Watch Over Me

by Mila Gray

  We approach the front door, which has been replaced with a thick piece of plywood, put in place by someone who obviously likes their nail gun. I guess the authorities wanted to keep it from becoming a crack den. The whole front of the house is blackened with soot, and in the driveway there’s a patch of charred concrete where I’m guessing Zoey’s car once sat.

  “There’s no way in,” Zoey says, examining the door and then stepping back to check the plywood that’s also been nailed over the window frames.

  Dejected, she looks around wondering, like I am, if Kate’s already been here, and if so, where she might have gone next. “Let’s go around the back,” Zoey says, and I follow her around the side and into a deserted courtyard. It’s midday and about a billion degrees, so no one is outside, though I notice a curtain flutter in a house across the way.

  The back of Zoey’s house is boarded up too, but one of the boards has been pried away and is hanging loose.

  Zoey races over to it, and together we rip it off. Inside, I catch a glimpse of a bedroom—though it looks like it’s been ransacked. There are clothes and blackened sheets strewn across the floor, and unless Zoey’s mom let Cole paint the walls with graffiti, then it’s safe to say we aren’t the first people to find our way inside. I heave myself over and jump down. My foot immediately crunches on a broken beer bottle. Whoever pried off that plywood had themselves a little party. I turn and help Zoey through the window. She jumps down and stands stock-still, staring in horror, as I get out my phone and shine the flashlight.

  “Kate?” I shout.

  I step in front of Zoey and push open the bedroom door, which leads into a living room. It’s worse than the bedroom. Green mold speckles the sofa, and the smell reminds me of a urinal inside a mushroom factory. I cover my nose and try to breathe as shallowly as I possibly can without passing out.

  There are beer cans and misshapen spoons and torn pizza boxes lying all around. Zoey makes a sound—an exhalation that sounds like a sob. I turn and see she’s holding something in her hand, and when I shine the torch on it, notice it’s a broken mug.

  “Cole made me this,” she says.

  I scan the ground and spot the missing handle lying in a pile of ash. Zoey turns the mug upside down and empties it of cigarette ends and blunts. “Here,” I say, taking it from her and picking up the handle. “We’ll fix it.”

  The skin on the back of my neck prickles just then, and I hold a hand up to Zoey, warning her to stay quiet. There’s someone here. I can feel it.

  There’s a quiet rustle from one of the rooms, and Zoey moves toward it, but I step in front of her again. I’ll be the one to open the door. It might just be a kid with a paint can, painting graffiti on the walls, or even a rat, but either way I’d rather it was me confronting it.

  I set the mug down on the edge of the sofa and then open the door. It’s another bedroom, with a bunk bed pushed against one wall. I shine the torch on the bottom bunk. The bedding is filthy—stained with God knows what, but by the smell of it, nothing good—and it looks like a campfire might have been lit and then smothered in the corner of the room.

  The closet door is open, and all the clothes have been ransacked, so the shelves are empty, barring a few pairs of Spider-Man underwear and a child’s sock. I shine the light onto the top bunk, and both Zoey and I jump back in fright.

  Kate is sitting, knees pulled to her chest, her head bowed and resting on her arms.

  “Kate?” Zoey whispers. She lets go of my hand and moves toward her, climbing the ladder and gingerly crawling onto the top bunk beside her. She puts her arm around Kate’s shoulders, and they both start to cry.

  ZOEY

  It’s going to be okay,” I tell Kate as she sobs in my arms.

  She shakes her head against my shoulder. “No, it’s not,” she says, her voice muffled.

  “It is,” I reassure her. “I know it doesn’t feel like it now, but it will be.” Tristan has left the room, and I can hear him moving around the apartment, probably looking to see if anything is salvageable, though I wouldn’t bet a cent anything is. “Why didn’t you tell me about Lis?” I ask Kate, once she’s calmer.

  She tenses, and I wonder if she’s about to deny things, but finally she says, “I don’t know.”

  “You know I would have supported you.”

  She leans back at that to look at me, her face all blotchy from crying. “You didn’t tell me about you and Tristan.”

