Southern Storms (Compass 1)

Our relationship, our marriage, our promises were over.

He tilted his head in my direction and seemed unfazed by it all. “Maybe you should go somewhere else tonight. For a while, actually. A few weeks, a few months… Go figure something out because you staying here isn’t going to work out anymore.”

“Where will I go?” I choked out, confusion hitting me fast.

“I don’t know, Kennedy. Go to your sister or something.”

Yoana…

I hadn’t seen her in over a year. What would it look like having me show up after all this time without a word? What would she say? Why would she give me comfort after all this time, after I’d gone MIA? All she received from me were text messages here and there telling her I was okay even though I wasn’t. She owed me nothing but still kept giving me everything. She’d write me long messages telling me about her life, keeping me up to date on any and everything. All I could do was send her a few emojis every now and again because while her life was moving forward, mine was standing still.

The last message she’d sent was about her honeymoon, which she was finally about to take after two years of marriage. The one before that was requesting that I come to visit. Before that? She left a long voice message about how she and Nathan flipped a house and were about to put it on the market. Since the two of them had gotten married, they’d both been so into the idea of flipping houses. The fact that they were able to work together and still be so happy reminded me so much of our parents. Mama and Daddy had been the same exact way.

Penn and me? We couldn’t have been more opposite. When I told him I wanted to be an author, he laughed at me, telling me I didn’t have the right education to do so. When I received my first book deal, he said it was luck. When my royalty checks came in, he told me not to spend them because more probably wouldn’t come.

Penn walked to his office and came back with a package of paperwork. “I was going to give these to you before the accident, but I held off. Just sign on the dotted line and leave them in the front hall when you go.”

Then he exited the room, leaving me sitting there with my too emotional self as he placed a nail in the coffin of our marriage. Divorce papers.

I signed them all as my chest ached.

I packed my things into three suitcases, taking only the important things, only the items that meant the world to me. Then I called myself a taxi and began the forty-five-minute ride to see a sister who didn’t have a clue I’d be showing up on her front porch to beg her to let me in.

After the driver dropped me off at her home in the town of Rival, Kentucky, I dragged my suitcases to the front porch.

A sigh of relief washed through me when I saw their car parked in the driveway.

I hurried and began knocking on the door. It was past ten at night, and there was a good chance Yoana was already sleeping. She’d never been a night owl, always an early riser.

“Who is that?” a deep voice questioned—Nathan’s, of course.

I spoke up a little. “Yoana, it’s me,” I choked out, sobs sitting heavily in my throat. “It’s Kennedy. I, well, I need…” I swallowed down the fear in my chest and shut my eyes. “I need you.”

The door flew open and there she was, standing there in her pajamas, looking at me with the most concerned stare ever.

My older sister looked like a goddess even now when she’d been awakened in the middle of the night. Gosh, I needed her. I needed her so, so much it made my stomach physically ache to see her eyes staring back at me…the eyes that looked so much like Mama’s.

“Are you okay?” she asked, and those three words cracked the shell of my hurts wide open. The sincerity in her voice hurt me more than I could say—the care, the gentleness, the love. I’d spent the past year lying to my sister about my well-being, out of stupidity and struggling with internal demons, and still, without a moment of hesitation, she was asking me if I was okay.

My lips parted, but no words came out. Tears began flooding my eyes, and I covered my face as I sobbed uncontrollably into the palms of my hands. “I’m sorry, Yoana,” I cried, shaking my head in embarrassment and pain. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

She didn’t seem to need my apologies. She didn’t hammer me with questions about my situation. She didn’t scold me for pushing her away. Instead, she stepped forward, wrapped her arms around me, and held me so tightly in her grip.