The Price of Love

Chapter 22: Trinity's POV - Unexpected Friendship

Two months after Vivian's visit

"Patricia, you're burning the pancakes again."

I look down at the griddle, startled out of my thoughts. Sure enough, smoke is rising from what were supposed to be perfect golden circles but are now more like charcoal discs.

"Sorry," I mutter, scraping the ruined pancakes into the trash. "I was distracted."

"You're always distracted lately," says Marcus Chen, my coworker at the youth center and the closest thing I have to a friend in Portland. "More distracted than usual, I mean."

Marcus is twenty-six, with kind eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses and an easy smile that makes even our most resistant kids feel safe. He's been working at the center for three years, and he has a gift for seeing through people's defenses—including mine.

"I'm fine," I lie, starting a fresh batch of pancakes for the Saturday morning breakfast program.

"Patricia." Marcus bumps my shoulder gently as he passes behind me with a tray of orange juice. "Talk to me. What's going on?"

I want to tell him. God, I want to tell someone the truth about who I am, where I came from, why I sometimes wake up in the middle of the night reaching for an engagement ring that's not there. But Patricia Williams doesn't have that history. Patricia Williams grew up in foster care, aged out of the system at eighteen, and has been making her own way ever since. It's a story that's close enough to the truth to feel real, distant enough from reality to keep me safe.

"Someone from my past tracked me down a few months ago," I say carefully. "It brought up some old stuff I thought I'd dealt with."

Marcus stops what he's doing, giving me his full attention. "Bad old stuff?"

"Complicated old stuff." I flip the pancakes, relieved to see these ones are actually golden brown. "Someone I used to care about. Someone I thought cared about me, but it turned out I was wrong."

"Ah." Marcus leans against the counter, his expression understanding. "First love?"

The words hit harder than they should. "Something like that."

"You want to talk about it?"

I shake my head, not trusting my voice. Marcus respects the boundary, but I can feel him watching me with concern as we finish breakfast prep.

An hour later, we're serving pancakes to a crowd of teenagers who've spent the night at the center's emergency shelter. These kids are why I stayed in Portland as Patricia instead of running somewhere else—they need advocates who understand what it's like to feel disposable, unwanted, afraid.

"Miss Patricia!" Mia, a sixteen-year-old who reminds me painfully of myself at that age, bounces over to our serving station. "Can you help me with my college application essays today?"

"Of course." I smile at her, feeling the familiar warmth that comes from doing work that actually matters. "What schools are you applying to?"

"Berkeley, UCLA, University of Washington..." Mia rattles off an impressive list. "Marcus says I have a real shot at scholarships if my essays are good enough."

Berkeley. The name hits me like a physical blow, and I must visibly react because Marcus immediately steps closer.

"You okay?"

"Fine," I manage. "Mia, those are excellent schools. Let's work on those essays after lunch."

But I'm not fine. Hearing about Berkeley, thinking about college applications and scholarship essays, brings back memories I've been trying to suppress. Memories of Christopher helping me with calculus, of Elena teaching me which fork to use, of believing I could have a future that included more than just survival.

After lunch, while I'm helping Mia craft her personal statement about overcoming adversity, Marcus appears in the doorway of our small tutoring room.

"Patricia? Can I borrow you for a minute?"

I follow him outside to the small garden behind the center—a scraggly collection of donated plants that somehow manages to be beautiful anyway.

"Okay, what's really going on?" Marcus asks, turning to face me with gentle determination. "And don't tell me it's nothing. You've been different for months, and today you looked like you'd seen a ghost when Mia mentioned Berkeley."

I sit down on the wooden bench we built last spring, suddenly exhausted. "It's complicated."

"I'm a good listener."

Marcus sits beside me, close enough to offer comfort but not so close as to be threatening. He's always been careful that way—respectful of boundaries, aware that many of the people who end up at the center have reasons to be wary of others getting too close.

"I told you I grew up in foster care," I say slowly.

"Right."

"That's true. But what I didn't tell you is that when I was seventeen, a wealthy family took me in. They... they gave me opportunities I never could have had otherwise. College, a different life, a chance to be someone other than a throwaway kid."

Marcus nods, waiting patiently for me to continue.

"I fell in love with their son. Or I thought I did. And I thought he loved me back." The words taste bitter. "Turns out I was just... convenient. A project. When someone more suitable came along, someone from his world, I became expendable."

"Patricia." Marcus's voice is soft but firm. "That doesn't sound like love to me. That sounds like someone who wasn't worthy of what you were offering."

"Maybe. Or maybe I was naive to think someone like me could fit into someone like him's world."

"Someone like you?" Marcus turns to face me more fully. "Patricia, you're one of the strongest, most compassionate people I know. You connect with these kids in ways that change their lives. You work harder than anyone else here, you care more deeply, and you never give up on anyone. If this guy couldn't see that, if his family couldn't see that, then they were the ones who weren't worthy."

His words are kind, but they hurt because they make me think about Elena calling me her daughter, about Christopher's parents fighting to protect me from Maria's threats, about all the love I threw away because I believed Vivian's lies.

"It's more complicated than that," I whisper.

"It always is." Marcus hesitates, then continues. "Patricia, can I tell you something? And will you not feel weird about it?"

I look at him, seeing something nervous in his expression. "Okay."

"I have feelings for you. I have for months. I know you're dealing with stuff from your past, and I'm not trying to pressure you or make things complicated. But I care about you, and I want you to know that whoever this guy was, whoever didn't appreciate what he had with you—he was an idiot."

The confession catches me completely off guard. Marcus has been nothing but respectful, professional, friendly. I never suspected he saw me as anything other than a colleague and friend.

"Marcus, I—"

"You don't have to say anything," he says quickly. "I just wanted you to know that you're worth loving, worth fighting for. Worth staying for."

Worth staying for. The words echo in my head, bringing back memories of promises made in gardens under fairy lights, of someone who said he would always choose me, who said he would wait as long as I needed.

Someone I left without giving him a chance to fight for me.

"I need some time," I say quietly. "To figure out some things about my past, about who I am versus who I've been pretending to be."

Marcus nods, his expression understanding even though he doesn't know the whole truth. "Take all the time you need. I'm not going anywhere."

The promise is meant to be comforting, but it makes me think about another man who said the same thing, who might have meant it just as much, who I never gave the chance to prove it.

That night, alone in my apartment, I find myself staring at my laptop, cursor hovering over a search engine. For over a year, I've avoided looking up anything about the Cruz family, about Christopher, about the life I left behind.

But Marcus's words keep echoing in my head: "If this guy couldn't see your worth, then he wasn't worthy of you."

What if I never gave Christopher the chance to prove he could see my worth? What if I ran before he could fight for us?

What if Vivian was lying about more than just the photos?

My finger hovers over the enter key, Christopher's name typed in the search bar. All I have to do is press it, and I'll know the truth about whether he's moved on, whether Vivian has taken my place, whether the fairy tale really is over.

But I'm not sure I'm brave enough to find out.