Page 36 of Fixed Up Ever After
“Hey, I’m only good at giving other people perspective. My life is a shit show.” She shrugged. “But now you know why I have been on edge all day and had a panic attack. Thank you for everything. I've never had a panic attack in front of anyone but my therapist before. You handled it well.”
“Camilia sometimes has moments like that. We call it her big feelings. I think she got it from her mother. Estella had bad anxiety, so I tried to learn ways to make it easier for her.”
“You don’t talk about her. Estella,” Lola said softly and Javi's body stiffened. It wasn’t as if he didn’t talk about Estella. No one ever brought her up and asked about her. He didn’t have many friends to confide in and he didn’t like the way people looked at him with pity in their eyes. Like he was the one who died and not her.
A soft hand wrapped around his own and he realized he had been silent for a beat too long. “You don’t have to speak about her. I just thought since you saw me ugly cry, I could return the favor.” Her smile was delicate, but she didn’t push. She didn’t need to. Javi found himself wanting to talk about her.
“Estella was my high school sweetheart. We met in middle school and hit it off. By ninth grade we were inseparable. When we graduated high school, she went to school for nursing and I started in construction alongside my dad. I wanted to help her pay off her loans and we wanted to start a family eventually.”
He remembered the exact day Estella had gotten into nursing school. He had come home from a late-night shift and found Estella curled up on the couch crying over her laptop. Javi’s mind immediately went to someone dying and ran to her, pulling her into his arms. But she pushed him away and showed him the acceptance letter she received. They were both crying after that.
“A year later she got really sick, so I took her to the doctor. Turns out we weren’t as safe as what we thought we were and she was pregnant.”
“Who picked Camilia’s name? It’s beautiful.” Lola smiled, squeezing his hand.
“Thank you, and Estella did. It was her grandmother’s name. Estella spent nearly a year with our little girl before she was taken from us.”
Lola’s eyes filled with unshed tears. Her heart was just so damn big and he loved that about her. He just didn’t want her crying for him. “If you don’t mind me asking, what happened?”
It was a question he had to answer and hear hundreds of times, but it never got easier. He could recite her death in his sleep for how many times he played it back in his head. “Estella had just dropped Camilia off at my dad’s house. He agreed to watch Camilia while I worked and Estella went to school for nursing. She only had a semester left.
“It was a rainy day, bad conditions on the road. From what I’m told, she had stopped at a stoplight and the light turned green. She went to go, but a semi-truck off to her left had lost control of his vehicle or something was wrong with his brakes. I’m not sure which. Whatever it was, he sped right through the light and straight into Estella’s car. The first responders said she died instantly, so at least she didn’t suffer. The worst part was she wasn’t even supposed to be on that road. I should have taken Camilia to my parents that morning, but she let me sleep in. If only…”
“Oh Javi.” Tears rolled down Lola’s eyes. He was surprised to find his own cheeks wet. Lola moved so she was in his lap, arms around his neck. “You can’t blame yourself. It wasn’t your fault. You had no way of knowing this would happen. Please don’t beat yourself up over this.”
He had heard that numerous times from his family. He didn’t think the pain or the guilt would ever go away, which is why he worked extra hard to make sure Camilia was well looked after and loved. It was hard not to feel like he took her mother away.
“Javi, look at me.” Lola cupped his face and forced him to turn in her direction. Their faces were inches apart. He could lean down and brush his lips against hers, but he held firm. “You are a good man and a great father. Camilia is so lucky to have you. What happened to Estella was a horrible accident. It never should have happened and I’m so sorry it did, but you can’t blame yourself. You can’t live with that guilt.”
Healing was a weird process. It wasn’t linear and sometimes it didn’t make any sense. One second you were fine and the next you were crying in the arms of a beautiful woman. And he fucking hated crying. It wasn’t so much due to toxic masculinity but more because it always made his eyes itchy and his nose run.
“I’ll make you a deal,” he said, wiping his eyes with the back of his hands. “I’ll work on forgiving myself if you work on not letting their opinions dictate your feelings about yourself.”
“Well fuck, Javi. That’s asking for a hell of a lot.” But even as she said it, she held out her pinky to his. “Pinky promise?”
Javi wrapped his pinky around hers. “Pinky promise,” he repeated, leaning forward to press a soft kiss to her hand. She smiled at his touch, letting her fingers linger against his before she slowly pulled away.
“Now that’s enough soul-searching for one day. How about we take advantage of my father’s credit card and order a shit ton of snacks and rent a few movies?” She grinned and reached for the hotel’s phone.
“Now you’re speaking my language. Let’s get our own party started.” And that was exactly what they did. Lola ordered far too much food and they watched the first two movies in theLord of the Ringsseries after Javi found out she had never seen them before. By the third movie, Lola had fallen asleep on the bed and Javi covered her up. He went around to turn off the lights and television before making himself a nice bed on the couch. Not five minutes later he was asleep with thoughts of a certain big-hearted woman on his mind.
CHAPTER23
Lola
Lola awoke the following morning to the sound of soft snores and an empty bed. She was still in the robe from yesterday and must have fallen asleep during one of theLord of the Ringsmovies, though she couldn’t remember which. They all blurred together after a while.
Although the bed was huge, she only occupied a small portion of it, not once moving throughout the night. The bed would have been more than accommodating for the both of them, but she had fallen asleep before they discussed it. Javi, always the gentleman, took the couch and she doubted it was as comfortable as the feather mattress she was atop of.
A soft buzzing sound grabbed her attention. Her phone lay on the bedside table, but it was not plugged in. She hadn’t had the chance to get her charger out last night and she was sure it was almost dead. Reaching for it, Lola brought the buzzing phone to her ear and saw that it was her mother calling. She groaned, nearly letting it go to voicemail, but thought better of it last minute and answered.
“Mother, hi,” she greeted her as formally as if the Queen of England had called her.
There was a pause on the other end and then the sound of shuffling papers. Knowing her mother, she was still neck-deep in wedding planning, even days before the actual event. “Good heavens, I hope I didn’t wake you. It’s nearly noon.”
One quick glance at her watch told her that yes, she had slept until noon. What the actual fuck? She hadn’t slept that late since she was a teenager. Flying and breaking down in the middle of her hotel room really took it out of her. “Oh, I was just lounging,” she lied, “did you need something?”
“Yes, I wanted to call and remind you that dinner tonight will be at the second-floor restaurant. Do you need me to send someone to retrieve you when it’s time? I know how forgetful you can be when it comes to things like this.”
