Page 59 of Dear Future Husband (The Dearly Written #1)

Maybelle

Trey.

He’d been the first thing I felt, saw, and smelled when I woke up. But just like last time I woke up in a hospital bed, my head hurt, my body ached, and the confusion was almost unbearable.

Except this time, I had time to collect myself. I could take in my surroundings, remember the last moments before unconsciousness took me and... Everything else.

Each memory, detail, dream and nightmare were back in their designated files.

Then I saw the book.

My precious journal in Trey’s hand. It was important to me before the return of my memories. I understood the sacredness of its contents, but now it was like being reunited with an old friend.

I held to it desperately as Trey and I snuck out of the hospital. We didn’t think the hospital would actually bar me from leaving. Trey took me not wanting to talk to people and my desire to be home as soon as possible very seriously. So, he decided that sneaking me out was the best option.

Before running, he mentioned it would be best if I wore something other than the open-back hospital gown. I agreed. He offered his hoodie, that skated past my mid-thigh. It was all we had in terms of modesty and disguise.

Trey was timid when I asked him to help me remove the gown. He softly undid the ties and made an extra effort not to touch my skin with his. As the gown slipped from my limbs, I noticed his eyes were deliberate in their focus to land on anything but my body.

When I was finally standing in only my underwear, I didn’t shiver against the chill of the room.

I didn’t cower with embarrassment when his sad green eyes finally met mine.

I mechanically followed the way he guided his hoodie over my head.

Then let him pull the hood up to hide my face from the hospital staff.

I knew I scared Trey when I retreated from him. I knew I made him unsure of what to do or how to act. But I needed a moment. I needed time because I was struggling to differentiate between fiction and real-life. I remembered jumping from the vehicle when that semi-truck crashed into us.

But I could also remember many moments after that.

Blissful, perfect, precious moments I didn’t have the right words to explain.

Then I was awake. I was here.

My mind felt like a mess, my body ached, my skin burned where it had been viciously gripped, and my heart felt hollow.

Honestly, I think my heart was just unsure it had the strength to feel, the courage to let everything in all at once.

I needed time and what helped me not feel guilty for taking that time was that I knew Trey wanted me to take it.

It was obvious in the way he was cautious with me, gentle in the way he spoke.

He was gifting me the space and ability to choose without pushing his needs on me.

“Follow me, May.”

He beckoned me forward, out to the parking lot and through the front doors. He didn’t lead me to the Jeep though. It was Chelsea’s car I recognized in the parking lot.

“Where’s your—” I started, then remembered the keys I was trusted with and the chaos that later ensued.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” I mumbled.

Trey’s smile was soft, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “You have nothing to be sorry for. I’ll get new keys soon.”

I hopped into the passenger seat of Chelsea’s car, and Trey buckled my belt for me. I still hadn’t put down the journal I had clutched in my hands, and I think he wanted to make sure I didn’t have to.

This journal acted as my life raft, my anchor in the storm of my childhood. Now it felt like it was the one thing keeping me afloat. Like if I let go, I would sink and drown under all the feelings and memories.

I was desperately trying to allow them in as a steady trickle and not the tirade of chaos it had the capacity of being.

The drive to San Francisco was long and it was silent. Even at pit stops, we didn’t talk, but the silence was the same as it always was with him. It was safe.

I was safe.

I woke up from my short sleep in the early evening. I even had the chance to watch the sun in its descent behind the horizon. When we finally reached my home, the California sun was still asleep, hiding behind the smoggy blanket of stars.

Trey didn’t have his keys Liam had gifted to him, but I remembered where we kept an extra key.

Atop the red door frame, just below the black and white sign that read, Mason .

A sign I finally understood. A sign that welcomed me home.

A signal to all weary souls who lost their way that they finally made it back home.

When we opened the door, I had to bite back the emotion that ached in the back of my throat. My mother’s beautiful home was dirtied with neglect. The home she built for her children. A haven she created to help heal her babies from a lifetime of hurt.

The smell was still the same, though. Almost as strong as if mom had just lit a scented candle of citrus, cinnamon, and vanilla. Letting it burn away the scents of our past.

