Falling for the Genie (Genie's Love, Book 1) (18 page)

Two days have passed since I wished Sebastian back to his home. I’ve been doing okay, not great, but better than I thought I’d do. Distracting myself with work helps a little, but when I enter my apartment and find it empty, the loneliness suffocates me. There’s no Sebastian sprawled on my couch watching his game shows. There’s no lamp on my night table. No guy kissing me and making me feel things I’ve never felt before.

There’s just…me.

The night after he left, I couldn’t sleep. All I saw before me was my genie’s smiling face. All I felt were his hands roaming over my body. I sat by the window and looked out. I’m not sure what I was hoping to see. Maybe some sort of sign that he got home okay. For all I know, he could have been sentenced to death the moment he set foot on his world.

Everything in this apartment reminds me of him. When I step into the kitchen, all I think about is him tasting my food and loving it. And of course getting sick. Terrible as that was, it broke the wall between us, brought us closer together. When I lie in bed, my hand automatically pats the spot next to me, expecting Sebastian to be there.

I’ll never forget him, but will I find another guy? Do I even
want
to find another guy? I’m not sure. I’m not sure about anything at the moment.

I sent him home, so I can’t be upset with myself. But I am, no matter how much I try to order my heart to let him go. Hopefully, he’s back with his own kind, with his sister who needs him. It would have been selfish of me to keep him here.

I’ve read my journal countless times, reliving every moment, every touch, every kiss. I don’t know why I torture myself. I just miss him so much.

After working—or trying to work on—dinner, I head to the window and peer out. I can try to convince myself as much as I want, but who am I kidding? I’m not doing okay. I’m a complete mess. How am I going to get over this?

The doorbell rings, forcing me to push my thoughts away. Macy is standing at the other side of the door. “Guess who,” she says.

After inviting her inside, we sit on my couch. “Hey,” she says.

I wring my fingers together in my lap. I haven’t told her about Sebastian yet, but she knows something’s up. She tried to get me to talk these past few days, but I pretended to be busy with work. And I might have been avoiding her texts. It’s not that I’m embarrassed or anything like that. I just…once we talk about it, it makes it more real. That he’s gone and will never come back. In my bubble, he’s on vacation, visiting his world for a bit before returning to me. Stupid, I know.

“I’ve been giving you your space,” she says after about a minute. “But I can’t stand seeing you like this. Please, can we talk about it?”

“Don’t you and Andy have something—”

She grabs my hand. “No, all the wedding prep can wait. I want you to talk to me. Is it your mom? Is it the genie?” She remembers him, too. I guess I was right—the past hasn’t changed on Earth.

I keep my gaze on the rug. “I don’t want to talk about it.” I don’t want to face the reality.

She’s quiet. Her lips are pressed together. I hate shutting her out like this, but maybe the truth is that I’m scared of her telling me
I told you so
.

Macy turns on the TV to a show none of us are interested in. I paste my eyes on it just so I won’t think about the guy who’s no longer in my life. Tears enter my eyes, and my fingers are too paralyzed to wipe then off.

Ten minutes later, Macy turns to me. She must not have noticed the tears before because her eyes widen. “He left, didn’t he? You made your last wish.”

I nod, blinking and causing the tears to spill down my cheeks. The next second, I’m in Macy’s arms. “I’m so, so sorry. Are you going to be okay?”

I shake my head. “I don’t think I
can
be okay.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

I push some hair behind my ears. “Aren’t you going to say, ‘Told you so?””

“Hell no. I mean, I wish you would have listened to me and spared yourself all this pain, but you needed to do what you felt was right in your heart.”

I sweep my arm across my eyes. “At least I got to spend some time with him before…before…”

She squeezes my arm. “I’m here whenever you need to talk. I’ll spend the night even.”

“But you and Andy are going to that opera—”

“Doesn’t matter. He’ll understand.”

“No, I won’t let you miss the show you’ve been talking about for months. As I recall, you’ve scored awesome seats that you’ll never, ever, give up. Not even for the president and First Lady.”

She laughs. “I did say that. But so what? Things are different now. You just lost the man of your dreams.”

