CHAPTER THREE
Even though it was late by the time Dex left, I was on such an adrenaline high that I couldn’t get to sleep even if I tried. And I did try. But after lying there for an hour, my mind going over everything that was suddenly happening, I threw off the covers and started packing up my room.
I knew I wasn’t able to take everything I had with me to Seattle. I’d probably need a moving van for that. And who knew what was going to happen to my poor little Put-Put. I guess one day I was going to have to come back and get the motorbike but I knew that day wouldn’t be a fun one. I really felt like if I left with Dex, I wasn’t going to be allowed back in the house for an awful long time.
And that was another reason why I had to be sure I was making the right decision. I still wasn’t 100% about it either, but the more I started gathering my clothes into an empty suitcase and piling shoes and purses and books together, I knew it didn’t have to be forever. The important thing was I was getting away from my parents’ prying eyes and though it was a long time coming, it was better late than never. And who knew, maybe within a week I’d luck out with a new job and be set to move out on my own. Maybe I’d find a house to share with a couple of young people. A whole new world of possibilities awaited me.
It still had me scared shitless though. When I finally fell asleep in the middle of the night it was only for a few hours and then I was up with the dawn, anxious and raring to go. I hadn’t felt so cagey since I was teen coming down from a long and ill-advised coke session.
By the time Ada came knocking on my door, I had packed up as much stuff as I could into my suitcase and some boxes I quietly snuck out of the garage.
“Holy crap,” she said from the doorway and I grabbed her skinny arm before she could say any more, pulling her inside, and closed the door behind her.
I shushed her, then said, “I don’t want mom and dad to know yet. Not until Dex gets here.”
Ada gave me a smile that was half-sad, half-proud. “You made your choice?”
I nodded. “It’s not the best choice but it’s really the only one I have.”
She kept that smile pasted on her face and sat down on the bed with a sigh. “So you’re really going?”
“Unless you can give me a reason not to…” I said and took a seat beside her.
She scooched closer to me, beanpole legs sticking out from plaid boxers. “I’m going to miss you.”
I felt a pinch of emptiness in my chest at that. I put my arm around her and lay my head on her shoulder. I tried really hard not to cry but I’d be lying if I said a few tears hadn’t leaked out.
“I’m going to miss you too,” I told her. Then I pulled away and put on my brave face. “But you’re going to do great without me.” >
“I know but…oh my God, are you crying?” she admonished but I could see her eyes were glistening too.
“No.” I sniffed and hit her lightly on the arm. “And neither are you.”
I looked around the room. It looked strange with half the stuff packed away. It felt right though. Even the right things can be scary.
“What did Dex say?” she asked.
“Actually he asked if I’d move in with him.”
Ada beamed. “That’s my boy.”
I laughed and gave her a funny look. “Your boy? I have to be honest; I’m not used to Little Fifteen being on Team Dex. I’m not even sure if I like it.”
“Get used to it,” she said. “He saved my sister. I owe him a lot. Hey, did you know Little Fifteen is actually a Depeche Mode song?”
“I’m surprised you know who Depeche Mode are,” I said wryly.
“I know, I always thought it was a type of dessert. Anyway, I think he’s coming around. Just give him time.”
I bristled. “I don’t have to give him anything. Not time, not friendship, not anything. This is just a temporary arrangement. Once I find a job, I’m out of there.”
“And what, you’ll never speak to him again? Yeah right.”
I shrugged and looked down at my ratty nail polish job. “Things are too messed up right now. I know he saved my life. I know he nearly gave up his own for mine. I know that. But…it doesn’t make the feelings go away. The hurt. What he did. I just can’t trust him. I don’t know if I even want to bother trusting him. What’s the point? Why do I need him in my life anyway?”
She stared at me with her big eyes like I was some odd creature at the zoo, something she’d never seen before and wasn’t sure what I was.
“What?” I snapped.
“You need him in your life to get out of your current one, Perry,” she said softly. “Let’s just start with that, m’kay?”