  Okay, she has me there.

  Kate cuts me off. “You never tell me anything. You didn’t tell me about Dad being out of prison either.”

  “I was trying to protect you.”

  Kate looks at me, offended. “I’m fifteen. I’m not a kid. You don’t have to protect me.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say again, seeing for the first time that she’s right. Because I’ve always thought of her as my little sister, someone I needed to look after, it’s difficult to think of her any other way. But the fact is, she’s only a year younger than I was when my dad went to jail. “I guess I didn’t want to upset you or make you worry over nothing,” I say.

  Kate narrows her eyes at me. “Is it nothing?”

  I open my mouth to answer her but pause. Here’s my chance to be straight with her, but I honestly can’t. “It’s nothing to worry about,” I tell her.

  “Don’t lie to me,” she says angrily. “I’m not an idiot. If there’s nothing to worry about, why did Tristan install that camera by our front door? Why won’t he ever leave your side? He’s worried about you. I’m worried about you.” Her voice cracks on this last part, so I take her hand and squeeze it.

  “Honestly, it’s fine,” I tell her, the lie clogging my throat.

  Kate’s eyes brighten again with tears. “Don’t lie,” she growls.

  I stare at her for a few moments before taking a deep breath. “Okay, yes, Dad has been calling me, making threats.”

  Kate’s face pales beneath the blotchiness. “What kind of threats?”

  “Nothing specific,” I say vaguely. “He’s mad at me. He blames me for testifying against him. But it’s just threats. He won’t do anything.”

  “What do you mean? Look what he did to Mom! He almost killed her. He would have killed her if you hadn’t …” She starts crying, fat tears falling fast down her cheeks. “And if you don’t think he’s going to do something, why the need for all the cameras? Why did Robert buy Mom pepper spray?”

  This is exactly why I didn’t want to tell her what was happening. I can’t bear seeing how afraid she is. I should have kept lying.

  “Have you told the cops?” Kate asks. “Can’t they do something?”

  I shake my head. “No. There’s no proof. That’s why Tristan installed the camera by the door.”

  “He’s been to the house?! He’s in Oceanside?” Kate asks, shrinking away from me in terror. “How did he find us?” she demands to know.

  “I don’t know.” I don’t tell her I think Cole might have told him.

  Kate’s lip trembles, and the tears start to come even faster. “Why can’t he leave us alone?” she cries.

  There’s nothing to say to that. I wish he would too, but I think the only way he’s going to leave us alone is if we catch him on camera breaking his parole terms and the cops arrest him and throw him back in jail. But he won’t be in jail forever; they’ll let him out … and what will happen then? Sometimes it feels like I’ll never escape him.

  “Are we going to have to leave Oceanside?” Kate asks, wiping her tears with the back of her hand.

  I don’t say anything. The truth is, I’ve thought about leaving, and every time I do, Tristan enters my mind and I dismiss the idea out of hand. But is that selfish? Am I putting everyone in danger by staying? Am I putting Tristan in danger as well? My dad has his sights on Tristan now too, and the knowledge makes me sick with fear.

  “I don’t know,” I tell Zoey, because I can feel her hanging on my answer.

  “I like it there,” she says quietly
. “I don’t want to leave.”

  “I thought you hated it?” I ask, surprised. “I thought you wanted to come back here.”

  She gives a gentle shrug. “I just miss Lis. I don’t miss the place.” She casts a glance around the room, at the wreckage and debris of our previous life, and as I stare at the trashed mattress and broken toys and stained walls, it’s as if I’m viewing someone else’s belongings. These things feel like they belong to a different life, one I’m happy to let go of. We were given a new start, and that new start involves Tristan.

  “Do you love him?” Kate asks.

  “Huh?” I ask, turning to stare at Kate. “Dad?”

  “No,” she says. “Tristan.”

  I open my mouth and then shut it. I don’t as a rule talk about myself or my feelings, not to anyone, but before I can stop it, the word “yes” tumbles out of me. For a moment, I want to snatch it back and swallow it. It’s scary to admit it out loud when I haven’t even admitted it to myself.

