Walking Heartbreak Read Online Free PDF

is.”
    “Zoe—”
    “No, listen: I just want you to forget a little bit. Lose the gloom, baby, like you did in there. Tomorrow won’t be a date, okay? We’ll just hang out.”
    I’m quiet as we pull onto my street, contemplate her suggestion. I could come with and be her chaperone. Yeah right. There’s no chaperoning Zoe.
    “We’re going to the park in plain daylight, Nadia. No candlelit dinner on a rooftop. You and Bo can watch us dry-hump on a blanket. No, kidding!” she adds when I groan and wiggle free of her embrace. “Imma gonna kiss him tho. Kisses are fine, right?”
    I hold back a smile at her silly monologue.
    “You and I. And two pretty boys in the park. Feeding ducklings. And flying kites. We’ll buy breadcrumbs for the crazy geese. They’re so dangerous!” she adds to bring my smile out all the way.
    “Oh stop,” I say, pursing my lips to hold back; I don’t think I can stomach an over-the-top victory gloat from my friend tonight if I give in.
    At my doorstep, she offers to sleep over. I’m not sure why. For me this is late, and I need my husband—alone. I want the past with him, the memories. I want to block out our future because I’d rather not deal.
    His parents come by once a month for dinner at some fancy place to make me feel better. I love them, but what can they do besides dole out money? Now they dole out money. Now, now they do. I wish they did before.
    I leave the light off when I let myself in. The neon sign across the street bathes the living room in an alien glow. The neighbors must be asleep, because it’s silent in here. So silent. Too silent.
    I swallow as I sit down and pull my feet in under me on the seat meant for lovers like us. I cross my legs and push two fingers against my eyes. I wish he were here instead of across from me. Wives are supposed to be in their husbands’ arms.
    “Do you know how much I love you?” I ask, not expecting a reply and not getting one. Heck, he knows.
    My forever, my baby.
    Under his gaze, I grab matches and light the three fresh tea lights, a citrusy scent instantly infusing the air.
    “You’d traveled so far that day. From San Francisco and aaaall the way down to sweet little Payne Point, leaving everything behind because of your bad choices.” I smile at the story he told me years ago. He’d been part groaning adolescent, part thankful that his dad had been so insistent:
    “I have an addictive personality, Nadia,” he’d said, grinning as his fingers traced my belly button. Half-heartedly, I’d pushed them away.
    “You do?”
    “Yes. Drugs, you know. Just marijuana, but then they found me with something harder in my pocket.”
    “Crack. Before you’d even tried it.”
    “Yeah. The old man. Damn, he was on me.” He chuckled, and I sat up in my bed, tall enough to kiss him. We had our ways, Jude and I, even with my grandparents around, to claim the intimacy we both craved. “Yep, Dad locked me up, called his secretary, who pinged a moving company and rented us a house. Whoosh, three days later, we were out of there. Mom and I—that look you say we had on our faces when we came into the church? Let’s just say it’s not every day you get thrown into a car and hauled off forever.”
    “And now?” I asked. “Are you a total drug addict?” I bit my lip in anticipation because over the last six months, his answer had been exhilarating variations of the same response.
    “Yeah, even Payne Point has drugs. My drug of choice is called ‘Nadia.’ It’s in ready supply—”
    I swatted him. “Shut up!”
    “—and I’m the only one who gets any. Mm-hmm, your village is okay.”
    Since I was thirteen, I’ve loved this man. Now, I look over the candles and deep into those sweet, blue, dear eyes I’ve stared into for eight years. “There’s no one like you.”

    The loss of my family still paralyzed me when my paternal grandparents took me from my country. At seven years of age, a new world met me, wide, affluent, and