The older woman’s eyes narrowed slightly as she observed Carmen for a few seconds. “Hold on to what, Carmen?” Gloria then asked. “Do you use the necklace to hold on to yourself? Or to your past?”
Carmen averted her gaze. “What difference does it make?”
“All the difference,” Gloria told her. “Holding onto yourself means using your own self as an anchor, letting yourself believe that you alone are enough to pull through something, but holding onto your past is allowing your misfortunes to define you. If so, then that necklace is no longer an anchor, is it?”
“No,” Carmen whispered, throat tightening. “No, it becomes dead weight.”
Gloria smiled. “So why do you hold onto the necklace?”
“I guess it…It reminds me of all the pain. I want it to be a reminder that I survived all these years, but whenever I look at it, all I do is remember the bad.”
“Maybe sometimes you can’t change things, Carmen,” Gloria said softly. “Did you ever consider that? That maybe the necklace won’t become an anchor, but it’ll always remain a dead weight?”
“You think I should get rid of it?”
“Do you want to get rid of it?”
“I want to be happy.”
“And what does that mean to you, Carmen? What does being happy mean?”
Carmen’s eyes flickered towards the window to her left, watching as raindrops raced each other down the glass, blurring the view of the streets outside it would’ve otherwise provided her.
“Being able to let the good things in, I guess,” Carmen murmured eventually, sighing as she relaxed into the cushions. “And learning how to let go of all that brings me down.”
“So, what’s the problem, Carmen?”
Carmen’s stomach knotted, her breath faltering as it hit her again and again and again like a punch to the gut. “I’m supposed to let in the good things,” she said in a low voice, regret lacing every word.
“Yes…” Gloria frowned, looking at her curiously.
“There was something good I’d found, something that genuinely made me happy…” Carmen’s heart paused, then resumed, stopped, then restarted all over again as the sudden realisation struck her like an arrow to the chest. “And I—I didn’t know how to let it in… So I let it go instead.”
•••
January came to an end a little faster than Carmen expected and for that, she felt a little grateful. But it also meant that Gloria had to always keep the window shut now, because unlike the on-and-off drizzles in the previous month, February brought with it a constant downpour.
“Tell me about the boy.”
That threw Carmen off guard, and it took her a good two minutes to regain her composure as she stared at Gloria with hesitancy in her demeanour.
“My cousin?” Carmen asked, all the while knowing exactly who it was Gloria was referring to. And that it most definitely wasn’t Hunter.
“No, not him. You told me he was your Achilles’ Heel, one of your weakest points.” Gloria’s dark eyes examined Carmen’s face for a fleeting moment. “I want you to tell me about the other one, the one who you said was a source of strength.”
“I don’t see the point in me talking about him. He’s not the problem here.”
Gloria smiled, her eyes patient and knowing. “You wouldn’t be here if you knew exactly what your problems were, would you?”
Carmen huffed, a panicky feeling washing over her. She didn’t want to talk about Asa. She couldn’t.
And that was exactly how she knew she should talk about him. But her lips remained shut, sewn together with threads made of steel.
“Why don’t you like talking about him, Carmen?”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” she replied matter-of-factly.
Gloria lifted both her brows at that. “No? That’s interesting, considering it took losing him for you to decide to get help.”
Carmen’s eyes tore away from watching the heavy shower outside and snapped to Gloria’s, her breath hitching.
“No, it isn’t. I’m here because of what happened at Thanksgiving.”
A soft sigh left Gloria’s mouth and she leant back in her seat, cupping her chin as she peered at Carmen.
“I thought we’ve been through this Carmen,” she said gently, but her voice still managed to be firm, not allowing Carmen to find a way out of this conversation. “Yes, you let in everything that you’d kept buried about your past after what happened at Thanksgiving. And yes, that was what made you realise you needed to talk about it to someone like me, but you didn’t take that step, did you? Even after that night, you didn’t tell your dad you were thinking of getting help.”
Carmen shook her head, fingers playing with each other as she felt a lump rise in her throat. “No,” she said hoarsely.
“So what did finally make you take the next step? What made you realise you didn’t want to go living like that for the rest of your life?”
Carmen’s vision blurred and that lump in her throat grew to the point that it became quite painful. “Losing him,” she choked out. “Losing Asa made me decide enough was enough.”
“So, tell me then, Carmen.” Gloria’s tone was gentler this time. “If he was an important person to you that losing him was a wakeup call, do you really believe there’s nothing to talk about when it comes to him?”
“No,” Carmen mumbled, then surprising herself and Gloria too, she suddenly cracked a smile. “I could go on talking about him, to be honest.”
Gloria tilted her head to the side. “Is that why you’re here? For him?”
Carmen’s smile faded, and she knitted her brows together really hard, feeling her stomach coil into a tight ball before the truth dawned on her. Clarity uncoiled the knot in her stomach, easing her nerves and allowing Carmen’s lips to form a peaceful, self-content smile.
“No,” she said softly, but decisively. “No,