I place my hand on hers. “And I appreciate you wanting to be here for me, but the truth is that I need to learn to move on. He’s not coming back. He’s never going to…” My throat clogs up. “Come back.” I shake my head and cough. “Staying with me won’t really accomplish anything. You’ll upset Andy and you might regret missing this show for the rest of your life. I’m not going to allow that. I’ll be fine.” I force a smile. “I’ll probably lie in bed all evening and watch some action movies.” No more romance. I don’t think I’ll be able to stomach another romance movie or book for a while.

Macy twists her nose. “But you can’t be alone.”

“That’s exactly what I want.”

She crosses her arms over her chest. “No.”

“Yes.”

We bicker back and forth like kids until I say, “You know I can kick you out, right? This
is
my apartment.”

She huffs.

“Please, Macy. Let me wallow by myself. I don’t want to ruin your night. You’re engaged to an awesome guy. Don’t push him aside because of me.”

She stares at the TV, contemplating my words. She’s stubborn and will argue until I give in. But I won’t this time. As much as I love being with her, I want to be alone, too. Sebastian left me, not her. Why shouldn’t she enjoy herself with her man?

“Fine,” she says after a little while. “I’ll go to the show. But I’m spending the night here and I will
not
take no for an answer.”

I can’t argue with that.

Saturday morning, I find myself standing outside the house I grew up in. The house I was thrown out of no more than a few weeks ago.

Macy and I had been spending a lot of time together. She’s great and I appreciate all she’s doing for me, but the void inside me still isn’t filling up. Maybe it never will, and I’ll need to learn to live with that. I told Macy the truth about where Sebastian came from. She couldn’t believe there is another world out there, a magical world.

The more we talked about him, the more the void grew. As I lay in bed last night, a thought knocked me on the head. I lost Sebastian, who came to be one of the most important people in my life. I had no control over that. Whether I sent him home or made a wish, he would have left me. But there’s one thing I
can
have control over: my relationship with my mother. I told myself I would not let another person walk out of my life. My mother decided to shut me out, but I’m not going to give up. I need her. We need each other.

As I stand in front of the house, my heart pounds in my head. The last time I was here, I had Sebastian with me. That caused some of the nerves to disappear. I’m not sure I can do this without him. But I need to. It’s going to be hard. I might get rejected more times than I can count, but I’m not going to give up. She’s the only family I have left.

Taking a deep breath, I ring the doorbell. I brought my key with me, but I don’t want to barge in unannounced.

No one opens the door. I shift from one foot to the other and bite my lower lip. I’m a little terrified to step inside. How much more pain and rejection can my heart handle? If my mother tells me to get out of her life again, I’m pretty sure my body will lose all feeling.

A part of me reassures myself that she’s not home, while the other part argues that she
is
home. Glancing up, I see the light is on in her bedroom.

I wait for about three minutes and ring the bell a few more times before deciding to muster my courage and stab my key into the lock. As I’m about to do so, the door swings open, revealing a woman who looks somewhat different from the woman I saw a few weeks ago. Her hair isn’t pulled into a lazy bun, her eyes are a little haggard, but there is some light in them. She’s wearing a green top and jeans, not that ratty robe.

When she notices me standing there, she freezes. We just stare at each other, my breathing getting heavy, my hands feeling clammy.

“Lily,” she whispers before pulling me into her arms. For a second, I’m too shocked to move, but after a bit, I return the hug, shutting my eyes and letting the tears slide down my cheeks.

We don’t say or do anything, just stay in each other’s arms. With hers tight around me, I feel my mom tremble. She mutters words that I can’t hear under her breath. I have so many questions to ask, but words won’t come. They don’t need to at the moment. This is enough. Hell, this is more than I ever expected.

After what feels like days, my mother slowly draws back. Her eyes are red and wet with tears. She tries to get rid of them, but they’re too strong. “Lily,” she says. “I’m so glad you came.” She rests her hand on my arm and invites me inside.

