He’d broken that promise. Mama told me he’d died in minutes, bleeding out in the gutters on a street we’d walked down nearly every day of my young life there.
Papa...I can’t do this anymore. It hurts too much. Please take this pain away.
Even in my tequila stupor, everything was too tight—my clothes, my chest, my fists. The doorbell rang and I glanced out my bedroom window, astonished to see that it was dark. The entire day had passed me by in my heartache-induced daze.
“Hello?” I heard a familiar voice call into the apartment. Helena.
I’d used all the tissues in my room, so I bolted out the door and toward the bathroom, but she was standing in the hallway, blocking my progress.
“Oh Janjica!” she said, taking my face in her elegant, long-fingered hands. “What are we going to do with you?”
Instead of answering, I sniffed and hiccupped, my lip quivering. I thought about the tragedy that linked the two of us, and how fitting it was that she was here right now. Helena pushed the hair from my face back behind my ear. Over her shoulder, I could see Alex watching us, and I knew then that it was Alex who had called her.
“Don’t be mad at Alex,” Helena said, reading my mind—as usual. “She’s worried about you. And so am I.”
I shivered and the tears came in a rush again. Helena pulled me into a hug, and I pressed my face to her shoulder and sobbed. “I can’t forget that night, Helena. I can’t.”
She knew what I was talking about without even having to ask. “You never will…and neither will I,” she said, switching to Bosnian. “That night changed us all forever.”
She gave me a little nudge toward my bedroom. As soon as we’d entered, Alex handed me a fresh box of tissues and then shut the door behind us.
Helena sank down on the bed beside me as I rocked back and forth, fisting my hands. She gave the bare room a onceover, her eyes landing on the boxes lining the wall. In mere hours, my life had been condensed into those boxes and I was ready to move on.
“Tell me what happened…”
I inhaled a shuddery breath and let it go. “There’s a boy…and…” My voice trembled, and I glanced up at her before quickly looking away. “He’s a man, actually, but…”
Helena placed an arm around my shoulders, watching my face carefully. “Go on, Janja. Tell me about him.”
My cheeks heated and I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye, feeling oddly guilty. Like I was cheating on her…and Brock.
“Last night I, uh…I told him I loved him.”
She nodded. “And it’s the truth? Do you love him?”
That shard of glass scraped over my heart again and the air hissed from my lungs. I doubled over. “Yes. I love him. I love him so much. So much it hurts. Oh God, Helena. I’m sorry.”
Her arm tightened, pulling me back to a sitting position. “Love is nothing to apologize for. And we are not meant to love only one person in our lives. You loved Braco. And now you love this man, too. That’s not a betrayal.”
My pitiful sobs started up again, drowning out her noble speech. “He’ll die, Helena. He’ll die, just like the others. Like Papa. Like Brock.”
She inhaled sharply and reached to push my hair back from my face. “Stop this. Right now. You have the right to love a man, and you have the right to be loved. Stop hurting yourself because you lived and Braco didn’t.”
“How can you be so nice to me? I didn’t drive him home that night—”
“We’re not going through this again, Jenna,” she said, switching to English with a stern tone. “You spent two years utterly depressed, crippled by your guilt. I don’t blame you, because it was not your fault. It happened. You went home early. He got another ride…”
Her voice faded out in a sob. That sob stabbed me to the core. I squeezed my eyes shut and buried my face in my hands, but Helena pulled them away just as quickly.
“Stop hiding. Stop running away. Listen to me!” She squeezed my hands. “You are like my own daughter. You know that. I tell you all the time. The only thing worse than losing Braco would be to lose you, too.”
“But—”
“No but. You get up. You wash your face and you go to this man. You tell him how you feel, all right? You tell him you love him and want to be with him. Be brave, Janja. It takes courage to get through this life, because if you aren’t brave, then life and circumstances will grind you up into dust.”
Be brave, Janja.
My breath stung in my lungs and tears clogged my throat. My eyes were so impossibly sore, yet tears continued to pour out. I had no idea where they were coming from.