Page 36 of Shattered By the Currents

Raven leaned her hip against the counter. “But you also live here because you enjoy it, don’t you?”

“Do I enjoy having people make my meals and clean my apartment? Yes. Do I like the daily reminder that I’m slowly losing my mind? Not so much.”

Her stomach dropped. “Mom?—”

“It’s okay, honey. I’ve accepted what’s happening to me. Admitting it out loud is actually therapeutic.”

God, her mother was amazing. And so incredibly strong.

Her mom handed her a piece of cake.

Raven frowned at the butter knife sitting beside the slice.

She waited for her mother to leave the room and sit on the couch before swapping the knife for a fork. It was the little thingsthat really upset Raven. Little things that would keep getting worse.

“Dad said you had a bad morning the other day,” Raven started gently as she joined her mother on the couch.

“I don’t remember much about it. I never do. It’s like this gray fog. But your father is so good to me.”

“He’s a good man.”

A spark lit her mother’s eyes. “What about you and Connor?”

So her mother forgot who she was some days, but she didn’t forget Connor?

Raven stuck her fork into the cake. “There’s not much to tell. He’s just a friend.” A friend who knew she was homeless. A friend who’d also been sitting in front of the community center every night for the last week. And if it wasn’t him, it was one of his teammates, which was absolutely his doing.

Her mother eyed her. “Are you ready, honey?”

“For what?”

“To move on from Xander.”

His name made the fine hairs on her arms stand on end, but not in a good way. “I don’t know. Idoknow that I’ll be okay if I never see him again.”

Her mother tilted her head. “I wish you would tell me the full story between you two.”

“I ha?—”

“Don’t. I don’t want lies to sit between us. I know whatever happened must be bad if you don’t think you can tell me. You think I can’t handle it. But I can. And I hope one day you’ll trust me with the truth.”

She swallowed the lump in her throat. Once upon a time, she’d told her mother everything. That was before her diagnosis. Before her mind had become so fragile.

They spent the next hour chatting before her dad got back from his physical therapy session. She was just leaving when her mother stopped her. “Wait. I forgot, this came for you.”

Raven frowned at the large envelope. She turned it over. No return address.

A sick feeling immediately churned in her belly. “Why would it come here?”

“I’m not sure. Maybe it’s someone local who knows we’re here?” Her mother patted her arm. “Drive safe, honey.”

She nodded before moving out to her car. The sun was just starting to set. She was halfway across the parking lot when something sounded to her right. The clatter of keys dropping?

She stopped and looked in that direction. There were a handful of parked cars, but as far as she could see, no one was around.

Air skittered from her chest, and she started walking again, faster this time, like she was trying to outrun a shadow.

The second she reached her car, she slid behind the wheel and locked the doors.