sleep. That’s all.”
I offer a reassuring smile and usher her into the house. Even though I pretend not to recognize the lie, I make a silent promise to keep showing up until that mask falls.
Inside, after we down a couple more baked goods, we set to work on painting.
Our conversation last night was monopolized by talk of my grandfather. And I cherished every word. But today I want to talk about her. Her life since we last saw each other, her job, her mom’s prognosis. The good, the bad, the ugly—I want to know everything.
“Did I do it wrong?” I ask when I return from the garage with an arm full of paint rollers and brushes. Hannah has peeled all the trim tape from the wall.
“This stuff is pointless.” She yanks the last strip from the baseboard. “It never works and you don’t need it.” She tosses it into the pile of discarded tape in the middle of the room before throwing me a self-satisfied smile.
I hold out an angled brush. “Looks like you’re on trim then, Picasso.”
“Duh.” She swipes it from my hand. “Feminism and paint rollers can’t coexist peacefully. Those things make my arms tired.”
“Fair enough.”
I’m howling so hard I can’t see. The roller lies abandoned on the drop cloth while I keel over at the waist, hand clutching my side.
Hannah’s in hysterics, body shaking. “Oh my god, stop! I can’t paint a straight line when I’m laughing.”
Instinctively, I grab the leg of the ladder she’s on to stabilize it. “There’s no way that story’s true,” I say.
“Yes, way. ‘G.E.M. is a P.O.S.’ is forever immortalized on the donor wall of the chimpanzee exhibit at the Denver Zoo.”
“And you had no idea?”
“No clue,” she says, pinching the bridge of her nose.
“I sold the engagement ring on eBay, gave the money to Mom because I didn’t want anything to do with it, and she told me she was gonna donate it to a good cause.
” Hannah blinks, meets my eyes at the bottom of the ladder.
“I’m thinking cancer research, malnourished orphans, clean water wells in third world countries, but no. Mom decides: chimps.”
I’m dying again.
“You know those fundraisers where you donate a certain amount and get, like, an engraved brick on a wall?” I nod.
“Just inside the main entrance, to the right, third row from the top, eighth brick from the left: G.E.M. is a P.O.S. And then underneath”—she sets her fingers like she’s framing billboard—“Anonymous Donor.”
My lungs cannot get air, I’m wheezing so hard. Tears fall down my cheeks.
“That woman’s a freaking menace to society,” she huffs, dragging her paintbrush against the can’s edge.
“I don’t know. She sounds pretty awesome. And to think, you came out so level-headed.”
Hannah snorts, our raucous laughter fading. “She needs someone to bail her out of jail. Guess it’s gotta be me.”
“Wait, have you had to do that?”
“No, but there’s still time.”
Her gaze freezes on the paint can in her hand. A long swallow runs down her throat as she registers her own words.
“Another death joke she’d be proud of?” My voice is gentle. I poke her calf to try and coax a smile.
Hannah’s lips only twitch, a flash of sorrow and memories, there one second and gone the next.
Palm flattened against her lower leg, I stroke my thumb across her skin. “How much time does she have?”
“Christmas, if she’s lucky.” I barely hear it through the tightness in her chest as she turns away. “Maybe not even that long.”
Five months? I find it hard to reconcile with the woman I met two nights ago. “That’s…wow…the other night she seemed so…”
“Healthy?” Hannah finishes for me. “She has her good days, but…” A pause as she starts to paint again.
“She’s lost a lot of weight and her skin is…
” She rattles her head and sets the brush aside before climbing down.
Once both feet are on the ground, she turns to face me.
“Her skin used to be golden and now it’s…
I don’t know…lifeless? Some days she barely eats anything. ”
She shrugs one shoulder like she’s faced this a thousand times before.
Like it’s nothing new. The truth of it is a knife straight to the heart.
Lydia’s been diagnosed four times. Four times the doctor sat across from her and said, “cancer.” Chemo, hospital stays, infections, remissions, time and again, all for it to come right back.
No sane person would blame Lydia for refusing to go through that again, but it doesn’t make the pain any easier to bear for the daughter she’ll leave behind.
Here I am feeling sorry for myself and my mom while Hannah’s watching hers wither away. In the end, I’ll get to keep mine; Hannah won’t.
I respond with the only words that come. “I’m sorry.” They’re not enough, not even close.
Her cheeks lift a bit. “With my luck she’ll pop out from behind the stage at her own memorial service in a hot-pink gown and yell, ‘Psych!’”
The joke was for her and it helps a little.
A chuckle hums from her chest and fades a second later, the moment settling against the quiet.
It happens in slow motion, the gradual shift forward.
The small shuffle of her feet and dip of her head before her temple lands in the hollow between my collarbones like she just needs a safe place to breathe for a minute.
I envelop her in my arms without a second thought. Her hands curl into fists against my sternum, resting under her chin. I squeeze her into the cradle of my upper body, my shoulders forming a shield around her. My palm runs a languid path up and down her spine.
“Hope is an anchor for the soul, right?” she whispers, voice fractured. My heart soars—Nana’s words. Then she adds, “I remember.”
All I can do is hold her tighter to combat the mess of feelings that make it hard to speak. There are no words.
Eventually, some of the tension she’s holding eases.
The slight tug of her nails over the fabric of my shirt as if she needs to grab it—to find a permanent tether to this spot, this moment in time when her mom’s alive and I’m here—has me begging God to let this be it.
Let her be it. Make it so I don’t have to leave.
“Rowan?”
I hum, hand still running over her back.
“Are you single?”
A ridiculous laugh tumbles out of me and I pinch her waist. She doesn’t retreat, only burrows in deeper. “Why? You lookin’?”
She scoffs. “Me? You wish.”
The quiet pulls until I reply. “Yeah, I’m single.”
“Okay, just making sure.” Her arms slide around my waist.
“Making sure I’m not a cheater?”
“Nah, you’re too honorable for that. Just needed to know if I was gonna have to cut a bitch.”
We sink into soft laughter again, both of us in simultaneous recognition and denial of one painfully unspoken truth—the elephant in the room. This can only be whatever it is for a couple more weeks. Yet I can’t find it in me to walk away.