Tristan (The Ruins of Emblem #1)

by Cora Brent

  “Ah man, why’d you have to bring that up?” I’d only been about six at the time, hadn’t thought about it in years. I found the creature in the road, its tail crushed, it’s belly scraped up to hell. Curtis was the one who helped me collect it into a shoebox and figure out how to take care of it until it was ready to scamper off into the desert on its own two feet again.

  Curtis forged ahead. “She sees a guy who stands by an old friend and sticks up for him when he can’t defend himself.”

  I squirted ketchup on my fries. I didn’t need any praise for trying to look out for Pike. Anyone with a soul would do the same.

  But Curtis wasn’t done. “I think she also sees someone who makes her feel things she didn’t expect to feel. She knows he’s a better man than he pretends to be.”

  “Quit with the fucking sappiness,” I grumbled, embarrassed by the tribute. “Or I’ll put down this hamburger and kick your ass.”

  Curtis belted out a laugh. “As if you could, little man.”

  “Little man?” I sputtered. Then I flexed. “I’m bigger than you are now, family guy. So stop getting under my skin because I don’t want Cassie to get mad at me for messing you up.”

  He laughed again and then quieted down, gazing at me thoughtfully. “I’ve missed you, Tristan.”

  “Missed you too, bro,” I said, rolling my eyes but pleased that we were acting like goofy fools.

  We hung out at the diner for so long that Cassie wound up joining us there after all. She was ravenous, finishing all the food Curtis had left on his plate and then ordering another round of appetizers plus another burger. Cassie also wanted to hear everything I had to say about her sister, what she was doing, how she liked living in Emblem. I suspected Cassie already knew everything about Cadence already and just wanted to hear me gush over her sister but that was all right. I could ramble on about Cadence all night.

  “When do you need to be back in Emblem?” Cassie asked, now munching a plate of cheese fries.

  “I wanted to have a talk with Brecken first.” I nodded at Curtis. “You said he’ll be working at Esposito’s until nine tonight?”

  “Nine,” Curtis confirmed.

  “I’ll stick around and catch him on his way out.”

  “In that case why don’t you hang out overnight?” Curtis suggested. “The couch rolls out and it’s been a while since the three of us Mulligan brothers were under one roof.”

  How could I pass up an opportunity like that? I couldn’t. I would have been crazy to even think twice.

  “You’ve got a point,” I said. “I’d be honored to crash on your couch.”

  That made Curtis happy. Until very recently I’d never realized how easy it was to make people happy.

  Now I didn’t understand why it had taken me so long to figure it out.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Cadence

  I was grading papers while crunching a haphazard early dinner of cornflakes at the kitchen table when Leah called.

  “Get down here,” she said with a smile in her voice. “You have visitors.”

  “Visitors?” I tapped my pen, puzzled. “What visitors?”

  Tristan was out of town, my grandfather was off somewhere with Karen and I didn’t have a long list of social contacts in Emblem. Maybe Aura and some of the other teachers were over there. I couldn’t imagine who else would be asking for me to join them.

  “You’ll have to show up to find out,” Leah teased so I knew whoever these ‘visitors’ were at least they were friendly.

  “All right, Ms. Mysterious, I’ll be right there,” I said, already dumping my bowl of cereal.

  The drive took less than five minutes and when I reached the parking lot I did a double take. I quickly exited my car for a closer look at the parked vehicle that had caught my attention.

  What were the odds that someone besides Cord Gentry owned a red Tacoma with Scratch bumper stickers and a small dent on the rear bumper courtesy of yours truly?

  I stopped to examine the truck and concluded that yes, the dent in question was identical to the one I’d inflicted on my father’s truck two years ago when I was home on a college break and backed up a bit too far, grazing a light pole in a Mill Avenue parking lot.

  The truck’s presence made no sense. My dad never made spontaneous trips down to Emblem, not even now that I was living here. He just didn’t.