I cautiously stepped into the house with Trey right there with me.

“I want to clean it,” I whispered as I turned to him. “Will you help me?”

He didn’t hesitate. “Of course.”

We didn’t sleep that night or that day. We didn’t speak either. We cleaned and cleaned and cleaned.

Trey started out on the opposite side of the house, keeping his distance as he tidied. I kept to my area, mentally working through the last couple days with myself. I let that trickle of feelings flood through me.

I had to keep reminding myself that I was safe. That no monsters could come crawling from the dark corners of the world. My demons were gone. I defeated them.

I fought in the battle, and I won.

The memory of vengeful hands ceased plaguing me. Instead, I held onto the one thought I had when I jumped from the car. The same thought I had as I took Liam’s hand, teetering on the edge of one life and the next.

I want to live . It was a new anthem my body, my mind, my heart and soul sang to with renewed vigor.

I can’t explain the experience I had after I accepted Liam’s hand and leapt from the car.

All I knew was my mind hadn’t been so dark or quiet those hours I rested.

And the company that was with me understood the hopeful song my being sang to.

I want to live.

I want to live.

I want to live.

If I listened long enough, I wasn’t alone in my singing. If anything, I knew without a doubt that I would never be alone again in this life I vowed to love—to live.

After a long while of recovering my home, I found myself drifting closer to where Trey was hard at work. He was so focused on his area. He didn’t speak to me. But I noticed the subtle glances at me from afar.

When I looked back at him, he didn’t immediately tear his gaze from mine. Instead, he smiled. I smiled back. Then we returned to work.

At some point in the next day, when the sun had already grown bright in the sky, breaking through the windows, I watched him.

Trey’s lips were tight as he concentrated on wiping down a countertop layered in dust. I studied those lips.

The lips I had kissed and the lips that kissed my—my everything.

I had seen that body that ripples and swells against the confines of his clothing.

Trey Turner, in all his glory, had seen every single inch of me, had worshipped and caressed every bit of my skin.

The skin that was now on fire as both my worlds collided before me, leaving me breathless.

“Mayhem?”

My focus tore up from his grinning lips as I looked at him. I couldn’t help the twitch of a smile at the corner of my mouth as my eyes met his.

I really, really liked that nickname.

“Trey,” I answered.

His smile grew a smidge more. “Are you okay?”

I nodded. “I’m a little hungry,” I admitted, and his small grin grew into a full smirk.

“I have some snacks out in the car,” he offered.

“Pop tarts?”

“Of course.”

We silently dined on pop tarts after that. Smiling when we made eye contact, but we didn’t talk again, not until later that night. When we both stepped back from our work and admired the clean home before us .

It was like I never left. Like Mom and Liam could walk back in through the front door at any moment. The cherry on top was the candle Trey salvaged from a storage closet and lit with a lighter he found.

It smelt of soft flowers, tart oranges and a little like… hope.

“May,” he said, and I turned to him.

I was no longer dressed in his hoodie. Earlier I spilled water all down the front of it when I was readying to mop. I changed myself into a lightweight pair of shorts and a soft, blue, cotton tank. Then I braided my hair back into a long rope down my back.

“Yes, Trey.”

He wore jeans and a fitted navy-blue tee, his tan skin a beautiful color against the fabric. He took a step toward me, and my breath caught.

“Are you okay?” he asked me again.

He was nervous.

The Trey Turner was nervously talking to me, but he knew me, every bit of me.

He had read my journal. My beautiful journal I safely stowed in my old bedroom, waiting for the moment I was ready to gift it back to the man who stood in front of me.

My blush became scorching as I recalled him claiming that journal was his.

That I was his.

I couldn’t keep up with the molding of my life before the memory loss and after. It was all a lot.

He took another couple of steps forward and was now very close.

Kissing distance close.

“Maybelle.”

My eyes snapped up from his lips back to his eyes and a half smile pulled at his features.

Being this close, I finally noticed the bruising of exhaustion under his eyes.

The weariness of his smile. This poor boy had gone through hell and back in the last couple of days.

I could see every bit of the pain and trepidation in his movements as he spoke.

“I’m okay,” I whispered.