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Her head fell back in the chair and I noticed her hair was thinning to the point I could see parts of her scalp through the wispy strands She lifted a hand like it weighed a thousand pounds and let it flutter uselessly between us "I’ood wife I do what I’m told God will reward e when it becomes difficult"

That wasfroe, Mo to die if you stay with him"

"He loves me He needs me" Her voice was thready and weak but I could hear that she believed this, really, honestly believed it

"Mom … the only person that man loves is himself When you love someone, you take care of them, you treasure them, and you put their happiness before your own The only person Dad has ever taken care of is hi you to eat so away and he isn’t doing a da to aze shifted to Wheeler and widened slightly "You can’t be here My husband would not approve of you being in our ho your skin is a sin You do not alter the vessel you were given by the Lord"

"Is she for real?" He sounded flabbergasted and slightly disgusted

I sighed "Unfortunately, she is very real Mo better, you can be a grandht kind of family" I seriously doubted Salem would let this wo desperate and ti out "You deserve better than this I want more for you for the rest of your life than for you to be Dad’s doorodly woman The Lord will provide forhe’s going to provide is a place in hell, next to Dad, which is where he’s going to end up for letting you kill yourself over him"

One of Wheeler’s hands fell heavily onin circles and she’s not listening We’ve got to cut our losses here and go, honey"

I veheative and leaned down to put my hands on my mother’s frail and bony shoulders "I can’t leave you here I can’t leave you with hiain and she turned her face back toward the"This is where I belong"

Wheeler pulledchest "She has options and she knows that now She can call you if she changes her mind and wants out We can drop by and visit with that sheriff and let hi on here He seeht be willing to stick his neck out to ht" His lips touched my ear and I shuddered as tears started to slide down my cheeks "You can’t save someone that doesn’t want to be saved, Poppy There are soed because there’s been too much time and decay You let her know she’s not alone and that’s all you can do"

Unable to see out of the sheen of aze, I whispered a broken, "Bye, loomy room

We were in the hallhen I heard her softly call out, "I would love a picture of irl, Poppy, you alere"

I was a good girl but that wasn’t enough to get her to go withwouldone last time "If you need me, Mom, find a way to let ive up and accept this as her horrible reality didn’t mean that I had to

Wheeler

I was stretched out on uy that brought it in toldfrom the rear axle What he failed tothe wrong way and had bent and torqued the da that looked like a modern art sculpture I would never understand why a custo their part in what they fucked up would alsoto require a whole new back end and it wasn’t going to be cheap

Swearing underto have to go up on a lift so I could assess the full dae and it ell into February, so the ce across it even for just a fewinstructions to a couple of ht of a familiar head of salt-and-pepper hair I hadn’t heard from Zak since I confir ready to start work on it I assuone back to California and our paths wouldn’t cross again, so needless to say, I was a little surprised to see hi at the now painted Hudson like it was a rare and priceless piece of art

I cleanedout of my back pocket andHe had his hands shoved deep in the pockets of his canvas coat and his expression was set in serious lines The previous two tilasses; now he didn’t When he turned to look at me as I approached, I faltered a step and ca back at me were eyes that were the same identical, unusual pale blue as my own Suddenly he didn’t just look familiar … he looked like family

I felt my hands curl into fists at my sides as we stared at each other until he broke the silence "Wanted to make my way back before the holidays so we could talk, but my wife isn’t in the best of health, so I couldn’t leave her alone" He took his hand out of one of his pockets and rubbed the back of his neck "You did some spectacular ith this car, kid Looks better than some of the ones I’ve worked on"

"Fuck the car Who the hell are you and why are you in e?" I crossed my arms over my chest and narrowed my eyes at hi to go well for you" I felt like there was a hive of angry bees buzzing under my skin I could hear each beat of my heart between my ears and every breath I took and exhaled sounded super loud and ragged in the space between us