  I pushed open the door to the Dirty Cactus and there they were. The Gentry triplets, lined up on bar stools, my father in the middle. They were talking to Leah and all three of them turned around at exactly the same time.

  “There she is,” said Creed Gentry, the big guy whose intimidating size and strength disguised a devoted husband and father who strummed his guitar to the tune of soulful ballads when he was begged to entertain at family gatherings.

  “The best teacher in Emblem,” toasted Chase Gentry, the wise guy of the pack, a dedicated teacher himself and my inspiration.

  “Still my little girl,” grinned Cord Gentry, my own father, a talented artist and the foundation for all the love and security I’d ever known.

  I had no idea how many years had passed since the three of them had all been in Emblem together and the sight of them lined up at the bar was striking.

  “I can’t believe you’re all here,” I said, still trying to process my shock.

  Uncle Chase clucked his tongue. “Why is she still standing by the door, Cord? You said she’d be happy to see us.”

  “She doesn’t look happy,” Uncle Creed pointed out. “She looks-“

  “Traumatized,” Uncle Chase finished. “Definitely traumatized.”

  Uncle Creed rolled his eyes. “Why the hell do you always cut me off?”

  “Why are you making this occasion about you, Creedence? If our niece is disturbed by the sight of us then I’m sure it’s your fault. You just look so old that you scared her.”

  Creed was offended. “We are exactly the same age you little turd.”

  Chase cowered. “I think he’s going to hit me, Cadence. Help!”

  Leah was laughing. Cord, after a lifetime of tolerating his brothers’ antics, chose to ignore them this time. He climbed off the stool and I walked right into his hug.

  “I’m so glad to see you, Daddy.” His strong arms circled me and I flashed back to a blurred time when I was a tiny child, maybe four or five, and it was Christmas Eve and I’d curled up beneath the large tree in the living room, intent on waiting for a glimpse of Santa. The only thing I still remembered about that Christmas was how my dad found me and carried me to bed, tucking the bed covers around my small body and whispering, “Merry Christmas, my littlest princess.”

  My dad pulled back and stared down at me. “Your Uncle Deck said he talked to you today.”

  “He did.”

  “He also said you sounded like you could use some cheering up.”

  “That’s where we come in,” announced Chase, joining us. “Don’t let Creed frighten you. Poor guy can’t help how he looks.”

  Creed grumbled and glared and I supplied each of my uncles with a warm hug so they would stop arguing.

  My dad was already moving toward the door. “Now that we’ve all claimed our hellos let’s go for a drive.”

  It was a strange suggestion. “A drive where?”

  “Around.” My father said. “You need a complete tour of Emblem.”

  “It’s actually a requirement,” Chase added. “I bet nobody told you this but you cannot be an official Emblem resident until you’ve had the tour.”

  I set my hands on my hips, wondering what they were up to. “The three of you came all the way down here just to chauffeur me around town?”

  The brothers exchanged a look, a look I was familiar with, a look that said the three of them could have an entire discussion without saying a word because they knew each other so well that explanations between them weren’t necessary.

  “That’s exactly why we’re here.” Creed confirmed, holding the door open. “Let�
�s go.”

  I waved to Leah and Chase called to her, “Tell your old man the Gentry boys said hello.”

  She chuckled. “I will.”

  My dad wanted us to pile into his truck so I took the passenger side while Chase and Creed climbed into the seats in the extended cab.

  “When was the last time you were all in Emblem at once?” I asked as I buckled in.

  A shadow fell over my father’s face. “I guess around the time our mother died.”

  I hadn’t been born yet. “Maggie,” I said, her name coming to my lips involuntarily.

  “Maggie,” he said with a sigh.

  Chase and Creed were quiet in the backseat.

  “I’ve been debating whether to tell Mom something,” I said to him.

  “What’s that?”

  “I ran into her mother on the street one day. I introduced myself.”

  “And how’d that go?” he asked as if he already knew the answer.