She gave me a quick pat on the shoulder and got up. “I better get ready for school. Don’t you dare leave before I’m back or I’ll be super pissed.”
I told her I wouldn’t dream of it, but then again, I had no idea what was in store. Dex was coming by at 2pm, that’s the only thing I could count on.
She left the room and I set about getting ready myself and putting most of the boxes and suitcase in the closet and under the bed, just in case my parents decided to pop in. Now came the hardest part: waiting until the afternoon, pretending like my life wasn’t about to undergo a humungous change that could potentially damage the already fragile relationship I had with my parents.
I thought about avoiding them for most of the day. And I tried, I really did, but around lunchtime my stomach was rumbling and I knew I’d have to eat or fall flat on my face. My panic attacks always worsened when I had low blood sugar.
My mom was in the kitchen puttering around as usual, putting things away that had already been put away, tidying dishcloths that were already hanging pin straight. She looked up at me in surprise, wringing her hands together.
“Oh, you’re up! I didn’t know if we should wake you or not,” she said. Her voice sounded taut, forced.
I took a seat at the stool beside the island, the soles of my shoes bouncing on the rungs. “I’ve been up for a while.”
“Oh. Can I get you something? I just made lunch for your father before he left.”
“Sure, if you managed to save something for me,” I said under my breath. She didn’t seem to notice my tone and quickly pulled out a small portion of pasta from the fridge, popping it in the microwave.
“It’s only a little bit,” she said and couldn’t help but let her eyes drift to my chest and arms. I knew what she was thinking, that I could afford to eat less. But instead of letting myself get enraged over it like I normally would have, I turned my thoughts off and looked out the window at the dreary day. If my weird telepathic thing was real and was magnified by my emotional state, I didn’t want her to find out. Not yet, when I was so close to leaving.
“Such a bad winter,” my mother said, following my absent gaze. We hadn’t even seen much snow this year, so I didn’t even know what she was talking about. I guess my mother had relegated herself to making small talk with me. It was better than, “so a medicine man helped cure your fever, huh?”
I made a grunt that didn’t mean anything and at the microwave’s loud beep, she bustled over to it and put the steaming bowl of marinara in front of me.
“Thanks,” I said, poking at it with my fork.
“Eat slowly.” She smiled cheerily and I wondered if she had recently gotten her teeth whitened. “It takes up to twenty-minutes for your brain to know it’s full. That way you’ll eat much less.”
I put fake gratitude in my eyes and was about to take a deliberately slow bite when the doorbell rang. I jumped in my seat and the pasta almost went flying off the fork.
My mother didn’t seem too concerned about the door and went out into the hall. I was praying it wasn’t Dex. It was too early and I wasn’t ready yet. Oh, I was nowhere near ready for this.
I sat rigidly, waiting to hear who it was, the air held in my lungs.
The sound of the door closing was followed by two pairs of footsteps coming down the hall.
A tall, red head poked around the doorway and smiled at me.
“Good afternoon, little lady,” Maximus said. He leaned against the doorframe and folded his arms. Like usual, he was wearing plaid, purple this time, and was giving off an air of comfort which annoyed me. It was like he belonged in my house or something.
Ex-house, I reminded myself. Ex-house or so help me God.
Mom scuttled past him, her cheeks flush as if his company made her all girlish or something. “Come on in Max. Are you hungry? I could make you something?”
I pretended that didn’t bother me and kept my eyes on Maximus like he was going to shapeshift if I looked the other way. I couldn’t believe that it wasn’t long ago that we were standing in the kitchen, doing a cleansing ritual. I couldn’t believe I had been naked in his shower, getting off on his big fingers, having him come in my mouth. That didn’t seem like me.
It wasn’t me.
Was it?
“I’m fine, Mrs. Palomino. But thank you,” he drawled. God damn stupid accent.
She clapped her hands together lightly. “All right then. I’ll leave you two to it.”
She left the kitchen. I wished he would have gone with her so I could have breathed a bit easier, but instead he sauntered his giant frame over to me and pulled out the stool.
“How are you?” he asked. It was innocent enough but I couldn’t help but give him attitude.
