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and it is built of hope.
    As I scrub between my legs almost to the point of pain, I curse hope. I curse it inside my head, and I curse it out loud. I curse it because it curses me.
    After my shower, I lie in my bed, playing over the last hour of my life. The literal nightmare and the figurative one. One is devastating to watch, the other devastating to live.
    Exhausted, I close my eyes and pray that, when I wake up, this will all have been a nightmare.

FOUR
----

Love shouldn’t hurt. It should give you life.
—LJ Sexton
    I feel a hand on my forehead, and I have to force my eyes open. They burn so badly.
    “Baby girl, it’s Christmas Eve. You’re still in bed, and it’s almost noon. You feeling okay?” Dad sits on the bed beside me.
    “Just tired, I guess.” My throat is raw, and it sounds scratchy.
    “Ava, you sound like …” He pauses. “Well, not like you.” He narrows his eyes at me. “Do you have a black eye?”
    “I hit the corner of my eye on the bed when I got up earlier,” I lie. “And I feel … not like me.”
    “Gotta be more careful.” He leans over and kisses the corner of my eye. “Okay, then sleep. I’ll get you some soup and send an email to Santa asking him to make sure he gets you something extra special.”
    I nod and close my eyes. “Thanks, Daddy.”
    ***
    When I wake an hour later, he is sitting in the chair next to my bed with a thermos. “Got soup.”
    I force a smile, and then I force myself to sit up.
    He hands me the thermos. “Tessa said the broth should help. She also hopes you can make it tonight. Everyone will be there.”
    Everyone.
    “Maybe I should stay home. I mean, then I should feel better tomorrow.”
    Dad nods. “I’ll stay here with you. Logan, you, and I can—”
    “No. Absolutely not. I’m not ruining your Christmas Eve.”
    “Wouldn’t be ruining it, Ava.”
    Tessa’s husband was shot and killed on Christmas Eve; there is no way in hell I’m going to let him stay here with me on an “anniversary” of such magnitude. It would kill him to be away from her, and I know it. I also respect it very much. He loves her and wants to be there for her, but he also wants to be here for me. Little does he know my illness is actually heart sickness.
    I get up and open the thermos, drinking some of the broth as he watches me.
    “Give me half an hour,” I tell him.
    ***
    I stand in the bathroom, looking at myself in the mirror. I look like hell—absolute hell—and I am going to see him tonight. I’m going to have to be in the same damn house with the man who broke my heart and shattered my dreams.
    When I walk down the stairs in my red dress lined with white fur that hits just above my knees, Dad shakes his head. “You look beautiful, Ava.”
    The love in his voice, in his words, and the way he looks at me are exactly what I need right now. Still, the pain from Luke’s rejection is so raw tears immediately begin to fall.
    “Ava?” He walks quickly toward me, and I lunge into his arms. “Oh, baby girl, maybe you shouldn’t go.”
    “No, I’m fine. I … I just missed you. I love you, Dad.” I hug him more tightly. “So much.”
    “I know, Ava. I know, sweetheart.”
    I step back and wipe my tears. “I’m ready now.”
    He looks at me expressionlessly and nods once. “Okay.”
    Dad insists I ride with him due to my sickness , and I agree to keep up the charade.
    The entire ride to his and Tessa’s house is quiet, and he keeps looking at me out of the corner of his eyes like I’m some ticking time bomb.
    Little does he know that the bomb has already gone off. Inside, I am dying, but on the outside, I am still trying to hold it together.
    God, I pray I can hold it together.
    As soon as we pull in, I spot Luke’s white Chevy pick-up. A wave of nausea hits my stomach, and I press against it in hopes of easing the pain.
    Dad stops and gets out quickly, walking around the front of the vehicle and opening the door before I am able to.
    “You sure