Her spine straightened, fire lighting in her eyes, and I applauded myself for doubling down and reminding her to fight. With so much death around her, she needed to live, and the best way I knew how to do that was to piss her off.
“You’re impossible,” she huffed, stomping down the stairs with more energy than I’d seen in the last hour.
“I’m right.”
She shook her head and refused to look at me until she’d ordered a coffee and croissant from the cafe on the street outside.
I didn’t hassle her again as we returned to the hospital, signed an endless pile of paperwork, and spoke with hospital representatives about the handling of remains and the decisions Tatum would have to make in the coming days.
Chapter
Thirty-Two
Tatum
Death had a lot of paperwork.
My head swam as Calix steered the car onto my parent’s street.
The houses looked the same as they had when I was twelve and street hockey was a neighborhood event. The trees were spaced at the same intervals. Even the cars were similar.
But as we pulled up outside my parent’s two car garage, it felt like a stranger’s house.
The air wouldn’t smell like Ma’s cooking. No one would be asking for the television to be turned down because the neighbors didn’t care who was pitching the ninth inning for the Coyotes.
“I’m alone now. Everyone leaves me,” I whispered. Staring sightlessly out the car’s windscreen, my mind flashed through a montage of loss.
A dark night cut apart by flashlights as we searched for Danny in the woods near our house.
The text that felt like it had jump started this whole phase of my life, and the empty apartment that proved I wasn’t worth fighting for.
My father who desperately wished I could fill the void of the son he lost, and ultimately chose to leave me, too.
And Ma.
I didn’t get to say goodbye.
So much loss. So many examples of me not being enough.
“I think you had better get out and see them before they bust in here.”
Calix’s voice broke through my morose thoughts, reminding me that, if only just for now, I wasn’t entirely alone.
My muscles ached as I released the seatbelt and pulled my body out of the car.
“Angel.” Tobias pulled me into a tight hug that was simultaneously too much, and exactly what I needed. The sweet scent of watermelon Jolly Rancher wrapped around us, and I allowed his warm tattooed arms to hold me for a quiet moment. The candy clicked against his teeth as he sucked on it. I wondered if his sugar cravings were worse because of the stress I might have caused.
“What the hell were you thinking running off like that?” There was a new strain in his voice. Something I hadn’t heard before, even when he’d woken from nightmares in the early days. “You had shows to play, and I was needed here. I didn’t think youwould care.” The excuse sounded lame, even to me. The truth was, I’d been terrified of what it would mean if I asked them to come with me.
And how I would cope if they’d said no.
“Angel, when I detoxed, what did I tell you?”
I didn’t want to think about that time. It was another example of almost losing someone.
He hooked a finger under my chin and caught my eye. The intensity in his face melted some of the numbness I’d been carrying, sparking a reminder of the connection I’d felt with him all along.
Why was I such a goner for this man?
