Mr. Mirano fights to keep his composure, and slowly nods. “Please, join us. Juliet would want that, and we’re sorry we didn’t realize this before now.”

We wait beside the car, allowing the family to slip past us, but as they do, Amy’s eyes find mine and there’s something inside them, a silent cry maybe, I don’t know.

But it has me lifting my hand, and more tears fall from her eyes as she quickly, almost desperately accepts, as if she were hoping for exactly that.

She clenches my fingers tightly, and each of us linked together in a line, the others slowly shuffling in behind us. We head for the arch of the hill that overlooks the Garden of Valor, where our friend will be laid to rest.

I learned a lot from the tragedy we’re facing today.

Love isn’t the sole driving force behind our pain. It can add to it, yes, but our pain comes from within. Sometimes it’s placed there from experience and other times, some of us have a dark place within us that, no matter what we do, who we have, and how we live, the light never quite reaches it.

Nobody can claim to understand the way one feels, because the reality is, we all feel differently.

We can live through the same exact moments, even side by side, but we don’t experience them the same.

I can only hope for the opportunity to hold someone up who feels they can no longer hold themselves up.

I look along the masses and slowly lower into one of the seats along the front row.

Soft music begins to play in the background, and the celebrant takes his place at the podium.

It’s a beautiful, devastating morning in Corona Del Mar.

A steaming latte with the lid off and fresh whipped cream added is placed on the railing in front of me, letting me know Ransom is back from his meeting with Sienna’s case manager.

With a soft smile, I turn to look at him, and he glides his knuckles along my jawline, slowly tipping my head back.

“You okay?” he whispers.

I nod. “Yeah, I am.”

His eyes search mine and a small frown finds its way along his forehead. “With everything, not just today?”

A low sigh leaves me, but it’s the good kind.

It’s been six days since my mom was carted off in handcuffs, two since Anthony followed suit, granted my mother was already sitting plush in a hotel a city over with the promise not to leave town by the time his black and white ride arrived.

It’s been a marathon ever since.

My dad, with the help of one of his judge buddies who ‘owed him one,’ had Sienna’s new guardianship paperwork, naming Ransom in control, expedited, so there would be no lapse in her care.