“How do you think I am?”
His eyes drifted down to my chest. I tried to not look down. That was the last time I wore a tank top around the house. His eyes came up to mine before it became awkward. “You’re looking mighty fine.”
I wasn’t buying it. “Why are you here?”
He rubbed at his broad chin, still grinning. “I’m here to see how you’re doing.”
Was he? I couldn’t help but think back to the car the other day when it seemed like he could hear my thoughts. Did I want to try it out on him now? He definitely wasn’t a normal man, I knew that much. But just how different was he? Was he really a ghost-sensitive type like Dex and I were, or was he something else? And was it only certain types of people that could potentially hear my thoughts, or was it everyone?
I decided it wasn’t safe. I had a hard enough time trusting anyone already.
Though the expression on his face was gentle and somewhat cheeky, I could pick up a vibe of something else. Beneath the laissez faire fa?ade, he was studying me.
I cleared my throat, suddenly feeling on the spot, and pushed my bowl of pasta toward him. “Do you want this? I lost my appetite.”
“You sure?”
I nodded and looked back at the window, the grey sky my failsafe.
I saw him start to eat out of the corner of my eye, happy that the mouthfuls were keeping his giant mouth occupied.
I decided to take the nice route out of all of this.
“Thanks for bailing Dex out of jail.”
He made an amused sound as he slurped up a noodle. “No problem.”
“Did you do it because you like the guy or did you do it for me?”
I realized right then I was being a tad presumptuous with his feelings toward me but I pushed through it and looked him straight on.
He eyed his next bite of pasta like it was a question. “Well, I guess you could reckon I did both. Dex didn’t deserve to be in jail. And I knew you’d be distraught without him.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” I said automatically.
His eyes narrowed into brief green slivers. “Interesting.”
“What?”
“I thought you would have gotten over your little problems by now.”
I leaned away from him. “Little problems? Need I remind you what those little problems did to me? F*ck, you men are all the same.”
“I’m just saying,” he said slowly, “that you seemed to have gotten over them when you were with me. That’s all.”
“I wasn’t me. I was possessed.”
He turned back to his pasta. “Darling, if you want to tell yourself that...”
Without meaning to, I punched him hard on his arm and the fork and pasta were finally set free across the kitchen, clattering to a stop on the floor.
He sighed and put his head in his hands.
“Sorry,” he said, even though I was the one who should have apologized. “I shouldn’t have…I should have known it wasn’t you.”
I breathed out in a huff and got off the stool. I threw the fork into the sink with a clatter and fished out a new one from the cutlery drawer.
“I’m sorry,” I said, handing him the new fork. “You don’t even know me. It’s not your fault.”
He gave me a sheepish look between his parted fingers. “You have to understand that when a gorgeous gal is throwing themself at you, it’s really hard to say no. I knew you weren’t quite yourself. I just reckoned it was a revenge thing…not a possessed thing.”
I allowed myself a small smile. “It was both. Sometimes I think you can’t separate the two.”
“I know what you mean,” he admitted. He held out his hand. “Friends?”
I hesitated, then shook it quickly. To his credit, he didn’t try to hang on any longer than he needed to.
“So,” I began. “You’ve checked up on me and eaten my lunch. Anything else you need?”
He grinned. “You’re not getting rid of me that easily. I promised your mother I’d spend some time with you.”
My face wrinkled with disgust, the feeling spreading through my veins. “Why? I don’t need a babysitter.”
He twirled pasta around his fork, watching the turns. “I know. But it makes your mother feel better.”
“So?”
“So…so I can tell her you’re doing great. And then she can relax and maybe not watch you 24/7, worrying that you’re not well.”
My hands suddenly felt cold.
“Is she really worried?”
“You have no idea,” he said, then took a pointed mouthful.
I rubbed at my arms. He eyed me.
“Are you feeling chilly?”
I ignored him. The clock on the wall read twenty to one. What were the chances of getting Maximus to leave before Dex showed up? What were the chances I’d be able to keep the whole thing a secret with him staring me down like some test subject?
