Tamales forgotten, I stormed up from the table and ran my hands viciously through my hair, hating the way it’d gotten so long—but still unwilling to go cut it because I just didn’t care to go see my barber and see the saddened look on his face when he saw me for the first time after Matias’ death.
But before I could work up too much anger, Izzy stood, too.
And then did the last thing I ever expected her to do.
She hugged me.
Threw her arms up around my neck and pulled me in close.
I inhaled deeply, and I was once again fighting to draw breath through a closing off windpipe.
Goddammit! Was it too much to ask for a little fuckin’ time?
But, the longer Izzy hugged me, the more I started to calm down. The faster the anger leeched off of me.
I blew out one final breath…and then gave up.
Wrapping my arms around her tightly, likely too hard, I hugged her to my chest and dropped my face down on top of her hair.
Her hair smelled like peaches. Peaches and cream.
Her body also fit inside of my arms perfectly.
Feelings I’d been denying since the first time I saw her roared to the surface, and all of a sudden, it wasn’t just a hug anymore. It was more. It was everything.
But before I could get too comfortable in that hug, she had to open her mouth and ruin everything.
“I need to tell you something.”
I dropped my arms from around her and lifted my head, unsure that I liked the tone of her voice.
She sounded like she was battling with something, and she really, really didn’t want to tell me that something she had to tell me.
“What?” I asked.
She backed up some more, and then reached for the other bag she’d brought with her, pulling it across the breakroom table like it was holding venomous snakes instead of the papers that I could now see since the bag’s tie had come loose.
And what I saw was familiar handwriting.
My handwriting.
I stiffened, a feeling of unease shifting through me.
Then I had my worst nightmare confirmed.
Because the letter that I’d written last week. The one that I’d written to someone that I thought was anonymous, was the first paper in a stack of similar papers—all with my handwriting.
All of them to some random fan that had become just as much of a lifeline after Matias’ death as she was before.
The letter that I’d written last week, the one that had shared how truly alone I was, was staring me straight in the face.
And there was no doubt in my mind that Izzy had read it.
Because, as I started to put two and two together, Izzy was RP’s Biggest Fan. Izzy was the person that I’d been writing to. Izzy knew everything that there was to know about me. My hopes and dreams, my worst fears come true. My entire life had been in those letters, and she knew.
She knew.
I swallowed, and then looked up at Izzy, unsure what to say.
But what I knew was that I couldn’t look at her right then.
I just…couldn’t.
“Please leave.”
Izzy’s shoulders slumped.
Then, without another word, she left, leaving everything that she’d brought with her behind in her haste to leave.
Even her jacket.
I watched her go, and all the while I wondered what that feeling in my chest was—disappointment or anger.
***
The first thing I did when I got to my empty, mausoleum of a house was go directly upstairs and find the letters I’d been getting over the last year. The moment I found the sealed lifelines, I started opening them, starting with the one on the bottom first.
It was only when I was through the fourth letter that I realized how very stupid I’d been.
I should’ve realized that my letter-writer and my Izzy were one and the same. They were both brash, said what they felt, and didn’t have the time for bullshit.
By the fourth letter, she’d also straight-up admitted who she was, too.
By the tenth letter, I was angry all over again.
Irrationally angry.
Why hadn’t she told me any of this face to face before now?
Sure, she’d given a pretty explanation as she had explained what happened and who she really was to me during my lunch break earlier, but that wasn’t the real reason.
Unfortunately, I was just too pissed off at her to ask her any more.
Lucky for me, she came looking for me. Otherwise, I might’ve held that grudge a lot longer than I had ever intended to.
***
Dear RP’s Biggest Fan,
I’m not sure this hole in my heart will ever heal. What I do know is that each and every day I wake up and he’s not here, the hole grows bigger and bigger and bigger. One day I’m afraid I’m going to wake up and the hole’s going to be so big that I’m not going to be able to pull myself up out of it and get out of bed.