“Your brother and sister?” I asked.
Something in Max’s expression fractured. She spun to face her mother, and her expression was terrifying and terrified.
“No. We’re not doing this! Do you hear me? If this is why you came, you can leave.” She slammed the album shut, and stormed back into her bedroom.
I expected her mother to act shocked or upset, but she calmly picked up the album and returned it to her things, like she was picking up a book and returning it to the shelf. She walked back into the living room and took down a picture she’d placed on the coffee table, too.
I wasn’t sure exactly what was going on, but I knew it had something to do with what Max mentioned about holidays the night before. And whatever it was, it had Max broken up into tiny little pieces that I hadn’t glimpsed until just now.
16
Max
I didn’t know whether to scream or cry, throw things or collapse to the ground. There was something about my mother that made me feel fourteen and pissed off all over again. I hated it, but I couldn’t seem to turn it off either. She just couldn’t ever leave it alone.
I didn’t need pictures of Alex all over the place to remember her. I saw her on the subway, at concerts, passing me in the street. I saw her when I closed my eyes. I used to see her when I looked in the mirror, before I’d changed my hair and inked my skin. I could see her reflected in Mom’s eyes every time she looked at me, like if she just wished hard enough she could make us trade places and get the good daughter back.
It didn’t matter how many times I said it, Mom always tried to make the holidays about Alex. She wanted to talk about the time Alexandria did this or when she said that. Mom brought her up so much that she was like this phantom sitting there at the dinner table that sucked all of the happiness and all the normal conversation into the realm of nonexistence with her.
Forget wishing I were dead. Mom made me feel that way already. Hell, she already had the photo album ready to show the world her other blond princess, never mind that I hadn’t been that girl in a long time. No one wanted to see pictures of this Max. Just Mackenzie.
What was wrong with letting the past stay the past? Why did we have to drag all our issues with us into the future? I couldn’t breathe out there for all the ghosts Mom hauled in with her. I didn’t fit in that world, and the more I tried, the more I felt like I didn’t fit anywhere.
I was lying on my bed, my face pressed into a pillow when I felt the mattress dip. I knew it had to be Cade. Mom never followed me after fights, easier to pretend they weren’t happening. And Dad steered clear of all things that involved emotion. I pulled myself up on my elbows and looked over my shoulder to see him seated gingerly on the very edge of my mattress. He’d left several feet between us.
I rolled over onto my back and waited for him to say something. To ask questions.
He didn’t. He lay down beside me, still careful to keep a buffer zone between us. He put one forearm behind his head, and stared up at the ceiling in silence. This close I could see how broad his shoulders were. I mean, I’d felt them, but I hadn’t gotten a chance to really look at him. His arms were muscular and his chest wide. I watched the way his body moved as he inhaled and exhaled. The rhythm was calming.
Watching his chest rise and fall was soothing enough that my anger just kind of drifted away. His eyes were closed and his face relaxed when he said, “I let people go.”
I sat up on my elbow and looked at him, but his eyes remained closed.
“Um . . . if you’re referencing the Bible and that whole let-my-people-go thing . . . I’m not getting the connection.”
One side of his mouth quirked up, and he sighed.
“Last night you asked why I didn’t fight for the girl from the song. It’s because I let people go.”
I had no idea what he was talking about, but I approved, as long as we didn’t have to talk about me.
“Always?”
“These days, yeah. When I was younger, I fought and lost too many times.”
I wanted him to open his eyes and look at me. This somber, closed-off Cade was disconcerting. I was in a dark enough place by myself, and seeing him like this pushed me even deeper. I never knew what to do in situations like this, so I decided to take his lead and stay silent.
I wasn’t thinking about the attraction between us. I was only thinking about comforting him when I slid closer and laid my head on his chest.
Maybe I was thinking of comfort for myself, too.