I started to loathe myself for getting involved with Maximus in the first place. I should have known better than to get with the guy who was always showing up at the most opportunistic times, including right now.
“Well,” I said, pushing away from the counter, “you’ll have to amuse yourself for the next while.”
He cocked a brow.
“I’ve got womanly stuff to attend to,” I finished.
He nodded, perhaps buying it. Or at least getting that I didn’t want him anywhere near me.
“I’ll be right here, little lady,” he said, the hope inside me deflating like the tomato he speared with his fork.
I quickly ran up the stairs before he had the chance to say anything else.
~~~
I saw the Highlander out on the street, a black metal beast waiting in the low fog, and booked it down the stairs before Dex could ring the doorbell. The last hour had been the longest of my life and the stored up energy insured I got to the door in seconds flat.
I opened it to see Dex coming up the stairs. He looked different in the daylight, his nose a bit swollen and tinged with a purple bruise that had spread to his eye. It had been courtesy of my father and I only then realized how brave he was for coming back to the scene of the crime.
If he was nervous in any way, he didn’t show it and his confidence gave some strength to my fluttering heart. His eyes were brown and clear, brow set in a determined fashion. He was wearing his black cargo jacket, hands thrust deep in his pockets and collar turned up against the cold. The newsboy cap perched on his head gave him an air of unique distinction though his face remained scruffy with a day’s old stubble.
He didn’t say anything but as usual with us, he didn’t need to. His look said it all: Are you ready?
I nodded grimly and opened the door a bit wider, my heart thumping wildly in my chest. He walked past me into the foyer and I pretended the smell of his skin and shampoo didn’t cause butterflies in my stomach.
>
“Perry?” I heard Maximus say from the living room.
I stood my ground and Dex stood beside me. His hands remained in his pockets though I was scared enough that I wished they were holding me instead.
Maximus appeared a few moments later, staring at us from down the hall. He didn’t look surprised at all, if anything he just looked disappointed and maybe embarrassed.
He strode down to us and I could feel Dex stiffening up beside me. That strange energy I sensed in the car was back and it was doing funny things to the hairs on the back of my neck.
To his credit, Maximus stopped a few feet away and wiggled his lips in thought.
“Well, I figured this would have happened,” he remarked casually. Everything was always so laid back with him, wasn’t it?
“Because you know everything,” Dex countered.
Maximus looked behind him for a second and lowered his voice. “Look, I knew Perry was itching to get out of this joint.”
“How did you know that?” I whispered, my voice sounding hoarse.
He chuckled. “Why else would Dex dare show his face here after what happened?” He gave Dex a pointed look. “You do realize that this can’t end well.”
Dex took a step toward him and looked him dead in the eye, brimming with intensity. “I realize that. That’s why we’re getting out of here. Perry’s better off in Seattle than she is here. Even if she did move in with you, you’re still too close to…this place.”
Maximus rubbed at his jaw and for once looked a bit put-out. He looked up at the ceiling and the spaces around our heads without really looking at us. “If you would just give me some more time with them, they’ll back off.”
Dex and I exchanged a glance out of the corner of our eyes.
“Are you talking to us?” I asked Maximus.
“Max, who is it?” my mother’s voice rang out.
“F*ck,” I swore under my breath. I think a part of me thought I could get moved out of there without anyone noticing and I could just leave them a note or something. It felt an awful like I was running away from home and, you know what, I was OK with that.
“Perry, what-” she said then stopped dead as she saw Dex. Her face went from impassive Swede to full-on IKEA rage. “What the hell is he doing here?”
Impulsively, I grabbed Dex’s arm and said, “Mom, we need to tell you something.”
“We?” she questioned, her voice turning up into an ugly sneer. She marched toward us and suddenly I was afraid of her throwing a punch at him. I had deliberately picked 2pm knowing that my dad wouldn’t be back from his classes until at least 4pm but maybe my mom had always been an equal threat in the abuse department.
“Mrs. Palomino, it’s all right,” Maximus said, putting his arm out to catch her. She shrugged away from his grasp and continued until she was straight up in Dex’s face.
