“My mom was sick, both mentally and physically.” I didn’t quite understand her until I was older and could see that the way my dad treated me was likely the way he had treated her as well. She tried to protect me the best she could, but she lived in a state of constant fear.
“Where’s your dad now?”
“Prison. I think. Maybe he’s out by now. Don’t know, don’t care.”
“That doesn’t scare you? Knowing that he could be out roaming the streets. That you could run into him at any corner?”
I scoff. “Not one bit. I’d fucking dare him to come find me. I’d love a reason to teach him a lesson.”
Annaliese nods in agreement, kissing my wrist once more before inching closer so she can curl herself into my side. Her head rests on my pillow, and I welcome her touch, pulling her closer as she nuzzles in.
“And your mom? Where is she now?”
“My mom died when I was fourteen.”
She snaps up to a seated position, the sheets pooling to her waist and I reach a hand up to run a palm over her stomach. My cock starts to harden under the sheets, conversation be damned, but Annaliese isn’t having it. She grabs my hand and holds it between the two of hers. “I’m sorry you lost her so young, Colt.” She brings my hand to her mouth to plant a kiss on my palm. “What happened then? You weren’t stuck with your awful dad, were you?”
“No, he was in prison by then. Once I went through puberty and hit my growth spurt, I was bigger than him and able to fight back. It all came to a head maybe a year before my mom passed and he finally got arrested. But by then my mom was sick–kidney failure. She was on dialysis and on the transplant list but got too sick to tolerate treatments. She went on hospice and passed a few days later.”
“Colt…” She sniffles as she lies down next to me and tangles her legs with mine. “I’m so sorry. I couldn’t even imagine losing a parent like that.”
“It’s okay,” I tell her. “As weird as it sounds it really is okay.” It’s been twenty-eight years since she passed away. I’ve already gone through every stage of grief one could imagine, sometimes lingering in certain stages for years. I’ve already questioned why shit had to happen to me, and I’ve already accepted that the way my dad chose to treat me was on him. Everyone loses a parent at some stage in their life. Yes, I was younger than most, but I don’t think it would have made it any easier getting to know her for my entire life only to lose her at the end.
“I went to live with my mom’s cousin after that. It was a rough transition going from living with my mom in my childhood home to moving out of the city and into the trailer parks with him.”
“Was he good to you?”
“He really was. He was only in his twenties and not ready to grow up at all, but he didn’t hesitate to take in a grieving teenager. He worked a grueling manual labor job, dabbled in drugs and drank a bit himself, but he was one of the nicest people I have ever met.”
Not many twenty-somethings would take in a teenager when they could barely afford rent for their shitty trailer. He made sure I’d get up in time for school. He’d truck me back and forth from baseball practice. He’d even sit at the kitchen table drinking cheap beer and quizzing me on my science homework. “I would be nothing without him.”
“I’d like to meet him sometime.”
I huff out an awkward laugh then roll on my side to face Annaliese. I tuck one hand under my pillow to mirror her position, the other going to rest on her hip to ground her. “He passed away when I was in med school.”
Her jaw drops, and tears pool in her eyes. I squeeze her hip, wanting to keep her in the moment. “It’s okay,” I tell her again. “I’mokay.”
“My goodness,” she whispers through a chuckle and reaches up to swipe the tears that threaten to fall. “Like, could anything else have happened to you? Your upbringing rivaled a terrible soap opera. You have gone through more in the first twenty years of life than most will ever experience in a lifetime.”
I chuckle at her watery smile, reaching a hand up to use my thumb to swipe away a lone tear. “Maybe it was pretty rough to start with, but I feel lucky to be where I am today.”
“What happened to your cousin? How’d he die?”
“Cirrhosis.” Apparently he had a rare genetic condition that put him more at risk for developing liver failure, and his nightly cocktail of weed mixed with a six-pack of the cheapest beer man could make caught up to him.
“He was in that gray area. He made too much money to qualify for state aid, but he didn’t make enough to be able to have quality health insurance. He put off going to a doctor for so long because he couldn’t afford it, and by the time he did, there wasn’t much he could do. If there was a free clinic near us, some judgement-free zone where he could have gone and been checked out without getting a bill for thousands of dollars, I could have maybe convinced him to go.”
Realization crosses her face. “That’s why you help out Ryan and Lainey.”
I pull her into my arms, and she comes willingly. Her cheek rests against my chest, and I hold her like that, letting the anxiety fizzle a little. I’ve never opened up to anyone about my upbringing. The most I’ve ever told Richard is that my parents divorced and my mom died. He didn’t need to know my dad landed himself in prison, and he didn’t need to know I was raised in one of the sketchiest neighborhoods in the city with access to drugs on a daily basis. But I can tell Annaliese anything. And as much as I am okay with my past, I can feel the faint prickles in the back of my throat threatening to grow.
“My cousin had a drug and alcohol problem, sure. But he was a good guy. He deserved better than that.”
She wraps her arms around my waist, gently squeezing to accentuate her point. “I believe you. Anyone that’d give up their freedom to raise a teenager is a good person in my book. And I think you turned out just fine. But I’m still so sorry that it happened to you.” Her voice fades with her last sentence, and I know she’s getting in her head about this, likely imagining me as a sad kid with so much emotional pain brewing inside that I did unspeakable things to myself.
“Is that why you became a surgeon?” she asks. “Because of what you saw your family go through?”
I pull her tighter to me and rest my chin on her head. She’s asked me this question quite a few times since we met. A look of hope in her eyes each and every time.
