Page 1 of When the Walls Come Down
“Shit, shit, shit!” I chanted as I navigated the sidewalk, juggling a Jenga tower of my belongings. “A little help here!”
My brother chuckled from somewhere nearby. “Nah, I’m good.”
“You know being a jerk isn’t going to make me stay, right?”
“Maybe not, but if you break your leg or get stuck cleaning forty thousand palettes of eyeshadow off the sidewalk, you probably won’t be able to leave, either.”
God, I loved Heath, but when I’d asked him to help me move, sitting around cruise-directing without lifting the first damn finger wasn’t exactly what I’d had in mind. I should have asked his wife, Clare, instead. She wouldn’t have been able to help me get my mother’s old mahogany trunk down the stairs, but she also wouldn’t have spent the day guilt-tripping me, either.
“I’m impressed you knew they were palettes. Has Tessa already started hitting you up for makeup?” I grunted, hoisting the stack of boxes into the back of my Chevy Traverse.
Heath finally sprang into action and gave them a shove before they had the chance to tumble out. “She’s not even six yet. She’s got forty more years before she’s allowed to wear lip gloss. I figure they’ll cover eyeshadow when I’m in the grave.”
It should be noted that when it came to Heath’s sisters, his wife, or his daughters, my brother was a caveman. Obnoxious as it was, I couldn’t blame him. In a way, he’d been forced into that role at a young age. When our mother died, the five of us kids had ranged in age from four to sixteen—Heath being the oldest and the only boy. I was the youngest, and to be honest, I barely remembered my parents at all.
I did, however, remember Heath kicking my father out after he’d lost himself down a bottle of Jack.
I also remembered Heath brushing my hair before picture day, putting Band-Aids on my scrapes when I’d fallen off my bike, and forcing me to eat carrots every night at dinner because he’d read that they helped eyesight and we couldn’t afford glasses for me until he graduated from the police academy.
In all the ways that mattered, Heath was the only parent I’d ever had, and as he slammed the hatch to my clunker SUV three times before it caught, I knew watching me drive away was going to break his heart.
Don’t get me wrong. He wanted the world for me. He just wanted the world to be around the corner and within his reach.
“Come on. Don’t go.” He stared at me with sadness crinkling the corners of his baby-blue eyes, which matched my own. He added, “Say the word and I’ll unload all of this right now.”
“Please don’t start this again,” I whispered, tucking a long, blond curl behind my ear.
“I’m not starting anything, Maggie. There’s no reason why you have to leave your entire family behind and move all the way to San Francisco. You’re a creative director. Last I checked, they have a ton of brands who need help in Atlanta.”
“Yes, but none of them gave me ninety-seven thousand reasons and an insane benefits package to stay.” I patted his chest as I walked past him, my heart quietly breaking right along with his.
It wasn’t like I wanted to leave. There was something to be said about having my whole chaotic family within a hundred-mile radius. Jenna, Laurie, and Melanie were all married with kids. Add Heath, Clare, and his two girls into the mix and our family barbeques felt more like a circus. I needed a drink and two Tylenol each time I left, but I was going to miss the hell out of those crazy afternoons.
I couldn’t stay though. I’d promised myself that, no matter how terrifying it might be, I was going to get the hell out of Atlanta as soon as I graduated college. I owed my mother that much. It had taken over a year to gather the courage to actually follow through with that promise, but it was finally time.
“Come on,” I said. “I need your help carrying Mom’s trunk down.”
Heath wasn’t ready to drop it, but luckily, he followed after me. “Cost of living in San Francisco is ridiculous. Ninety-seven grand there is the equivalent of making well into six figures in Atlanta. Hell, what Roman offered you came with a six percent four-oh-one K match, health benefits, and an allotment for a home office. You’d be the richest twenty-four-year-old kid in the state.”
I took the stairs two at a time. “Give it a rest. I have an hour to get on the road or my entire timeline is going to be jacked.”
A groan rumbled in his chest, but his footsteps grew louder. “Why are you so damn stubborn?”
“Because you raised me.”
“See, I knew that was going to bite me in the ass one day.”
