I can tell my mother becomes more desperate, because she raises her chin and rasps, “If you leave, Brody, we are done. We are fucking done.”
I shiver.
My father reclines his head in what looks a little like agony, and I watch his chest fall heavy when he exhales above him. “You’re so fucking selfish, you know that, right?” He says the words like they mean nothing.
My mother’s hand cracks across his cheek in an instant. “Am I? Am I, really?” she yells, “You disgust me.”
His hand wraps around her wrist, pulling her into him. “I love you, Cherry. Goddamnit, but I have to go. You know this job is important, for all of us.”
She shoves him again. “No, you fucking don’t. If you loved me,us, you would stay.”
He steps back.
He is going to leave,I know it–I can feel it.
My father turns toward the window, finding me, his eyes latching onto mine remorsefully before he drops his head.
“You’re a fucking coward.” My mother’s words come out as sharp as a blade when her gaze flicks back and forth between me and my father.
He strides back up to her and tries to grab her face again, but she hits his arms away. “Don’t.”
“I’m sorry,” he states, stepping back and dropping his head between his shoulders. “I’m so sorry.”
The vivid picture of my mother lying on the bathroom floor for weeks, crying uncontrollably, filters through my mind. She never did tell me what happened, yet I had seen the welting scratch marks as she clawed at her arms, the tears that had permanently stained her cheeks.She wanted to protect me from the evil of the world, choosing to suffer alone.
I would give anything to hold her again, to let her know that she was never alone,that she had me.I was there the entire time. Why didn’t she just let me in?
My father and her were never the same again after that, even when they got back together. And it took a while for Mom to let him move back in, because when he did eventually return to Shadow Heads, he spent a good month in a local hotel room.
Yes, they loved each other deeply, and in ways it was quite frightening,but sometimes love just isn’t enough.
“After the loss of Summer, and your father leaving town, your mother had found comfort in Manic.” Rusty clears his throat.
I remember Mom not being home much. I can’t help but shiver again. I had a feeling she was seeing someone, but she never told me or brought him back to the house,and now I know why.
My mother didn’t find comfort in Manic…She was using him,lashing out at my father in a way that she knew would hurt him, the same way he had hurt her, to bring himhome.
I imagine she never would have thought that the simple act of entertaining another man would have ended her and her soulmate’s lives in a sinister attack of jealousy and possession, because if she did, she wouldn’t have done it.
Heated rage surges up my throat as I begin to tremble, my teeth banging down on each other.
Communication was always their biggest downfall.
Rusty kneels in front of me, dropping a hand to my knee.
“I’m so sorry, Cherry. I tried everything to save her, I really did, but by the time I went back down…” His head falls between his shoulders, and he sighs in defeat. “It was just too fucking deep.”
I curl my fingers into his tightly and clear my throat, though my voice still comes out raspy, more tears escaping. “Rusty, I hope you know you did everything you could have. For your wife, for my mother, they were both so lucky to have you fight for them.”
Rusty throws his head back and clears the emotion coiling his throat, his long golden curls brushing the top of his broad shoulders.
“Rusty,” I whisper, squeezing his hand a little tighter, hoping he will look at me.
Harlen coughs beside me. I know he’s trying to hold back his tears too, though I can’t look at him, not until I say what I have to say to Rusty. Yet, I do reach out with my free hand and squeeze Harlen’s thigh to let him know he’s not alone.
Rusty’s gaze flicks back to mine, and I hold his hand as I speak. “Thank you for saving my life, thank you for giving me that second chance, because without you andyour courage, I wouldn’t have met your son, and I wouldn’t be here today with two of the best men I have ever known.” I whimper, tears streaming from my eyes, a cry ripping from my throat.
I can feel my nails digging into Rusty’s skin at the top of his hand, and I do the same when I latch onto Harlen’s, gazing over my shoulder. His bloodshot, rheumy eyes stare back at me in what resembles agony.