  Kate smiles at me and rests her head on my shoulder. “Good,” she says. “He’s nice.”

  “Yeah,” I say with a smile, thinking how “nice” doesn’t cover it. “He is.

  “Did you love Lis?” I ask after a while.

  Kate sniffs. “I don’t know. I think so. How do you know for sure?”

  I laugh. It’s not like I have any experience of love apart from what I feel now with Tristan and what I’ve always felt toward Mom and my siblings. But that’s a different kind of love. What I feel for Tristan is like fire: almost too bright to look at, warming, comforting. But terrifying, too—as though it could consume me if I let it.

  I sense Kate waiting. “I guess it’s knowing you’d do anything, risk anything, sacrifice everything for them,” I tell her.

  Kate takes that in, then stares at me with an intense, unhappy look. “That’s sad.”

  “What is?” I ask, confused.

  “You think love is sacrifice.”

  “Isn’t it?”

  Kate struggles with that, her nose wrinkling. “I guess it’s part of it,” she admits, “but it shouldn’t be all of it. You shouldn’t sacrifice your own happiness or your own dreams to make other people happy.”

  “But I’m not … ,” I argue.

  “Yes, you are,” Kate argues back. “At least, you have done that for us. You didn’t go to college, you’re having to work now to pay the rent and bills, and … it’s not fair. You’re the smart one. You should be in school.”

  I shrug, staring at Kate, who suddenly seems older than her fifteen years. It is what it is, though. Who said life is fair? “But I am happy,” I tell her, trying to reassure her.

  “Now you are,” she says. “Because of Tristan.”

  I can’t argue with that.

  Kate rests her head on my shoulder. “I’m sorry,” she says.

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “That you’ve had to do so much for us.”

  “I don’t mind,” I say, kissing her forehead. “Honestly.”

  Kate hugs me tight. “I love you.”

  My throat tightens with emotion, a lump rising up from my chest. I can’t remember the last time we said we loved each other. I can’t remember the last time we spoke like this. “I love you too,” I tell her.

  “I’m sorry I stole your money,” she says in a small voice. She sits up and starts scrambling around in her bag, pulling out the tattered envelope of cash I’ve collected from tips. “Here,” she says, thrusting it at me. “I only spent sixty dollars. I promise I’ll pay you back as soon as I can.”

  “It’s okay,” I say.

  She rests her head again on my shoulder. “I didn’t tell you about Lis because I was ashamed,” Kate says after a while.

  I turn to look at her. “Why?” I ask.

  Kate takes a deep breath. “It sounds stupid, but when I was little, I remember Dad seeing a couple in a restaurant, and they were holding hands—that’s all they were doing. It was two guys and they weren’t kissing or doing anything. They were just holding hands. And Dad said something to them. He told them they were disgusting and started cursing at them. It was awful. I wanted the ground to swallow me up.”

  I’m not even surprised. I remember him saying homophobic, sexist, horrible things all the time. “He hates everyone,” I tell her.

  “I know. He’s an asshole. But it still stuck with me, you know?”

  I nod, thinking ruefully of the word “whore” and how that stuck with me my whole life too. “You can’t let him have that power over you,” I tell her.

  “I know,” she says, “I just … I hate him.”

  I shake my head at her. “No. That’s what he does. He hates. Don’t be like him, or he’s won.”

  “How can you not hate him, though?” she asks me, incredulous.

  I take another deep breath and let it out slowly. It’s hard. I have to admit that. “Because hating him doesn’t do anything,” I eventually say. “It doesn’t change anything. It just makes me angry and sad. And I don’t want to be those things. I don’t want to be anything like him. I just want to be happy. And I don’t think you can be both.”

  Kate frowns. I can see her struggling with knowing I’m right and with processing the anger she feels. It isn’t so easy to stop being angry and to stop hating. All those feelings have to go somewhere, and where are you supposed to put them? I think I buried all my feelings down deep, keeping busy, not thinking about him, and now … and now I guess there’s no room in me for all that old, squashed-up anger. The good has displaced it.

