I can’t sleep. All I have done for what feels like hours is listen to the fan buzz and repeat all the reasons why Tori will never be mine. She’s had her back to me, and I’ve tried to listen out for her breathing to change to indicate that she’s asleep, but it never came.
She rolls over. “Noah?” she whispers.
“Yes,” I respond with my own whisper.
“Are you awake?”
“No,” I say, trying my best to hold on to a laugh.
She flicks my arm, and the laugh falls from my lips.
“Good. I can’t sleep either.” She shifts onto her back, so we are both staring at the ceiling.
“Why can’t you sleep?” I ask.
“Too much on my mind. And you?”
“Same thing,” I answer.
“Can I ask you something?” I give her a side eye, but her attention is still fixed on the ceiling. “What made you join the Marines?
I let out a breath and clench my jaw, thinking of all the reasons I signed up.
“Lots of different reasons. Jack and I were best friends in high school, and he talked about joining since the day I met him. I guess I wanted to belong somewhere and make a better life for me and my sister.”
Usually, this is where I end my story, but there’s something about this girl that tears down my defenses and makes it feel safe to speak my truth.
“My dad walked out on us when I was about six. Ria was only a toddler, so she doesn’t remember.”
“Oh, Noah, I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. He was a bad guy. Used to knock my mom around and cheated on her a lot. One night, I was in bed, and heard them arguing. My mom had caught him with another woman again, and she confronted him. He hit her so bad, one side of her face was unrecognizable. He left after that and never came back.”
My chest tightens at the memory. I hate thinking about my dad. He doesn’t deserve the title of dad. Tori’s hand links with mine, and I am thankful for her comfort.
“After he left, my mom drank a lot. She was always out, leaving me and Ria alone. She had a different man every week. Most of them assholes who used her for a place to stay, food, money. Not that she had any.”
Tori squeezes my hand, and I continue. “A few of them beat her pretty bad. When I got older, I was able to fight them off. I was always taking her to the ER to get stitches. One night, when I was eighteen, I was looking after Ria, and I got a call to say Mom had been found in a bus stop, passed out, no purse. She didn’t remember what happened. I never told Ria.”
Tori gasps and inches a little closer towards me, but still not touching me. “Noah, I’m sorry. That must have been really tough.”
“I had Jack, he was a great support, but yeah, it was hard.”
She strokes my arm, and I lean into her comfort. No one has ever comforted me the way she does.
“After that, my mom was good. She got a job cleaning houses and stopped going out. I thought she was turning her lifearound, and it felt safe to leave Ria, so Jack and I enlisted, and I thought life was finally going well. But then I got a call from Ria, when I was close to finishing basic training.”
I shut my eyes, remembering the chill that ran through my body when she called me and uttered the words.
“My mom had a new boyfriend, and when my mom was out, the son of a bitch tried to rape my sister.”
Tori rolls on her side and pulls me to her. I rest my hand on her arm that is draped across my chest, where my heart is beating so hard it feels like it might burst through my chest.
“Ria was only in her mid-teens, so CPS took her. I tried to get custody of her, but the courts ruled in favor of my mom if she agreed to go to parenting classes and AA. I felt so helpless.”
“Noah, it’s not your fault,” Tori reassures.
“I should have been there; I should have never left her in that house with her,” I say on a shaky breath.
