The Elements Series Complete Box Set

by Brittainy Cherry

  The moment Dad walked out the door in the mornings, Mama smiled and hummed to herself as she cleaned up around the house and got me ready for the day. She’d talk about Dad, saying how much she missed him, and would write him love letters until he came home at night. When he came home, Mama would always pour them both a glass of wine while he hummed their favorite song, and he’d kiss her against her wrist whenever she grew close enough to his mouth. They would laugh with one another and giggle as if they were kids falling in love for the first time.

  “You’re my love without end, Kyle Bailey,” she’d say, pressing her lips to his.

  “You’re my love without end, Hannah Bailey,” Dad would reply, spinning her in his arms.

  They loved in a way that made fairy tales envious.

  So on that sizzling August day years ago when Dad died, a part of Mama left too. I remembered in some novel I’d read the author said, “No soulmate leaves the world alone; they always take a piece of their other half along with them.” I hated that he was right. Mama didn’t get out of bed for months. I had to make her eat and drink each day, just hoping she wouldn’t fade away from sadness. I’d never seen her cry until she lost her husband. I didn’t show too much emotion around her, because I knew that would only make her sadder.

  I cried enough when I was alone.

  When she finally did get out of bed, she went to church for a few weeks, taking me alongside her. I remembered being twelve and feeling completely lost sitting in a church. We weren’t really a praying kind of family until after bad things happened. Our church trips didn’t last very long, though, because Mama called God a liar and scorned the townsfolk for wasting time on such deceit and empty promises of a promised land.

  Pastor Reece asked us not to come back for a while, to let things smooth out a bit.

  I hadn’t known people could be banished from a holy temple until that very moment. When Pastor Reece said come one, come all, I guessed he met a different kind of ‘one’ and a special kind of ‘all’.

  Nowadays Mama had moved on to a new pastime: different men on the regular. Some she slept with, others she used to help pay the bills, and then some she kept ‘round because she was lonely and they kind of looked like Dad. Some she even called by his name. Tonight there was a car parked in front of her little house. It was a deep navy blue, with shiny metallic silver frames. The inside had apple red leather seats, a man sitting with a cigar between his lips, and Mama in his lap. He looked like he’d walked right out of the 1960s. She giggled as he whispered something to her, but it wasn’t the same kind of laugh she’d always given Dad.

  It was a little vacant, a little hollow, a little sad.

  I glanced down the street and saw Ms. Jackson surrounded by the other gossipy women, pointing at Mama and her new man of the week. I wished I were close enough to hear them so I could tell them to keep their yaps shut, but they were a good block away. Even the kids who were tossing a ball in the street, hitting it around with a few broken sticks stopped their actions and stared wide-eyed at Mama and the stranger.

  Cars that cost as much as his never traveled down streets that looked like ours. I’d tried to convince Mama she should move to a better neighborhood, but she refused. I thought it was mainly because she and Dad had bought the house together.

  Maybe she hadn’t completely let him go yet.

  The man blew a cloud of smoke into Mama’s face and they laughed together. She was wearing her nicest dress, a yellow dress that hung off her shoulders, hugged her small waist, and flared out at the bottom. She wore so much makeup that it made her fifty-year-old face look more like a thirty-year-old. She was pretty without all that gunk on her cheeks, but she said a little blush made a girl turn into a woman. The pearls around her neck were from Grandma Betty. She’d never worn those pearls for a stranger before tonight, and I wondered why she was wearing them now.

  The two glanced my way, and I hid behind the porch post where I was spying from.

  “Liz, if you’re planning on hiding, at least do a better job at it. Now come on over and meet my new friend,” Mama shouted.

  I stepped from behind the post and walked over to the two of them. The man blew another puff of smoke, and the smell lingered around my nostrils as I took in his graying hair and deep blue eyes.

  “Richard, this is my daughter, Elizabeth. Everyone we know calls her Liz, though.”

