Chapter Six
Leah
It’s been a week, and I’ve barely eaten a thing. Not that anyone notices. I’m invisible. I don’t matter at work. It’s a shit job doing reception for the town office. I knew my options were limited in town. I never wanted to work for my father, but the cold, hard truth is that he wouldn’t have hired me anyway. Most days are so slow, if I left for hours at a time, no one would notice. At home I’m as much of a ghost as Liam is. Maybe I shouldn’t have returned?
Steel
Helena is small. People know each other. People say they care about each other. I still have a few friends from high school that I got back in touch with. They begged me to come to the musical they’re doing.
Even though I can’t actually remember what Julie and Lisa said the musical was about, anything beats having to sit around at home and try to blend in with the walls. Anything.
I’m one of the last to arrive at the community center. I barely glance at the stage as I tuck myself into a seat near the back row. My eyes scan the crowd. I know who I’m looking for. He comes every single year. I told myself I was coming here for my friends, because they wanted me to, but I’m a liar and I know it. I came because I hoped to catch a glimpse of him. Just a single glance. I shouldn’t do this to myself. It’s pathetic. I should stop. I should do what Steel said and leave this town for good. Stop fantasizing about something that’s never going to happen.
I spot my parents right away, sitting together, near the front, my dad in an immaculate, expensive designer suit. It is probably the one and only time he will ever wear it, and it likely cost a couple of grand. My mom sits beside him with her head held high, her blonde hair piled attractively above her head, her makeup to perfection, and a black dress and cardigan outlining her slender build.
Appearances are everything, and to the outside world, we’re one small, happy family unit that has somehow moved on after the tragedy of my brother’s death and held it together by the miracle glue of love. Of course they’d come tonight.
I grind my teeth against the painful ironic hypocrisy of it all. Instead of letting my gaze linger on my parents, I shift my focus across the aisle and a few rows back, to the sea of black. There must be forty chairs occupied by leather-clad men, some accompanied by their old ladies and any children too young to be taking part in the musical tonight.
They sit proudly, genuine smiles on their faces, ready for the production. Because I just can’t help myself, my eyes are drawn to the largest form. He sits directly in the middle of all that leather.
My heart kicks up painfully in my chest. It hurts, because his rejection bites in again. I sink my teeth into my lower lip to contain a whimper. The man I built my entire world around doesn’t want me. Worse, he never wanted me.
He only touched me twice—the night up on the tower, and the night he roughly escorted me out of the bar—but he has already ruined me for anyone else.
The lights dim and the musical starts. Steel’s eyes remain locked on the stage. I can’t see his face from here, but when his daughter comes on, I imagine those gray irises glisten, anda smile breaks over his harsh, craggy features like a ray of sunshine so bright it illuminates the entire gym. She has a minor role, which really is incredible, given that she’s got a hearing impairment. She’s not afraid of putting herself out there. Of doing things other people would tell her she can’t. I guess she gets her stubbornness from her dad.
Looking at Harley, just a few years younger than me, reciting lines perfectly—crisp and clear—a girl who has her father’s eyes and raven-black hair, my stomach sinks. No wonder Steel doesn’t want me. To him, I’m just a girl like his daughter. It probably disgusts him to think of me in that way. I finally understand why it is that he doesn’t want me. It truly is because he can’t. He’s right. The people in this town would butcher him. My own father would end him just to flex his power—not because he loves me or because I mean anything to him.
I get it.
I really fucking get it.
And again, my world comes crashing down around me. It breaks me like losing my brother did. Steel is the one thing I have clung to so frantically like a life raft.
I realize, in a room packed with humanity, that once again, I am entirely alone.
As the pain sinks in, the tremors start in my hands. They vibrate violently, then the pain travels up to my arms, and into my chest. A few of the people sitting beside me turn to look at me with funny looks on their faces and I realize I’m actually shaking.
Lucky for me, I’m seated near the back and over to the edge. It’s nothing to slip over the three people to my right and dash into the shadows where no one can see me.
I run blindly, the noises from the theater carrying down the hall behind me. The roaring in my ears drowns it all out. My palms are slick and damp when I plant them on the door that leads to the women’s washroom. I plunge inside, breathing panicked shallow breaths, my stomach still churning so violently that I am sure I’m going to purge the little I’ve eaten today.
I hover near the stalls, not brave enough to plunge in because the thought of sticking my head in a public toilet grosses me out. Instead, I slam my back against the cool tile and concentrate on calming myself down. Deep breaths in and out. I have done this a thousand times since Liam died. When the panic would take me late at night in my nightmares, the assault of memories, the sight of my brother crumpled in the passenger seat of my car, his face a bloody pulp, the only thing I could do was wake in a twisted, sweaty mess and breathe, talking myself down from the panic attack.
After a few minutes of steady breaths, I feel brave enough to get the heck out of the bathroom. I don’t want to risk someone coming in and seeing me like this—face ashen, hands still trembling, my white blouse and black pants clinging to my skin, outlining the white cami and lace bra I have on underneath.
I don’t want anyone to find me.
Period.
I crave the freedom of the night more than I need my next breath, the fresh air filling my lungs, all that open space, the blanket of the night sky looking down on me, the raw earth beneath my feet, the sweet-scented air fresh with dreams I’ve never dared give voice to. The little bit of uncaged wildness in my soul longs for it more than I need my next breath, so it’s an easy decision.
I slip through the door silently, my black dress shoes making only the tiniest squeaks as I glide through the halls.
The double doors loom straight in front of me, a promise of freedom. I’m so close. So very close. A dark shadow blurs my vision. I see it out of the corner of my eye, hovering in my periphery, and then it’s on me.
It moves fast, a heavy arm thrown around my shoulders like a heavy yoke, rendering me captive and helpless. A massive palm slams over my mouth, choking off my ability to scream, but also to breathe. I don’t have time to offer so much as a whimper of shock and terror before my back is slammed into a rough wall of muscle and I’m half dragged, half carried, a few steps backward. I stumble and nearly fall, my eyes wide.
