by Kelli Warner
I’m not sure exactly how it happens or why, but I’m suddenly on my feet. “Cade didn’t start the fight,” I blurt out.
All three heads turn in my direction. “What did you say?” the man asks.
“Paige, why don’t you head into my office. I’ll be there in a minute.” Jay gestures to his open door.
“Wait.” The man holds up his index finger in Jay’s direction, but his eyes are still on me. “What did you just say?”
“I said—Cade didn’t start the fight. Dane did. I was there in the cafeteria; I saw it.”
“Is this true?” the man asks Cade in an odd tone, bewilderment wrapped in frustration, as if he’s relieved to hear the news and yet not entirely surprised that it came from someone else. “Then why didn’t you tell Mr. Chapman that?”
Cade lifts one shoulder.
“Paige, are you sure?” Jay asks. “That’s not what the other students I talked with reported.”
I have no idea what the other students thought they saw. If they’re Dane’s friends, maybe they were just sticking up for him. “Positive. I saw it with my own eyes.” Cade looks away, his jaw tense. “Cade approached Dane, but he was just talking. It was Dane who threw the first punch.” Slowly, I sink back into my chair.
Jay mulls over my words, dipping his head and rubbing the back of his neck. “Cade, I’m at a loss here. We just spent the afternoon discussing this at length. I gave you ample opportunity to give me your side of the story. Why didn’t you tell me this yourself?”
“Does this mean he’s not suspended?” the man asks, placing a hand on Cade’s shoulder.
Jay hesitates, his gaze bouncing from me to Cade and back again. “I suppose—in light of this new information—no. We’ll forgo the suspension for now, until I can sort this out. But you will serve two days in after-school detention for not being honest. School policy doesn’t tolerate violence or dishonesty, Cade, and neither do I. You and I are going to talk about this tomorrow. Come see me before your first class.”
The man extends his hand to Jay. “I’ll make sure he comes to see you.”
Cade reaches down for the backpack sitting on the floor between us. As he retrieves it, he leans close and, surprised, I freeze.
“Don’t believe everything you hear,” he says in a voice so soft that only I can hear him. “Or you’re no better than the rest of them.” And with that, he slings his pack over one shoulder and heads for the door.
What in the world? Before I can begin to dissect Cade’s ominous message, Jay exhales deeply. “Come on in, Paige.”
Dutifully, I follow Jay into his office and close the door behind me while he slips off his suit jacket and hangs it on a hook on the wall.
“So, how did it go? Did you have a good day? How are your classes?” He ruffles through some papers on his desk and glances up at me when I don’t answer. “Did you have any problems?”
“No, it was fine.” I glance over my shoulder at the closed door. “Who’s Hannah?”
Jay’s head lifts. “Who?”
“Hannah? That’s who Dane and Cade were talking about before the fight in the cafeteria,” I say. “I was just wondering who she is.”
Jay works his jaw in thought before dismissing my question with, “No need to concern yourself with that. It’s best if you steer clear of Cade Matthews.”
The roar of an engine pulls my attention to the window. Just as I spot a helmeted rider on the back of a large, silver motorcycle, it peels out of the parking lot and shoots up the street, out of view.
I turn my attention back to Jay. “And why’s that?”
He contemplates his response before saying firmly, “Because I told you to.”
Okay, then. Clearly, this is not a topic he wants to discuss, which is unfortunate because I have a lot of questions. Instead of pressing it further, I make a mental note to ask Quinn my questions tomorrow and drum my fingers on the desktop next to a framed photo of Jay and his family. It’s one of those pictures taken in an actual photography studio, in which everyone is positioned just right and told to smile on cue. I’ve never seen Jay smile like that. I squeeze my eyes tight. I’m so angry at my mom, and it drives me crazy that I will never know what she could possibly have been thinking when she decided to give me to a stranger.
“I hear you met Mrs. Talbot’s daughter, Quinn.” Boy, news travels fast around this school.
“Yeah, she introduced me to a bunch of people at lunch.”
“Great,” Jay says, his attention buried in the paperwork in front of him. “She hangs with a good group of kids.” Um, okay—including a kid who just punched another guy in the middle of the cafeteria. I keep that thought to myself.
I stand and cross the room to look at another set of framed pictures on the bookshelf. In one of them, a much younger Jay is wearing a blue-and-white football uniform. I lean in to take a closer look.
“I played quarterback in high school,” he proudly says.
“Is that when you were dating my mom?” Silence. I turn and wait for an answer.
“Abby and I dated for about a year and a half.”
“And then—you just broke up?” I press.
Jay stands and moves a few items around on his desk. “It was complicated.”
“Complicated because she got pregnant with me.” It isn’t a question, and Jay’s face pales. He loosens the knot on his tie.
“I didn’t know about you, Paige. I told you that.”
“How is that possible?” I ask.
