Only a Breath Apart

by Katie McGarry

  A week after I reported what happened between my parents to the police, my mother was granted custody of me and Isabelle after she proved that my father had left the house and that he was renting an apartment in town. We also have a new, shiny social worker who confirms that our family attends therapy weekly and who reminds my father that she’s watching him like a hawk on a field mouse.

  I’ll admit, I like our social worker. She’s like a five-foot-four poodle who is half grizzly bear.

  Dad has visitation rights, and I’ve gone along to keep an eye on my sister, but I don’t talk to him. He tries to talk to me, but I’m not there to sweep up the ashes of the bridge we both lit on fire and burned. I’m there to make sure he respects my sister.

  While Dad is “officially” out of the house, Mom hasn’t truly thrown Dad out. He doesn’t live here, but he’s still in control of her life. The physical moving out is more for show for the court than a true reflection of our lives.

  Last night, Mom crossed the huge, gaping moat I created that’s filled with fire-breathing dragons and barbed wire when she invited Dad home for dinner. I’m not stupid. I know what that means. Dinner leads to staying to chat, to help with homework and to watch TV. That leads to a late night where he stays over, and that eventually leads to him returning home.

  The merry-go-round my mom and dad is on goes round and round and it’s broken because it never stops. Because it doesn’t stop, I can be easily fooled to believe that I can’t get off, but I refuse to be conned. I will exit this insane ride, and I’m leaving now, even though that means I have to jump. I have to prove to myself and show my sister that the two of us deserve better.

  Like Pastor Hughes explained about Jacob, I don’t have to let fear and anger rule my life, and that also means I don’t have to settle here.

  Mom drops onto a stool at the counter, looking utterly and completely destroyed. A part of me hurts for her, but she’s made her choice and now I’m making mine.

  “I don’t want you to leave,” Mom says.

  “I don’t want to leave either, but I can’t watch Dad hurt you anymore. If I stay here, I’m condoning your behavior and his.”

  “He says he can change.” My mother stares into space as if she’s in shock. “He says he’s going to really change this time.”

  “Good.” I want him to change, and there’s this small desperate hope in my heart that I don’t think I’ll ever get rid of that prays desperately for him to change. “But he needs to work on himself without us. Dad needs time, Dad needs space and he needs to figure out his problems before being involved with any of us again.”

  Mom slowly moves her head to look at me, as if she’s stuck in sand. “If you do this, you’ll be on your own. He’ll cut you off financially. I won’t be able to help you if you fail.”

  Even though I know this, my stomach roils. “I’d rather be on my own than live a life where I think it’s my fault my father chooses to hit, and I’d rather live my own life than think it’s okay for someone to abuse you and hurt me and my sister.”

  “You’ll fail,” she says. “You’ll be broke, you’ll be hungry, you’ll be alone and you’ll fail.”

  I swallow back tears because she could be right, but I’ll hate myself if I never try.

  JESSE

  Scarlett turns on the bathroom light of the studio apartment and peeks her head in as if she’s terrified a clown from a Stephen King novel might pop out. Obviously there’s no psycho clown as she slowly makes her way in. The place is small, comes furnished with a fridge made for a dollhouse and a kitchen counter big enough for a low-wattage microwave. The living space has room for a twin bed and little else.

  The tiny window by the front door will let in morning light, but this place will be midnight in the afternoon. It’s not where I’d want to spend the rest of my life, but the rest of life isn’t the plan. This place is a glorified waiting room. If Scarlett is granted emancipation, the idea is to live here until she can figure out her next step in life, which is graduation, only six to eight months away. After that will be college. Her hope is that if she is granted the emancipation that she’ll be able to be awarded financial aid under her independent status.

  Currently, Scarlett lives at home with her mom, but Scarlett is building her case for emancipation and that includes showing the judge that she has found a safe and affordable place to live away from her parents.

  Scarlett walks out of the bathroom, the folder that contains leasing information pressed tight to her chest. The landlord is letting us tour the place on our own, and I appreciate that. Scarlett needs time to process.