  Richard eyed me up and down in a way that made me feel less like a person. He studied me as if I was a porcelain doll he wanted to watch shatter. I tried not to show my discomfort, but it seeped through as my eyes shifted to the ground. “How do you do, Liz?”

  “Elizabeth,” I corrected, my voice hitting the concrete I’d been staring down at. “Only people I know call me Liz.”

  “Liz, that is no way to speak to him!” Mama scolded, her slight wrinkles deepening in her forehead. She would’ve had a fit if she’d known her wrinkles were showing. I hated how whenever a new man came around, she was quick to back them up instead of standing up for me.

  “It’s all right, Hannah. Besides, she’s right. It takes time to get to know somebody. Nicknames need to be earned, not given out freely.” There was something so slimy about the way Richard stared at me and puffed on his cigar. I was wearing a pair of loose jeans and a plain, oversized T-shirt, but his eyes made me feel exposed. “We were about to go grab a bite to eat in town, if you want to join us,” he offered.

  I declined. “Emma’s still sleeping.” My eyes glanced back at the house where my baby girl was lying on the pullout sofa she and I’d been sharing for one too many nights since we’d moved back in with Mama.

  Mama wasn’t the only one who’d lost the love of her life.

  Hopefully I wouldn’t end up like her.

  Hopefully I’d just stay in the sad phase.

  It’d been a year since Steven passed away, and still each breath was hard to swallow. Emma’s and my true home was back in Meadows Creek, Wisconsin. It was a fixer-upper place where Steven, Emma, and I had taken a house and created a home. We fell deeper in love, into fights, and back in love, over and over again.

  It became a place of warmth just by us being within its walls, and after Steven passed away, a drift of coldness filled the space.

  The last time he and I were together, his hand was around my waist in the foyer and we were creating memories we’d thought would last forever.

  Forever was much shorter than anyone would ever like to believe.

  For the longest time, life flowed in its accustomed stream, and one day it all came to a shocking stop.

  I’d felt the suffocation of the memories, of the sadness, so I’d run off to stay with Mama.

  Going back to the house would ultimately be me facing the truth that he was really gone. For over a year, I’d been living in make-believe, pretending he’d gone out for milk and would be walking through the door any time now. Each evening when I lay down to sleep, I stayed on the left side and closed my eyes, pretending Steven was against the right.

  But now, my Emma needed more. My poor Emma needed freedom from pullout couches, strange men, and gossiping neighbors who said words that should never fill a five-year-old’s ears. She needed me too. I’d been walking through the darkness, only being half the mother she deserved, so maybe facing the memories of our house would help bring me more peace.

  I headed back inside the house and looked down at my sleeping angel, her chest rising and falling in a perfect pattern. She and I had much in common, from our dimpled cheeks to the blonde tone of our hair. We shared the same kind of laugh that was quiet, yet grew loud in the company of the ones we loved. She smiled out of the right corner of her mouth and frowned out of the left, the same way my lips did.

  But there was one big difference.

  She had his blue eyes.

  I lay beside Emma, placing a gentle kiss against her nose before I reached into the heart-shaped tin box and read another love letter. It was one I’d read before, yet it still tugged at my spi
rit.

  Sometimes I pretended the letters were from Steven.

  I always cried a little.

  2

  Elizabeth

  “Are we really going home?” asked sleepy Emma when morning came through the living room window, spilling light against her sweet face. I picked her up from the bed and placed her and Bubba—her teddy bear and all-time favorite companion—on the closest chair. Bubba wasn’t simply a teddy bear, he was a mummified teddy bear. See, my little girl was a little weird, and after she saw the movie Hotel Transylvania—which involved zombies, vampires, and mummies—she decided that maybe a little scary and maybe a little weird was perfect.

  “We are.” I smiled toward her as I folded up the pullout. The night before I hadn’t slept a wink and I stayed up packing all of our belongings.

  Emma had a goofy grin on her face that matched her father’s. She screamed, “YAY!” and told Bubba we were really going home.

