She rolls her eyes and laughs again.
The sound sends a warm glow to my gut.Taya’s alive and here.I’m insatiably curious about her life. I guess the feeling is mutual.
Once we’re out the front doors of Fit and settled into my Jeep, Taya asks, “Will you tell me about the rest of your life?”
“What do you want to know?” Not in the habit of oversharing, I fall back on my default of answering a question with a question—what my old therapist would call deflection or avoidance, something I guessI learned from my childhood. I amend it with, “I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.” And I mean it. I want to know everything about her too. That she’s had a life to live the last three years is inexpressible. It makes my heart hurt but in the best way. I rub my chest with my palm as I drive one-handed.
“I want to know about it all, especially the girl. But start with where we left off and don’t stop. But . . . can we just drive? Hey, wanna go see Sugar and Cookie?” She turns sideways in her seat. “I bet they miss you.”
I grip the steering wheel with both hands, knuckles going white. She tracks the tension.
“He’s gone, Jay. It would just be us and maybe Mitchell, the caretaker my dad hired a year ago.” She’s looking at me to gauge my reaction.
I nod slowly. I’d probably agree to whatever she wants right now. “Okay.”
“Okay? Really?”
“Yeah, Taya, we can go.” Her name feels foreign in my mouth but familiar. My grasp on reality feels tenuous. I wonder, not for the first time, if it’s too early to drink—and I don’t drink. Speaking of drinking, I decide to start there. “After he caught us . . . found us that night and threatened to have me arrested, I tried calling and texting you. When you didn’t respond, I knew—”
“He took my phone.”
“Yeah.” I nod and resume my death grip on the steering wheel. I see it in my mind like it’s yesterday, but I haven’t pictured it in years. “After trying to reach you by phone for almost twenty-four hours, I went back to your house and banged on the door. I had some half-cockedidea I’d just bust in there and take you away.” One side of my mouth quirks up as I quickly glance over at her in the passenger seat.
The windows are down, and her golden strands drift across her face. Her green eyes look sad.
I turn back to focus out the windshield so I don’t have to see them.
“He sent me to boarding school that day. Didn’t give me a choice. Said he’d have you arrested if I didn’t go.” She tucks her hair behind her ears, but it still swirls across her lips and nose.
I swipe my hand down my face and drop it into my lap. When I blow a heavy sigh out through puffed cheeks, Taya puts her hand on top of mine and squeezes. Nodding, I say, “I know. I, uh, I kinda lost it after that. Got shit-faced drunk. Stole the alcohol from my parents and drank in one of the empty stalls until I passed out.”
“One of our stalls?” I see her eyes go wide in my periphery and nod.
“He found me there the next morning. That’s when he started threatening me with words like statutory rape. I left so he wouldn’t call the cops—left my bike there and walked home. For the rest of that week, I stayed drunk. At the trailer. If my parents noticed, they didn’t care. It must’ve been three or four days. When I finally went to get my bike, I went to the front door first. I had some wishful thinking that he’d calmed down and would tell me where you were. That’s when he told me you weren’t coming home. That you took a bunch of pills, and it was my fault. That if I’d never come to work for him, he’d still have a daughter.” I stop to take some deep breaths.
Taya’s hand covering the back of mine is gripping it so tight that her knuckles are now white.
I look down at her hand and turn mine over in hers. Our fingers intertwine and we both squeeze. I don’t want to tell her the nextpart—mostly because I don’t want to relive it. I take one more deep breath and begin. The short version.
“I took off on my bike, drunk. I stopped and got more to drink and just kept going. I was going too fast, taking turns, and I think I was . . . trying to die.” I see her swipe her other hand along her cheek. “I crashed in front of Allie’s house. She helped me. She gave me a job. I learned everything I know from her. I owe everything I am to her.” I hope the CliffsNotes version will suffice.
She pulls our joined hands into her lap and covers them with her other. “What an asshole,” she breathes, like she’s shocked.
I laugh because it’s such an understatement for the evil he did to us. “Yeah,” I concur. We pull up to the entry gate of her property. It’s a new entrance with an automatic iron gate, a giant iron B on the arch.
She rummages through her bag and produces a remote, taps it and the gate begins its slow swing to allow us entry.
“That’s new.”
“He installed it right after . . . ” She lets the rest of that sentence hang unspoken. She motions for me to keep driving past the house and around to the barn.
It’s as picturesque as I remember. I stop the Jeep in front of the wooden picnic table on the side of the barn. It’s showing signs of weather and almost ready for another makeover.
She says what I’m thinking. “It’s held up well.”
“M-hm,” I answer absently, lost in time. I open my driver’s door almost in a trance, like I’m being pulled through a portal. I step into the shade of the barn, where the lack of sun drops the temperature.
An older man pushing hay and debris through the far doors stops and turns to greet us. He’s not as old as I thought. His skin justlooks weathered, probably from years of working outdoors. He props the push broom against the nearest stall and moves toward us. “Hey, Taya.” He greets her casually as he extends his hand to me. “Hi, I’m Mitchell.” His handshake is firm, strong. His eyes kind. He’s wearing a ball cap backwards, straw-colored hair curling around the edges and poking out through the hole on his forehead. His eyes look like heavily creamed coffee. As he finishes shaking my hand, his eyes track back to Taya and linger. Too long. His eyes move over her face. His expression softens as he smiles at her.
