I get the job. I start shadowing the woman who has just put in her two-week notice, and when she's gone, I'm on my own. I do fine; eventually I have regulars, and I make enough to support myself.
The same cannot be said of my mom. God's Redeemers does not take her back into the fold. Apparently, she is not worthy of redemption. How ironic.
She stays gone for a year, trying to get hired at a hospital somewhere near the cult. They do not have openings for nurses, so she works in the gift shop. She's overqualified, but one day she saves a person's life when they go into cardiac arrest while picking out a gift for someone they've come to visit. Eventually the friend my mom and Travis are staying with gets married and moves, and my mom cannot support them without help.
Almost exactly three hundred and sixty-five days later, she returns to our apartment. We live together for seven years until my mom finds an opportunity to be a home nurse for a woman in Monte Vista, a town nearly five hours away. When she goes for the interview, she meets the old woman's son, Henri.
In no time her bags are packed, along with Travis's. It's the same scene from seven years ago, minus the pudgy hands and baby scent of his head.
The heartbreak is nearly identical.
1
Wyatt
"He's coming home.Tonight. Right now."
It's loud in the Chute, the voice of the lead singer in the live band bouncing off the walls and ricocheting around me, but I can still hear the fear in Sara's voice as it travels over the phone line.
"I'm on my way." I end the call and push away from the bar, tucking the stool back under the bar with my booted foot.
Denny and Ham stare at me, quiet judgment plain on their faces.
"Stop," I bark, peeling off a couple twenties and stuffing them in the rocks glass that holds my tab.
"You can't save her for the rest of time." Denny's brave enough to say what he knows I don't want to hear. Around the longneck bottle poised at his lips, he adds, "Or him."
The muscles in my face flex. I know the truth as well as they do, but I'm not ready to face it. Sometimes a person needs to see something through, needs to bleed the situation dry before they can admit defeat.
I owe Mickey. Without him, I don't know where I'd be. He saved me once upon a time. Now I'm saving him. From himself, of all things.
I nod my head at my friends. "See you back at the ranch." Denny and Ham are cowboys at the Hayden Cattle Company, but they've been my friends for as long as I can remember. They're also Mickey's friends, but they've washed their hands of him. Or maybe they're showing him tough love. I don't know which it is, I just know I'm not doing either.
The Chute is busy tonight, hosting both a live band right now and bull riding later. I weave through bodies, stopping for a moment to say hi to Jackson and his younger brother, Colin. Colin sips from a bottle of root beer and smiles wide at me, his arms opening for a hug. Colin has Down syndrome, and he likes me for reasons that have nothing to do with my last name. I hug him, the same way I have for years. He steps back, his frame bulky in this tight space full of bodies, and bumps into someone's back. The guy turns around, pissed. The front of his shirt is wet with what I assume is the other half of the beer he's holding.
"What the fuck," he growls.
His eyes never get the chance to land on Colin because I'm there, stepping in front of him. It's possible the guy would've seen Colin's disability and chilled the fuck out, but now we'll never know.
"I'm waiting for your apology," the prick says. He’s wearing black jeans, leather lace-up tennis shoes I know are expensive as fuck because I own boots by that brand, and a shirt with a hole near the neck. The hole looks too on purpose, like the shirt was sold that way instead of earning a tear with hard work. I dislike the guy immediately.
"You should hold your breath and wait to see if that happens," I tell him, pulling myself to full height, expanding my chest and lengthening my shoulders. Along with giving me a good life and emotional wounds, my dad showed me how to be physically intimidating. The first two are woven into the fabric of my life; the latter I call upon every now and again.
I don't have time for this shit with whoever this newcomer is, but I also don't have it in me to back down. Behind me, I hear Jackson tell Colin it's time to take a seat, and that makes me feel better. I push past the guy, giving him a good shoulder shove, and continue on through the crowd and out the door.
The truth is, I have no business driving right now. Laws are arbitrary to me, but there are a few I abide by, and drinking and driving is one of them. Despite this, I keep hearing Sara's voice. The fear. The dread.
I get in my truck. Turn it on. Sit back. Grab the bottle of water from the center console and down it. Sara's house isn't far from here. It's later on a Friday night. There won't be very many people out right now.
Just as I go to shift into drive, a tap on my window stops me. The lighting in the parking lot is dim, so I can't tell who it is very easily. I roll down my window.
"Fuck," I mutter.
"What are you doing, Wyatt?" Shelby Trask crosses her arms in front of herself. Her stiff uniform doesn't ripple, which is an accurate metaphor for her personality. She has definitive beliefs about right versus wrong. Let's just say Shelby and I have never really seen eye to eye.
"I'm just sitting in my truck, Officer Trask." I smile at her. It gets me nowhere.
"Wyatt, are you aware that it's against the law to sit behind the wheel of your vehicle when you are intoxicated?"