  “As expected.” I sighed. “Should I tell her?”

  “You may as well. Your mom figured you’d run into her sooner or later. It’s not like Emblem is a huge metropolis.” My dad gave me an appraising look. “So where’s your boy today?”

  “Tristan’s up in your neck of the woods visiting his brothers.”

  “Good for him. Your mother was saying that we needed to have the two of you over for dinner soon. Or maybe you both could come up and spend a weekend.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “You want to spend a weekend with Tristan?”

  He grunted but then grinned. “If he’s the guy for you then yeah, I’d like to get to know him better.”

  “You two will get along better than you think,” I said, entertained at the concept of my dad and Tristan hanging out together.

  “Probably.” Now it was his turn to sigh. “In some ways he reminds me of me.”

  “Nah,” Chase piped up from the backseat, unwilling to be excluded from the conversation any longer. “Tristan’s way tougher than you ever were, Cord.”

  “Who asked you?” Creed growled.

  “I was plenty tough,” Cord argued. “I kicked ass in those fights.”

  “Fights?” I asked.

  “Underground fight clubs, or whatever you want to call them. You win, you get paid. You lose, you go home with nothing but bloody knuckles and humiliation.”

  I’d been aware that my dad was no saint before he married my mother but this slice of history was new. I was having trouble imagining it; the man who used his hands to tenderly tuck in his children at night, embrace his wife and create enviably brilliant artwork used to batter his opponents for cash in an illegal fighting operation.

  “I can’t picture that,” I said, staring at my father.

  He cocked an eyebrow. “It’s the truth. Sometime I’ll tell you the whole story.”

  We were in the middle of the long stretch of Main Street that ran through the center of town and though the daylight was fading every landmark was clearly visible. The brothers pointed things out left and right, talking over each other at once so it was hard to keep up.

  “That’s the old water tower we used to climb.”

  “High school bleachers look exactly the same.”

  “Check out that corner where Creed pissed in the gutter after drinking six bottles of orange soda in ten minutes.”

  “Damn it, Chase, that was you!”

  “What happened to the little drug store that was over there? We used to steal bags of potato chips on the way home from school.”

  “Only because we knew there wouldn’t be any dinner at home.”

  “Nope, no dinner. Only a beating.”

  “Sure, a beating. Or two. Or three.”

  “Unless we got lucky because he’d been arrested again.”

  The atmosphere took a grim turn as we made a right down the narrow two lane road where the dwellings were scattered and set far back from the street. Some houses, mostly trailers. A squad of kids, all under the age of ten, surrounded a plastic blue pool beyond a bent fence and watched water pour from a hose. Random discarded cars and furniture were visible here and there, likely dumped by people looking to avoid the junkyard fees. This had been their neighborhood, not the relatively orderly streets in the middle of town where my mother had grown up. There was a different vibe out here, quiet and isolated yet also beautiful with the distant mountains bracketing the skyline.

  Cord Gentry made a sharp left turn and bumped along a dirt road for a few hundred yards before setting the brake.

  “There it is,” he announced and I didn’t see much of anything.

  After blinking a few times I detected the evidence that once a structure had existed here, maybe more than one. The soft twilight shadows turned the scene into a creepy moonscape with dust, thin sporadic vegetation and half buried garbage. An old truck tire. A broken lawn chair. And the outline of the ramshackle home where three boys had fought to survive.

  Wordlessly we all climbed from the truck and lined up to stare at what was left. My father was the one to break the silence.

  “The county condemned the place,” he said. “After they died. So we had it taken apart. Sold the land, which was worth peanuts anyway. I guess nobody saw fit to build anything else here.”

  Chase snorted. “They might get choked by the ghost of Benton Gentry if they tried.”

  I took a few steps and my shoe bumped into a rusted hunk of metal that might have been anything once. A piece of car, part of a building. Now it was just a remnant that brought to mind a phrase I’d once heard.