  “What do you think?” I ask. The apartment is within walking distance to the Save Mart, and it’s on a bus route to school. I’ve already offered to pick her up and drop her off anytime she needs to go to Glory’s for work. I’ll also take her to anywhere else she needs.

  “It’s a definite improvement over the apartments in Lexington.” She squeaks out a pathetic smile.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask.

  She shakes her head and strands of her long black hair fall out of her makeshift bun. I push off the wall, cross the room and weave my arms around her. She falls into me, and like always, a sense of peace surrounds me with having her in my arms.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask again.

  Scarlett draws back, and I let her go. Everything in her life is changing so quickly that I can’t imagine how she’s mentally keeping up. At the window, she undoes the lock, opens the window, closes it shut then relocks it. I smile—she’s learning.

  “I’m scared,” she says as she looks out the window.

  “Of what?”

  She inhales deeply then slowly blows out air. “Of failing. Of being alone … Of failing. When I told Mom that I filed for emancipation, she said I’d fail. And some days I feel I already have. Camila won’t talk to me. Evangeline says Camila feels like I betrayed her by not telling her everything going on between you and me. They don’t even know what has fully happened between me and Dad yet, so I’m sure those friendships are beyond repair. And then I don’t know if I’ll be able to afford food and rent and a car and car insurance and—”

  “Do you want to do this?” I interrupt her. “Do you want to be emancipated?”

  “Do I want to be emancipated? No. I want Mom and Dad to take a very long break from each other while Dad works on his problems. But that’s not going to happen. They’ve made their choices and now I need to make mine. But what if I fail?”

  I walk over to the corner of the room, slide down to the floor and gesture for her to follow. “Come here.”

  Her face scrunches in confusion. “What are you doing?”

  “You have to come here to find out.” I waggle my eyebrows.

  Sighing loudly to show her annoyance, she crosses the room to me. I widen my knees and wave both of my hands, welcoming her to sit. She settles between my legs, her back flush to my chest, and her legs brush against mine. I tuck her hair over her shoulder, wind my arms around her waist, then level my head so I can whisper in her ear, “Close your eyes.”

  “We’re touring an apartment, Jesse. The manager will be in here soon.”

  “Just do it.”

  With another annoyed sigh, she does, and after a few deep breaths, she relaxes into me.

  “Now open.”

  Her eyelashes flutter open.

  “Do you see it?” I ask.

  “What?”

  “The tea bags on the counter. We should have known Glory was going to give you those and the teacups. She also gave you that large ugly rock on the folding table by the window. I know she says it brings good energy, but I think she’s full of crap.”

  Scarlett giggles in my arms, and the friction feels good. I drag my mind away from kissing her and focus on helping. “Leo complains about the size of the TV on the wall, but you’ve figured out that the guy whines too much to begin with. Plus he’s jealous we received such a good deal. Nazareth found it at a flea market. I know i
t stunk like smoke when you first got it, but that candle you keep burning covers the smell.”

  “Do I have a couch?” she asks.

  “Not yet, but we’re looking for one. But you got the financial aid you needed so you move into the dorms soon. You’re debating whether it’s worth it to have one. Plus V prefers to sit on the floor. She’s recently developed a phobia to furniture, and after listening to her reasons as to why, you’re starting to wonder how many bugs are in your bed.”

  Scarlett laughs, and I nibble on her ear in praise. She cuddles closer and I kiss her neck, wishing we were truly alone.

  “And what are we sitting on now?” she whispers.

  I turn my head and breathe into her ear, “Your bed. I gave you the one I had in storage.”

  She shivers and leans her neck closer to my mouth. I’d love to take her up on her invitation, but we do want her to take the apartment and not get kicked out. I press my lips lightly to her skin and then tell her the truth I’ve learned from my past couple of months alone.