The house looks cleaner than it did the last time I was here. It smells like home, like the house I grew up in. My mother and I sit down on the couch. She takes my hands, and we sit like that. Until she says, “I was going to call you.” She shakes her head. “I was waiting for the right time. I…” She runs her hand through her hair. “I’ve been seeing a therapist for a few days now.” She strokes my cheek. “About a week after you left, all I thought about was what you said to me. How I would lose another daughter. I didn’t want that to happen, but I didn’t want to reach out to you until I was better. Maybe that was a mistake, but I wasn’t right in the head. I’m so sorry, honey. You traveled
three thousand miles
just to see me. And I threw you out.”

“It’s okay, Mom.” I fling my arms around her. “I’m so glad you’re getting better.”

She kisses my cheek. “I’m sorry I threw you out. I was in a bad place, sweetie, and I didn’t want to talk to anyone.” She pulls back. “Seeing you…it brought me back to that night, to the pain I shoved away. When you came over, it was like a dam opened inside me and all I wanted was to close it up. I’ll never forgive myself for the way I treated you.” She takes me in her arms again. “I don’t deserve it, but I hope you can forgive me.”

I nod quickly. “Of course I can.” A warm feeling overcomes me. Mom wanted to have a relationship with me as much as I wanted to have one with her. She was just waiting to get better. She didn’t want to screw things up between us. As much pain as I’ve been through, hearing her say she wants me in her life undoes it all.

“You’re the most important person to me,” she says. “I want you to know that.”

“You’re the most important person to me, too.”

She smiles sadly. “I’m the luckiest woman alive, because I have you for a daughter. There were many times where my thumb hovered over the button to call you, but I couldn’t bring myself to. I was terrified you would never want to talk to me. I’ve lost sleep worrying about you. Are you doing okay?”

Sebastian enters my head, but I push him away. “Mostly, yeah.”

“How’s work? School?”

“Fine. Still working on getting into culinary school.”

She stares off at something. “I’ll do whatever I can to help you afford it. I’ll work extra hours—”

I place my hand on hers. “It’s okay, Mom. I don’t want you to work hard for me. You’ve been doing that all my life. Let’s focus on getting better. Maybe we can go see the therapist together, if you want.”

She nods. “I’d like that.”

“And I need to show you New York City. It’s more amazing than you can ever imagine.” I hug her tightly, still not able to believe it’s my
mother
I’m talking to. I wish Sebastian could be here. I’d like him to see how we made a difference by coming here. It caused my mother to reexamine her life and make changes. Sure it’s going to take a while until we’re back to how we used to be, but at least we’re talking.

Mom runs her fingers through my hair. “What is it?”

She’s always been able to read me. “Nothing. I’m fine.”

“Lily?”

I sigh. I don’t want to keep anything from her, not when we’re starting to rebuild a relationship. “It’s just…this guy I was seeing. He had to leave.” I shut my eyes. “It’s stupid, not important right now.”

“Of course it’s important.” She runs her hands up and down my shoulders. “Tell me about him.”

And I do, making sure to leave out the fact that Sebastian was a genie. I pretend we met at work, and I tell her that he swept me off my feet from the first moment we kissed while we danced. I give her a small smile. “You know how I’ve always dreamed of having what those girls in the romance movies have?”

She nods, laughing a little. She probably remembers how I used to swoon each time the guy and girl kissed on screen.

“I had that with him,” I say in a low voice.

Her eyes soften. “Why did he leave?”

I tear my gaze away from her. “He just had to.”

“Okay, we can talk about this another time.” She squeezes my shoulder. “I promise you we’re going to spend a lot of time together. And I’ll help get you into culinary school. I’ll make my little girl’s dreams come true.”

“Mom, I don’t need that right now. I’m just happy to be here, talking to you.”

Her hold on me tightens. “That’s exactly how I feel. I love you, honey.”

“I love you, too.” I pull back. “How are things going by you? How’s work? Your friends?” She used to be a very social person, like Daisy was.

She plows her fingers through her hair. “Work’s fine. But I need to give my friends a call. Ever since…” She presses her lips together. “…the accident, I’ve pushed away all the important people in my life. I want to reconnect with everyone and not hide in the house all day. Hopefully with time.” A pained expression clouds her eyes as she rubs my arm. “And hopefully one day, we’ll be ready to talk about Daisy, to keep her memory alive. But right now it hurts too much.”

I rest my head on her shoulder. “We’ll get through this together. All we need is each other.”