Her eyes flutter shut and she leans against me. I want to be there for my sister, be the strong one, and see her through everything. But in reality she’s the one seeing me through it. She is seven years older than me, but we’ve always been close, except for the last three years when everyone thought I was dead. But we stepped right back into our easy relationship when I returned—until she thought I’d overstepped my bounds. She was upset at me for not telling her when I found Trent strung out. No matter how many times I try to tell her Trent made his own choices, she still blames herself that he’s ended up in rehab. Blame is a strange thing; it consumes you, haunts you, takes over your life. Hell, she should blame me. I was the one who was the strong male influence in his life until I up and disappeared from their lives. But in the end, my nephew is getting the help he needs and that is really all that matters.
I should have taken care of everything for today. Instead she organized all of the funeral arrangements while dealing with her son’s situation. I wanted to help but I couldn’t see past the blur of the last two weeks.
“Hey, Ben, did you hear me?”
I lift my eyes from the ground to hers. “What did you say?”
“Come on, we have to leave. Everyone’s waiting for us at the restaurant.”
“Go ahead of me. I just want to say a few more things to. . . .” I don’t finish because flashes of light blind me. I look over to the tree line at the edge of the cemetery and fuck me if some asshole isn’t snapping my picture. “Stay here,” I warn my sister and then storm over to the perpetrator. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me right now,” I yell as I grab his camera and throw it against one of the trees. But he isn’t smart enough to shut the fuck up.
He points a shaky finger at me. “Aren’t you the guy who was supposedly shot a few years ago in a car jacking?”
I level a glare at him. I don’t need this shit right now.
“You are. I know you are,” he shouts. Then he removes his phone from his pocket and tries to snap another picture.
I don’t know what comes over me but a switch goes off inside my brain and a rage is unleashed that I can’t control. After the first swing he falls to the ground but I don’t stop. I just keep punching him until my sister pulls me by the collar of my jacket.
“Ben, stop it!” she screams.
Before I know it, Caleb is pulling me off him and Jason is quoting some bullshit to him about invasion of privacy. When I stand up and look at my bloody fists and then the perp’s bloody face, I shrug Caleb off me and hastily move toward the limo.
“Hey, man, wait up,” Caleb shouts behind me.
I keep walking.
“Ben, talk to me.”
I can’t catch my breath. I sit in the limo and cradle my head in my hands. “Fuck, what the hell is wrong with me?”
“Hey, no one can fault you for laying into that slime ball.”
I look up at him and give him a twisted smile. The photographer’s camera is in his hand. “Thanks, man.”
He shrugs. “I found it.”
I shake my head then ask, “Where’s Serena?”
He points to a bench near the mausoleum. She’s wrapped in Jason’s arms and my stomach turns. I drop my head. I know he’s a dirty cop. I’ve known it since they divorced. I never had proof; I could just feel it in my gut. It was the things Serena would tell me that made me realize the way he was living his life didn’t add up to the life he was living. Although she’d never admit it, I’m pretty sure Serena knew it and that’s why she divorced him. And now with their son fresh off to rehab, he wants to be here for her. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Chapter 2
Wicked Games
Voices echo through the small space as we arrive at the restaurant and I look up at the gathered crowd. I brush the doorway with my shoulder not really watching where I’m going and stare unseeing at the thirty or so people scattered around the room waiting for us. There’s a buffet filling a long table off to one side. Some of the flowers from the church are situated in the corners in a failed attempt to brighten the dismal surroundings. As I look around, I wonder how Serena could have possibly arranged all of this.
“Ben, I can’t do it,” Serena says to me with tears in her eyes.
“I don’t understand,” I mumble.
“A few words about mom, I can’t get up there and say a few words about her,” she whispers.
I take her hand. “I’ll do it.”
The one thing I’m good at, the only thing that never fails me, is finding the right words. With a newfound strength, I make my way around and talk to those who knew my mother. Then as people begin to fill their plates, I find my sister and we stand together in the front of the room.
I clear my throat and everyone silences. “My sister and I want to thank all of you for coming today, for being a part of the celebration of our mother’s life. She was an amazing woman who endured a lot in her lifetime. She was the person who kept the people around her from falling apart. I suppose some of her superpower came from the loss of her husband and from being left to raise two children alone. In some people that hardship might have led to a hardening and pulling away. But not Grace Covington; she held a softness that everyone who knew her found amazing.”