  “Scarlett.… you’re going to fail. You’re going to melt plastic mac-and-cheese cups in the microwave because you forgot to fill them with water. You’re going to forget homework and get a zero on it because you were so busy working to make sure you can buy another mac-and-cheese cup. You’re going to eat nothing but mac-and-cheese and ramen because you’re more concerned about your grades at school than taking on more hours to afford more groceries.”

  “You make it sound so promising,” she says.

  “But,” I emphasize, “what makes the difference is how you choose to look at it. You melted the mac-and-cheese cup, but you learned not to do that again, and you learned you’re handy with a fire extinguisher. In fact, you feel like a warrior because your quick thinking stopped the entire complex from burning down.

  “You get pissed off at yourself for forgetting your homework, but you figure out a system to remind yourself what’s due and check it every night before you go to bed, and then you realize that the world isn’t coming to an end because you messed up on one thing.

  “And then when your friends are sick and tired of watching you eat ramen, they take you out for dollar tacos. Then when you get tired of watching your friends eat ramen, you take them for dollar tacos. While eating tacos, you laugh because Leo will only speak in Old English, complete with an accent, and then you’ll watch him crash and burn as he tries to pick up the girl at the table next to us while speaking like Kermit the Frog.”

  She snorts because she’s already seen this act in real life, and it’s as horrifying as it sounds.

  “The point I’m making is that you can choose to look at the tough moments as failures or you can choose to look at them as a bad few minutes in a good day. It’s okay to feel sorry for yourself for a few seconds, but then you need to pick yourself up and brush yourself off. If you do that, you never fail.”

  Scarlett leans her head back onto my shoulder. “Is it possible? Can I succeed?”

  “Yes, Tink.” Calling her that makes me think of Gran and the hours she spent reading Peter and Wendy to me over and over again. “Do you want to know why Gran called you Tink?”

  “I thought it was because I was loyal.”

  “It is, but there’s more. It was said in the story that Tinker Bell was so small that she could only experience one emotion at a time. She was either all happy, all sad, all mad and so on. Gran said you were all or nothing. You were either all in or all out. All mad, sad or happy. Failure and success isn’t an all-or-nothing. It’s a little bit of both and everything in between.”

  She’s silent for a while, taking in what I said, and I’m just as quiet, reminding myself that I have to play by the same rules.

  Scarlett turns to look at me. “I want so badly to succeed and to do it on my own. I want to prove to myself, to my mom and to my sister, that this can be done. That I can support myself. That I don’t need someone to take care of me.”

  I caress her face and spot the determination in her eyes. I wish my mom had been more like her, but she wasn’t and that cost both me and her. “You’re going to do it, Tink. I know you will.”

  The smile she gives me is the most blinding and brilliant I’ve ever seen, and I lean forward and kiss her sweet lips.

  “What do you think of the apartment?” I ask her between kisses.

  “I’m taking it.”

  SCARLETT

  My pulse beats in my ears as the judge looks over his glasses at me then back at the paperwork in front of him. My social worker just finished testifying how I can afford the rent for the studio apartment, which Marshall has agreed to cosign for. She also detailed how, with the fact I am turning eighteen soon and won’t be bound by the Graduated Driver Licensing program, I’m working toward earning my driver’s license, and how I’ve lined up a very used car that probably shouldn’t be driven longer than fifty miles. My lawyer also laid out that I seem to have a good understanding of the responsibilities of living on my own.

  The underlying theme: yes, Scarlett is aware, for the foreseeable future, she’ll be eating ramen noodles for every meal, will learn to wear layers and work by candlelight to save on energy costs, and will be shopping at Goodwill in the desperate scenario that she has to purchase something.

  My lawyer, Susan Adachi, covers my hand with hers. She’s a rock, she’s a queen, and I love her even more because she’s taken me on as a favor to Marshall and because she believes in me. This is family court, and in theory, the room is closed, but all the people who have spoken on my behalf are behind me: Marshall, Glory, Pastor Hughes, the police officer who handed me a tissue as I cried and told him what happened between my mom and dad, and then there’s Jesse.