“Look—”
“Then why did you break up? Can you answer that?”
“What did Abby tell you?” he counters.
“She just said you went off to college.”
Slowly, Jay comes around his desk and leans against the edge, thick lines of thought creasing his forehead. “Her father didn’t particularly like me.”
I wasn’t expecting that. “I never met my grandfather,” I tell him. Now it’s Jay’s turn to look surprised.
“What do you mean, you never met him? Abby was so close to her family.”
“We’ve lived in California since I was born. We never went to visit my grandparents in Florida, and my grandmother was the only one who came to visit us in San Diego.” I try to explain the best I can, but I don’t really have an answer to what Jay is asking me.
“Well, anyway, her father made it very clear that it would be better if Abby and I didn’t see each other anymore,” he continues.
“So, that’s it? You just left the girl you supposedly loved because her dad didn’t like you? That’s weak.”
He shakes his head. “It wasn’t that simple, Paige. Martin Bryant was—a difficult man.” He’s still for a moment, his brow furrowing at unpleasant memories. Before I can say anymore, Jay stands, moves back around his desk and begins shoving papers into his satchel.
I’m aware that something happened many years ago that blasted that branch of my family tree into splinters. A disagreement with her father, that’s what Mom had called it, but even I know that a disagreement, no matter how big, can be mended. What can’t be repaired by my mother’s standards is a betrayal. Whatever happened between her and my grandfather was enough to make her pack her bags and abandon her pedigree.
Mom rarely talked about her father. I only saw his name on Christmas and birthday cards each year, and I know his signature had been scrawled in my grandmother’s perfect penmanship. Mom kept in touch with her, and while she occasionally visited us, she always came alone; her only traveling companion was the excuse that Martin couldn’t get away from his work.
My grandfather passed away four years ago after suffering a massive stroke. I wasn’t sad that he died because it’s hard to mourn what you never knew. What bothered me the most was the sadness that took up permanent residence in Mom’s eyes. While I don’t know if she would have done anything differently if she’d had the chance, I know she wished their long, silent separation had never happened.
I like to think, or at least hope,
that there were times when my grandfather wanted to reconcile with my mother. Maybe he even went so far as to dial her phone number, but it was the years of detachment and the chasm of miles between them that sadly convinced him it couldn’t be done. That thought is so much better than allowing myself to accept the alternative—that a man could just let his daughter walk out of his life for whatever reason and never wish to have her back. With only Martin Bryant and Jay Chapman’s sudden appearance in my life as my reference points, I hold little faith in that universal order known as fatherhood, or the men who are, for better or worse, card-carrying members.
Is Jay the reason my mom never again spoke to her own father?
Jay removes his jacket from the hook and slips it on, a gesture that clearly states this conversation is over and we’re going home. Reluctantly, storing my questions for another day, I pick up my backpack and follow him out the door.
CHAPTER FIVE
Cade
I try to put some distance between Shawn and me as we leave the school, hoping to give him some time to cool off before his impending lecture. What I really want to do is take my bike up the highway and ride as fast and as far as I can until I forget this day ever happened. But I was never really good at running from my problems without creating more of them, so, instead, I head for home, and right on par with the rest of my crappy day, I hit what has to be every red light on the way.
This wasn’t how today was supposed to go. Hannah wasn’t supposed to leave. Dane wasn’t supposed to take the first swing, but I guess I didn’t really think that through when I cornered him, given everything that’s gone down between us. And I don’t even want to think about what’s going to happen when my sister comes home. I was relieved to see Shawn at the school instead of Macy. While he was clearly disappointed, facing her would have been so much worse.
I drop my backpack and helmet on a chair at the kitchen table, shrug off my jacket and open the fridge. I was a little preoccupied at lunch, so I’m starving. The backdoor screen wrenches open and then, as if a prelude to what’s about to go down, it bangs shut.
“Look, I know what you’re gonna say, but it wasn’t entirely my fault,” I begin. Keys clatter on the counter behind me.
“You got another letter today.”
Audible silence drowns the space between us as that unexpected plot twist sinks in. Recovering, I pull a can of soda from the fridge and turn to face Shawn, who’s leaning against the counter with a white envelope in his hands.
“Not interested.”
He sighs, lips drawn tight. “Cade, sit down.”
“I have homework.”
“It can wait.”
“If you’re planning to start in again on my misguided feelings for my father, can I at least make a sandwich first?” Right on cue, my stomach growls. Nice.
“Sit. Down.” At the thin tone of warning in his voice, I drop into a chair at the table. “Contrary to what you may think, I don’t particularly like having these conversations with you.” Shawn slides the envelope across the table. I glare at the return address. “I don’t want this letter lying around when Macy comes home. It upsets her too much.”
“Fine.” I swipe up the envelope and flick it into the garbage can two feet away. “Problem solved.”