“You get the f*ck out of this house and stay the hell away from my daughter.”
My jaw nearly plummeted to the ground. I had almost never heard my mother swear before and on top of that, she was acting like she actually gave a shit about me.
Dex managed a small smile and without faltering said, “I’m afraid that’s impossible Mrs. Palomino. I’m here for your daughter. I’m going to be doing the opposite of staying away from her. She’s moving in with me. She’s coming to Seattle.”
My mom cackled like a witch, her face fighting between belief and disbelief. “You really think I would believe that?”
She looked at me with incredulous eyes. “Why is he here, Perry? Did you invite him?”
I looked at Dex who was keeping his eye on my mom and then I turned to Maximus. He gave me a sympathetic smile and I knew I had no choice but to bite the bullet.
I met her blue-eyed gaze with what little reserves of strength I had left. “Dex is telling the truth. I…I don’t think I should live here anymore. I think it’s time for me to move out.”
She blinked at me a few times, her brain trying to fight the sincerity she heard in my voice. “But…pumpkin. That’s OK. We can work through this. Just don’t move in with him.”
“I can’t wait. There is nothing to work out. I need…I want to get out of here. Now. I’m going with him. I love you but it’s time for me to go.”
Her face fell into quiet lines. A flash of bitterness swept across her brow.
“You don’t know anything about love,” she said in a low voice, her accent heavy.
I hadn’t prepared for that remark. That stung. That felt like a blow to the chest and a kick to the guts and I tried oh so hard to not let that all show up on my face. There were so many things I could launch into if I had the chance, but this wasn’t that argument.
“I’m sorry,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. I noticed Dex had inched closer to me until his hard arm was flush against my shoulder. “I’ve made my choice.”
I tried to brush past her and go for the stairs but to my utter surprise, she pushed at my collarbones until I stumbled back a foot or two.
I felt Dex’s hands grab my arms and hold me with a vice-like grip while my mother came up to me, her once pretty face now boiling red with anger, her eyes sparking like a defensive animal.
“You’d choose to go with him over your own family?” she sneered. “You’d give us all up over a man? A good for nothing man who left you pregnant and on your own with only your family to look after you!”
Earlier, I had started to think that Dex was breaking some new record for not lashing out but that was gone in an instant.
He pulled the back of me closer to his chest and shot over my head, “Hey, for your information, ABBA, I had no f*cking clue that she was pregnant and if I had, I can assure you things would have been a hell of a lot different.”
“Right,” my mother muttered, shaking her head in disgust.
“Exactly f*cking right,” Dex yelled. “And don’t you dare start throwing this love shit into this mix because if you actually knew a damn thing about that, your daughter wouldn’t literally be dying to get out of your house of horrors. That should say something about your f*cked up righteousness, the fact that she is moving in with the good for nothing man who left her, instead of rotting here with you!”
“Whoa now,” Maximus interjected, raising his hands in a sign of peace. “Let’s all calm down here.”
“F*ck you, ginger balls,” Dex sniped and pulled me toward the stairs. I let him lead me up them and usher me into my room. He shut the door, clapped his hands together and said, “Well that went well! Let’s say we get your shit out of here before your dad comes home and I have to take both of them on.”
I could only stand on the spot and look around me like a dumb cow. The fear and hurt and words and everything was swarming over me like a tidal wave and my brain was struggling to process what had just happened.
Next thing I knew, Dex was crouching in front of me and holding my shoulders, his eyes searching mine and just inches away.
“Focus, Perry. We have to get out of here while we can. It’s only going to get worse.”
Tears threatened my eyes as I fought for the words. “I…I can’t leave like this.”
He shook me slightly. “You have to. You have to now, right now, because this is the only time you are ever going to get the upper hand.”
“But my mom doesn’t think I love her,” I whimpered.
“Well, my mom never loved me, so we all have our demons. But yours, yours have the potential to get much worse if you stay here a second longer. When people are angry, they do strange things, and I feel like this whole situation is more than personal to your mother. You hear me, kiddo?”