  “Don’t let him win,” I tell Kate, repeating the exact same words the district attorney told me all those years ago, before I took the stand. “He wins if you let him dictate your life and your choices.” As I say it, I realize I’m actually talking to myself as much as to Kate. I’m not leaving Oceanside, I realize. I’m not running anymore. I’m not letting my dad have that power over me or letting him take my happiness away. I’m not leaving Tristan. And with that knowledge, I turn to Kate. “Shall we go home?” I ask her.

  She blinks away the last of her tears, then nods.

  When we leave the bedroom, there’s no sign of Tristan, but I assume he’s waiting outside.

  I give Kate a boost, and as she climbs out the window ahead of me, I hear her squeal.

  “What is it?” I ask, alarmed and scrambling quickly after her.

  As I straighten up, I spot Tristan walking toward us, holding something in his arms. It’s a writhing, spitting fur ball of white and black.

  Kate sprints toward him, arms outstretched. “Romeo!”

  I run after her, watching as she scoops the protesting cat into her arms and smothers him in kisses, all while he tries to claw her face off. Somehow Romeo looks more bobcat-size than house cat–sized, and I wonder what he’s been eating.

  “Where was he?” I ask Tristan in amazement as Kate ignores Romeo’s frenzied slashing and squeezes him even harder.

  Tristan smiles at me and nods his head over his shoulder. I glance past him and see Winston, our old neighbor, the man who helped us the night of the fire, walking toward us, grinning ear to ear.

  “Saw you climbing in the window,” he says, jerking his head in the direction of the house. “I was about to call the police. We had a few problems with people breaking in,” he says by way of explanation. “Then I saw it was you.” He grins at me, then points at Romeo. “I found your cat. Been taking care of him these last few weeks.”

  “Thank you,” I say, watching Kate finally get a spitting Romeo to settle down, albeit grumpily, in her arms.

  “I tried to find you,” Winston says, “but there’s no record of you online. Couldn’t get your number, either, from the police. I hoped you’d show back up one day.”

  “Thank you,” Kate says. “Thank you so much.”

  “You gonna be moving back in?” Winston asks, nodding at the house.

  Kate looks at me, beaming, then at Winston.

  “No,” we both say
in unison.

  TRISTAN

  I haven’t slept in thirty-two hours, and I’m almost seeing double. It’s not safe to drive all the way home, and after calling Gina to assure her Kate is with us and everything is fine, I suggest that we stay the night in Vegas before heading back home in the morning.

  Zoey, almost as exhausted as me, nods, and before she can worry about the cost, I tell her I’ve got a contact at the MGM Grand who’ll comp me a room.

  Whatever happened in the house, it seems that Zoey and Kate talked things out. And seeing Kate’s face when she saw the Tasmanian devil was almost worth the drive here. But it’s hers and Zoey’s reactions when we walk into our suite at the MGM an hour later that definitely make the drive here worth it.

  Kate’s jaw hits the swirly carpeted floor as her gaze takes in the chandelier the size of a car that’s suspended from a two-story ceiling. Zoey walks slowly through the living area to the enormous window and the panoramic skyline view of the city.

  I go to stand by her, and she slips her hand into mine. “This is amazing,” she whispers.

  “Manager owed me a favor.”

  “What did you do for him?” she asks.

  “Saved his life,” I say smugly. “And his boat from sinking.”

  Zoey stares at me in wonder.

  “Oh my God!” we hear Kate shriek from upstairs. When we look up we see her leaning over the railing above us. “There are THREE bathrooms. Three!” she exclaims. “And they have robes!” she squeals, before showing us her hands full of miniature bottles of toiletries. “And free shampoo!” She runs back into one of the rooms, and we hear more squeals of delight.

  “Want to explore?” I say to Zoey.

  She nods, and we run around the suite, opening up doors and discovering a dining room, a study, two bedrooms, and the three bathrooms that Kate already informed us about.

  “My friend told me we can order anything we want from room service—it’s all complimentary.”

  At that, Kate’s eyes grow even wider, and she throws herself across the bed and toward a table where a room-service menu sits. “I’m starving!” she yells. “How much can we order?”