  Home.

  That word stung a little in the back of my heart, but I kept smiling. I’d learned to always smile in front of Emma because she had a way of growing sad whenever she thought I was sad. Even though she gave me the best Eskimo kisses when I was feeling down, she didn’t need that kind of responsibility.

  “We should make it back in time to see the fireworks on our rooftop. Remember how we used to watch the fireworks on the roof with Daddy? Do you remember that, babe?” I asked her.

  She narrowed her eyes as if going deep into her mind, searching. If only our minds were like file cabinets and we could simply retrieve our favorite memories from a neatly organized system whenever we chose. “I don’t remember,” she said, hugging Bubba.

  That breaks my heart.

  I smiled anyway.

  “Well, how about we stop at the store on the way and pick up some Bomb-Pops to eat on the roof?”

  “And some Cheeto Puffs for Bubba!”

  “Of course!”

  She smiled and screamed once more. That time the grin I gave her was nothing but real.

  I loved her more than she’d ever know. If it hadn’t been for her, I would’ve definitely lost myself to the grief. Emma saved my soul.

  I didn’t say goodbye to Mama, because she never came home from her dinner date with Casanova. When I first moved in with her and she didn’t come home, I would call and call, worried about her whereabouts, but often she would yell at me, telling me she was a grown woman doing grown woman things.

  So, I left her a note.

  Going home.

  We love you.

  We’ll see you soon.

  —E&E

  We drove for hours in my broken-down car, listening to the Frozen soundtrack enough times for me to consider pulling out my eyelashes one at a time with a razorblade. Emma somehow listened to each song a million times, yet had a way of making up her own words to every line. To be honest, I liked her version of the songs the best.

  When she fell asleep, Frozen slept with her, leaving me with a car full of silence. My hand reached out toward the passenger seat, palm up, waiting for another hand to lock my fingers with theirs, but the touch never found me.

  I’m doing good, I told myself, over and over again. I’m so good.

  One day, it would be true.

  One day, I’d be good.

  As we merged onto the I-64 freeway, my gut tightened. I wished I could take back roads to get to Meadows Creek, but this was the only way into town. It was quite busy for the holiday, but the new smooth pavement of the once broken roadway made for easy travels. Tears formed in my eyes as I remembered watching the news.

  Pileup on I-64!

  Chaos!

  Mayhem!

  Injuries!

  Casualties!

  Steven.

  One breath.

  I kept driving and the tears that tried to escape failed. I forced my body to go numb, because if I wasn’t numb, I’d feel everything. If I felt everything, I’d fall apart, and I couldn’t fall apart. The rearview mirror showed me my small bit of strength as I stared at my baby. We made it across the freeway, and I took another breath. Each day was one breath at a time. I couldn’t think much further than that, otherwise I’d choke on the air.

  On a polished white piece of wood was a sign that read ‘Welcome to Meadows Creek’.

  Emma was awake now, staring out the window. “Hey, Mama?”

  “Yes, baby?”

  “Do you think Daddy will know that we moved? Do you think he’ll know where to leave the feathers?”

  When Steven passed away and we moved to stay with Mama, there were white bird feathers scattered around the front yard. When Emma asked about them, Mama said they were small signs from the angels, letting us know they were always close by, watching over us.

  Emma had loved the idea, and whenever she would find a feather, she would look up to the sky, smile, and whisper, “I love you too, Daddy.” Then she would take a picture with the feather to add to her collection of ‘Daddy and Me’ photos.

  “I’m sure he’ll know where to find us, sweetie.”

  “Yeah,” she agreed. “Yeah, he’ll know where to find us.”

  The trees were greener than I remembered, and the little shops in downtown Meadows Creek were decked out with reds, whites, and blues for the festivities. It was so familiar yet foreign all at once. Mrs. Fredrick’s American flag flapped in the wind as she fixed the patriotically dyed roses in her flower pot. Pride bloomed from her entire existence as she stepped back to admire her home.