I nodded, my mind dwelling a bit on what relationship Dex must have had with his mother while he flung open my closet and let out a satisfied sigh when he saw my suitcase. “All right, this is a start. But this can’t be all of it. I know you…you must have a caravan out back full of ugly concert tees or something.”
I was about to tell him I had some boxes underneath the bed when the door opened and Maximus stepped in.
“Am I interrupting something?” he asked, shutting the door behind him.
“My God, you just can’t keep away can you?” Dex mumbled, tossing the heavy suitcase onto the bed like it was a magazine.
Huh.
“Perry,” Maximus said, looking to me with imploring green eyes, “you can’t leave like this now. Your mother is downstairs crying her eyes out.”
Gee, that was just what I needed to hear.
“You know what,” I said, crossing my arms, pretending I wasn’t crumbling inside, “I don’t really give a flying f*ck what you have to say. You should be happy that you get to take over my room when I’m gone, though you may have to fight Ada for it.”
“So you’re that eager to go that you’re not even going to stick around to say goodbye to your sister?”
“Are you trying to make me feel guilty?” I came at him with my finger poised, ready for eye-gouging.
He didn’t back off. “I’m just trying to bring you the truth. I’m trying to help you. Both of you.”
He eyed Dex who was watching him like a big cat ready to pounce. He turned back to me. “But I can’t help you if you won’t listen to reason. You’re both hopeless. And, I’m sorry, right now you’re acting a bit crazy.”
The minute that word left Maximus’s mouth, I knew there would be hell to pay. I didn’t appreciate being called crazy. Dex hated it.
Dex was on him in a second, the cat finally pouncing. He grabbed Maximus around his throat and lifted him up, throwing his back against the wall, causing the window panes to rattle. I heard my mom utter a cry from somewhere downstairs.
“The only crazy person here,” Dex growled as he brought his face right up to Maximus’s, “is you, if you can’t see the bigger picture. Go on sucking the Palomino family dick if it makes you feel better. I’ll feel better knowing Perry is safe.”
While Dex was spurting these things into Maximus’s reddening face, my eyes drifted down to the floor. The room spun around me as I clued in to what I was seeing. Dex was actually holding him up around his neck with one hand. Maximus’s toes were dangling several inches above the ground and considering the height and weight difference between David and Goliath, that feat was nearly impossible.
“Uh, Dex,” I said softly.
He pried his eyes off of Maximus and followed my gaze. A wave of shock rolled over him when he realized what he was doing. He let go and Maximus’s feet landed with a loud thump.
“Oh, sorry,” he said, clearly flustered. He went over to the suitcase, pretending to be busy, but from the tense way he held his back, I could see he was bothered.
Maximus was rubbing at his throat lightly, faint pink fingermarks running across it. He didn’t seem upset but he was watching Dex and thinking hard about something.
“Where’s the rest of your stuff?” Dex asked and I told him to look under the bed, my eyes never leaving Maximus’s pensive face.
“Not used to being beat up on, are you?” I asked him carefully, wanting to talk about it. But maybe I was just overreacting. Dex was on an adrenaline high and your body can do some pretty freaky stuff.
Maximus slowly brought his face toward mine and smiled. “I don’t know, I reckon you did a pretty good job.” He tapped the spot on his face where I’d scratched him mid-sex, back when I was all demonic. He knew exactly what buttons to push with us and he was pushing the same ones again.
If Dex wasn’t tense before, he was now. I was ready for him to flip around and go after Maximus again, but he didn’t bite. He just kept his mouth shut and picked up the first box. He turned around and I could see the temper swirling around in his eyes, the killer grip on the box’s edge. He gave Maximus a forced smile that looked completely menacing.
“Please move,” he said, gesturing to the way he was blocking the door. “I’d like to get out of here before I break your nose.”
“I’d like to see you do it,” Maximus answered, not moving.
“Oh, come on,” I chided them. “You can measure penises after I move out.”
“You don’t think I can do it?” Dex continued, ignoring me.