  “Another ruin in the town of Emblem,” I said and shivered as I regarded the fragments that remained of my father’s rotten childhood.

  Uncle Creed was at my side now. “Some things should fall to ruin,” he said with a troubled frown as he gazed at his own bad memories.

  My father nudged him and the two of them walked together, exploring the landscape that was probably as familiar to them as the cozy backyard in Tempe where I’d played with my sisters as a child.

  Uncle Chase hung back next to me and watched his brothers from a distance.

  “I wanted to ask you how things are going,” he said. “Over at Emblem High I mean.”

  I could tell him the truth because he was a teacher himself. He would understand. “I don’t know, Uncle Chase. With each passing day I get a little more worried that I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.”

  He nodded. “You’ll learn. And it gets easier.”

  I wasn’t sure about that. “Do you ever think you’re failing to get through to your students? That you’re failing them in general?”

  He turned to me with a rare solemn expression. “Why would you think you’re failing them, honey?”

  “Some of my kids don’t have enough to eat. Others watch family members get carted off to prison. Or they get jumped in the hallway at school. Or beaten to within an inch of their lives at home.” My throat was burning and I had to take a deep breath. “So what on earth do I have to offer them?”

  My uncle looked at the dust beneath his feet. Then he raised his head and I was struck by how strongly he resembled my father. The three of them were fraternal triplets, easy to distinguish from each other, but there was no denying the bond that ran thick through their blood.

  “You have everything to offer them, Cadence. The kindness we show is just as important as the instructions we give them. They all have their own stories. Sometimes things are bad at home. Sometimes they’re hurting for another reason. And sometimes the only caring words they hear all day are the ones that come from us. So that becomes our job too. And I know that’s what you’ll give them.”

  I allowed my uncle’s wisdom to sink in while I watched my father staring out over the flat expanse of desert. He nodded over something Uncle Creed said to him.

  “Thank you,” I said softly and squeezed his arm.

  “Anytime.” He gestured to his brothers. “Let’s see if we can move them along and go find something worth eating in the
se parts.”

  I was relieved to abandon this haunted spot. I imagined the brothers felt the same way. As my father nosed the truck back to town I looked into the rearview mirror but darkness had settled and I couldn’t see a thing.

  We stopped by my grandfather’s house so my dad could say hello to his father-in-law. Karen was there and insisted on launching into a flurry of activity and cooking us dinner.

  “Why are you smiling at your bowl?” my father asked when we sat down at the table.

  I twirled pasta around my fork, remembering the first time Tristan made me dinner. “I just really like spaghetti.”

  My grandfather was delighted with his dinner guests and it seemed impossible that there had ever been a time when he despised Cord Gentry. Things change. People change.

  Or they don’t, I thought, thinking of the bitter old woman likely sitting down to dinner alone somewhere in this very town.

  “Where’s Tristan tonight?” Karen asked me with a playful wink. I noticed my father paying close attention as I answered, even though I’d already discussed Tristan’s whereabouts with him. He was trying to evaluate the blushing smile that appeared when my boyfriend’s name came up.

  “He’ll be back tomorrow,” I said, confident that I spoke the truth. My heart wouldn’t allow me to consider anything else.

  I never saw Tristan Mulligan coming. He’d surprised me over and over. He’d set my world on fire in the most fundamental and bewitching way. I knew who he was. I knew how he made me feel. And I knew there was no one else around like him.

  So yes, he’d be back here in Emblem with me tomorrow.

  He had to be.

  Because he understood as well as I did that what we had didn’t come along very often.

  And we’d be fools, both of us, to give each other up.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Tristan

  Brecken’s shift had supposedly ended twenty minutes ago so I figured he had to emerge sooner or later. And eventually he did. He was with a guy about his age and they were walking close together, laughing about something. Breck nudged the other guy affectionately with his shoulder and took his hand. The parking lot was dark and Breck was so engrossed that he didn’t notice me hanging out in the shadows even when he passed by a few feet away.