  We got stuck behind the one traffic light in town for ten minutes. The wait made no sense at all, but it did give me time to take in everything that reminded me of Steven. Of us. Once the light switched over, I placed my foot on the gas pedal, wanting nothing more than to get home and ignore the shadows of the past. As the car took off down the street, from the corner of my eye I saw a dog dashing toward me. My foot moved quickly to the brake, but my old, beat-up car hiccupped and hesitated to stop. By the time it finally did, I heard the loud yelp.

  My heart leaped into my throat and stayed there, blocking the ability for me to inhale my next breath. I slammed the car into park. Emma asked what was happening, but I didn’t have time to reply. I swung my door open, reaching the poor dog right as a man raced up to me. His wide-eyed stare locked with mine, almost forcing me to train in on the intensity of his stormy grayish-blue eyes. Most blue eyes came with a warm, welcoming feeling attached to them, but not his. His were intense, just as his stance was. Icy and private. Around the rims of his irises were profound blues, but silver and black strands of coloring were woven in and out, which added to the shrouded look in his stare. His eyes matched the shadows of the sky right before a thunderstorm was about to pass through.

  Those eyes were so familiar to me. Did I know him? I could’ve sworn I’d seen his stare somewhere before. He looked both terrified and livid as he moved his eyes to what I was assuming was his dog, which was lying still. Around the stranger’s neck were huge headphones that were attached to something resting in his back pocket.

  He was decked out in workout clothes. His long-sleeved white shirt hugged his muscular arms, his black shorts showed his built legs, and sweat was brewing along his forehead. I assumed he’d been taking his dog for a run when he lost hold of his leash, but the man wasn’t wearing any shoes.

  Why wasn’t he wearing shoes?

  That didn’t matter. Was his dog okay?

  I should’ve been paying closer attention.

  “I’m so sorry, I didn’t see…” I started to say, but the man grunted harshly at my words, almost as if they offended him.

  “What the hell?! Are you fucking kidding me?!” he shouted, his voice making me jump a bit. He lifted his dog into his arms, cradling the pet as if it were his own child. As he stood, I stood. As he searched around, I searched around.

  “Let me drive you to the vet,” I said, my body shaking from seeing the dog trembling in the stranger’s arms. I knew I should’ve been annoyed with the tone he’d
taken with me, but when someone was in panic mode, you couldn’t really blame them for their behavior. He didn’t speak back, but I watched the hesitation in his eyes. His face was framed with a very thick, dark, untamed beard. His mouth was hidden somewhere in the wildness resting against his face, so all I had to rely on was the story he told with his eyes. “Please,” I begged. “It’s too far to walk.”

  He nodded once and only once. When he opened the passenger seat, he and his pet sat inside, closing the door behind them.

  Hopping into the car, I started driving.

  “What’s going on?” Emma asked.

  “We are just going to take the pup to get checked out, honey. Everything’s fine.” I really hoped I wasn’t lying to her.

  It was a twenty-minute drive to the closest 24-hour animal hospital, and the car ride didn’t exactly go the way I’d thought it would.

  “Take a left on Cobbler Street,” he ordered.

  “Harper Avenue will be faster,” I disagreed.

  He grunted, his annoyance shining through. “You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, take Cobbler!”

  I took a breath. “I know how to drive.”

  “Do you? Because I think your driving is the reason we’re sitting here.”

  I was five seconds from kicking the rude jerk out of my car, but his whimpering dog was the only reason I didn’t. “I already apologized.”

  “That doesn’t help my dog.”

  Asshole.

  “Cobbler is the next right,” he said.

  “Harper is the next, next right.”

  “Don’t take Harper.”

  Oh, I’m taking Harper just to annoy the living shit out of this guy. Who does he think he is?

  I turned right onto Harper.

  “I can’t believe you just fucking took Harper,” he groaned. His infuriation made me smile a little, until I hit the construction zone and ‘closed street’ signs. “Are you always so ignorant?”