“I know you can do it. I just want to see it.”
“I’ve done it before.”
“I want to see you do it…now,” Maximus replied. I didn’t like the squirrely way he sounded, like he was attempting to do Dex a favor or something.
“Dex,” I said loudly. He and Maximus were locked in some internal showdown, brown eyes against green, short against tall, caveman against caveman.
“Dex!”
With great reluctance, he broke the staring contest and looked my way.
“Please. Let’s go.”
He nodded and readjusted his hold on the box.
I glared at Maximus. “And you, please get out of the way. I, personally, have no problems with breaking your nose.”
Maximus sighed and moved over, opening the door for us. Dex pushed past him and Maximus whispered in a voice so low, I could barely pick it out. “You watch yourself.”
Dex didn’t even pay attention. I quickly scooped up a box of books and went after him.
The minute I hit the top of the stairs, I could hear my mom on the phone, crying to my dad. I knew if we didn’t act fast, we’d be majorly hooped. For all I knew, he could be calling the cops and making up a whole bunch of shit to get Dex in trouble again.
Our footfalls were quick and silent and when we reached the ground floor, he gave me a steady look, making sure I wasn’t about to run into the kitchen where my mom was and plead insanity. I swallowed hard, as tempted as I was to totally cave in, and together we scampered over to the car and started piling the stuff in the trunk. >
“I’m going to go get the rest,” he told me, putting his hand on my arm. “Will you be OK here?”
I nodded, though I knew I was on the verge of crying or panicking or something.
He gave me one last deep look and when he was satisfied that I was going to be OK, he patted me lightly on the shoulder. “I’ll be back.”
I whimpered something and leaned against the car, the trunk door open. It was hard to believe that in a few moments it would contain most of my life.
It didn’t feel right to leave this way. I wanted nothing more than to go back inside and plead with my mother and try to get her to understand. I wasn’t doing any of this to hurt her, I was doing this so that she wouldn’t hurt me. But what did it matter in the end. In the end I would be seen as the villain and nothing else. They were so damn ignorant they’d never ever see the truth, even if it was crying in front of their face.
But then there was my dad, who I knew had a smidge more respect for me than mom had. I knew he’d be absolutely livid and confused as to why his daughter would leave in such a harried, disrespectful manner.
And Ada…she was on the inside but the way things were going, we’d be safe and gone before she returned from school. Sometimes it was hard to believe she was in high school and lately I’d been relying on her more and more. Maybe as sisters we had a backward relationship, but it was one that worked and one that I would miss dearly. I owed it to Ada to stick around. But if there was anyone who would understand, it would be her.
Even though she’d be pissed.
Dex was back in an instant, hauling the luggage behind him with one hand and carrying three heavy boxes with the other.
I raised a brow. “So, have you traded in cigarettes for steroids, or what?”
He threw the suitcase in the back, not caring at all if I had valuables in there and plunked the boxes down. “Oh you know, chicks dig men with muscles.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Another Dex Foray mystery?”
He wiped his hands and gave me a charming smile. “Will you ever run out?”
“I guess not,” I replied absently. I looked at the house like I’d never see it again. It might as well be true. Maximus came to the doorway with his arm around my mother who was sobbing into her sleeve. I’d always imagined the day I’d leave home, but I’ve got to say it never looked like this.
I cleared my throat and stood up tall as Dex slammed the back shut.
“I’ll call you when I get to Seattle,” I told them. My mom wasn’t looking at me, so I unfortunately had to say it to Maximus.
He nodded solemnly and gave my mother a squeeze, like he was playing the part in a play. It left a film of bad taste in my mouth but I could only ignore it and turn around. I took the slow steps toward the front door, conflicted by the need to get the hell out of there while I could and the need to stay behind and tell my mother that everything was going to be OK.
If it wasn’t for the energy I felt from Dex on the other side of the car, the reality, the reason for leaving, I wouldn’t have been able to do it. But I pushed through and went by on that instinctive need to protect myself.
I got in the car, shut the door, and we roared off down that fog-shrouded road I grew up on.