  Strong Jesse. Beautiful Jesse. A lighthouse in the midst of my storm. I peek over my shoulder, and he sits as if he’s the most carefree person in the world. He’s not watching the judge like everyone else, but me. Our eyes meet and he winks. A flurry of butterflies in my chest, and I force myself to focus.

  It’s going to be okay. Everything is going to be fine.

  My parents aren’t here. They sent in signed statements with their lawyer, stating that they don’t agree with my choices but that they will respect the decision of the court. I’m not sure how I feel about that—a bit empty, a bit relieved, a bit sad that they aren’t here begging for me to give them another chance. Even if they did, it wouldn’t change my mind. It’s just that every child wants their parents to want them. There’s this ache inside me that is begging for me to be loved—by them.

  I still see Pastor Hughes once a week, by my choice, and I asked him during one of our sessions if that ache would ever go away. He didn’t answer me directly, but I saw the honesty in his eyes—children always want their parents to love them and he told me that his Father, his God, offered the type of unconditional love that heals all wounds.

  The judge takes a deep breath, nerves overtake my stomach, and with a few words of encouragement, the judge announces that I’m free.

  “We also asked for visitation for her sister, Isabelle,” Susan says.

  “I’m also granting the visitation.” And my entire world is right.

  * * *

  Dad is in the basement, Mom is in her room crying, Isabelle is watching cartoons and I’m wondering for the millionth time if I’m making the right choice. I’m leaving. Tonight. I’m terrified, and I want to puke. Across the street, Jesse and Marshall are sitting on the front steps of Jesse’s trailer. They’re there in case something goes wrong.

  Jesse wanted to come in with me, but Marshall had worked it out with my parents for them to give me space to pack. Marshall believes that we should handle everything with as little emotion and confrontation as possible. Problem is, I don’t know how to stop feeling.

  Hot and clammy, I fold another shirt and place it on top of the others in the suitcase. I’m taking my clothes, some items like makeup and then some personal things like my favorite stuffed animal as a child and a photo of me and my siste
r. Marshall told me to only take things that I can prove were given to me as a gift—otherwise Dad could claim I’m stealing from him. Is he that bitter? I don’t know, and I don’t plan on finding out.

  “You don’t have to do this,” my father says in his deep, sad tone.

  My stomach sinks, and I briefly close my eyes before turning to look at him. He stands in the doorway with his hands in his pockets, looking so regretful. A slow throb starts in my head—and the merry-go-round starts up again.

  “Yes, I do,” I say.

  “You can stay, and we can try again.” Dad rubs the back of his neck, reminding me of the conversation we had in front of Glory’s booth back in August. “I was wrong to get so angry that night, and I was wrong to hit your mother. It’s just that when we came home and found you gone, it terrified me. I thought of how I lost my sister and—”

  “Stop!” I hold out my hand, and I notice that it has a slight tremor. Standing up for myself is terrifying. In my back pocket is the prepaid cell I bought for myself last night, and it’s my only security blanket in this horrendous situation. One call to Jesse or Marshall, and they’ll be here in a heartbeat.

  “You don’t get to do this anymore,” I say. “You don’t get to excuse away your behavior. Something horrible happened to you, but that does not give you the excuse to do something horrible to Isabelle, Mom or me.”

  “I know,” he starts, “and I’m truly working on this. I’m still in counseling. I’m attending several times a week now. I just need more time—”

  “That’s great, but you should be figuring this out away from here. You should be giving Mom space to figure out why she’s okay with how you treat her, and you should be allowing me and Isabelle space to heal from our wounds. But you aren’t. You’re staying here so I have to leave. I’m no longer going to allow your problems to be my problems.”

  Dad’s face and posture crumple, but while I hurt, while I feel sorry for him, I also feel sorry for me. He’s broken, and I can’t fix him. That’s not my job anymore. It should have never been my job to begin with.