“Problem not solved, Cade!” Shawn paces in front of the table, one hand on his waist, the other in his hair, his head tipped back like he’s searching for something lost among the ceiling tiles. His patience maybe? His last nerve? I seem to get on top of that one a lot. “What is going on with you? What really happened in the cafeteria today?”
“I told you. The guy was a jerk and he had it coming.”
“That’s not what the girl in the office said,” Shawn reminds me. “Who is she? And why in the world did she stick up for you when you didn’t bother to stick up for yourself?”
That’s the question I haven’t been able to get out of my head since I tore out of the school parking lot. Why did she stick up for me? She knows nothing about me, and all I know about her is that her name is Paige, she has a habit of stealing suitcases, and she comes from an unfortunate lineage.
“Why didn’t you say something when Principal Chapman accused you of starting the fight?” Shawn takes a seat across from me and waits for my answer. I try to remember that he means well. When he married my sister two years ago, I wasn’t exactly in a good place. Neither was she. But when he signed on for better or for worse, the guy really meant it. I just wish I could find a way to stop disappointing him.
“Well?” Shawn prompts.
“Because it doesn’t matter.”
“What do you mean it—”
“It doesn’t matter, okay? It doesn’t matter because whatever I could have possibly said in that office wouldn’t have a made a difference. I broke the rules. I screwed up. Again.” Shawn opens his mouth in rebuttal, but I cut him off. “And don’t give me that crap about second chances. Sometimes, there are no second chances. No matter what I do, no matter what I say, I’m the screwup. Let them think what they want.” I slump back in my chair.
“You’re not a screwup. You screwed up. There’s a big difference, and that was over a year ago.” Shawn stands and crosses to the garbage can, where he fishes out the letter and places it in front of me on the table. “And there is such a thing as second chances. You just have to be willing to forgive.”
“I’m not doing this,” I murmur.
“Cade, he didn’t choose to leave you. And you know that.”
I stand abruptly, nearly knocking over my chair. “What I know is that I don’t want to talk about this again—for the millionth time!”
“He’s in prison,” Shawn continues, ignoring my comment. “And I don’t think it’s too hard to imagine what it’s like to be locked away from your family while you’re serving time for making poor choices.”
Nice dig. If I weren’t getting more annoyed by the moment, I’d have to give Shawn credit for knowing just what to say to get under my skin.
“I thought you were on my side.”
“There are no sides here,” he says. “I’m the neutral third party, remember? I’m the only one in this house who doesn’t have an agenda on this. So, please, can we just have a reasonable conversation?”
I swallow against the stillness filling the space between us. Even when Shawn’s off the clock, he’s still trying to help people. When he finally raises his eyes to meet mine, they’re clouded, strangled by a mix of emotions I can’t fully identify. I hate it when he looks at me like that.
“Why are you doing this to her?” he asks.
My chest constricts as each of those seven words sucker punches me right in the heart. I was two seconds away from leaving the kitchen, but the weight of Shawn’s words on my shoulders drops me back into my chair.
He folds his hands on the table between us. “Every time one of those letters arrives, your sister gets hopeful, even though there must be twenty more in that drawer over there. And each time you don’t open one, it kills her, Cade.”
I stare at the rip across the knee of my jeans and nod.
“Then why do you do it?”
I attempt to count the lines in the grain of the tabletop, but my vision blurs.
“Why do you insist on hurting her?”
“That’s not fair.”
“No?” Shawn sucks in his bottom lip and turns his eyes skyward once more. “Then why don’t you tell me what it is.”
“Look, what happened in the cafeteria today and whatever you think is going on with those letters are two very different things. Why don’t you get that?”
“Because there’s a lot of anger inside you, Cade, and it’s not doing you any favors. You’ve finally put some of the pieces of your life back together, and I don’t want to see you throw that away because you’re holding on to things you need to let go.” Shawn stands. “Please, do me a favor and think about that.”
He heads for the living room, leaving me alone with my thoughts, which is,
ironically, a form of punishment in itself. I stare at the envelope, wanting so badly to chuck it back into the trash can, but I’m not a jerk. I respect Shawn too much to do something so spiteful. Instead, I snatch it up and cross to my mom’s antique hutch, which still displays her china, like it did when she was alive. Some days, I’m glad Macy kept it, and other days it’s just one big reminder of all we’ve lost.
That one memory is like a match, igniting white-hot resentment inside me. I yank open the top drawer, scooping up a bundle of identical, unopened envelopes bound together by a thick rubber band. If I had my way, they’d all be in the trash, long gone without an ounce of remorse or regret. I don’t care what’s inside them. I have no plans to read them. But because my sister hopes I’ll change my mind, she insists on keeping them.
I slide the new envelope beneath the band, then shove the thick stack back into the drawer. It takes a few moments and a couple of deep breaths, but slowly, my anger simmers to cool disgust. I stare at the pile of letters, trying not to think about the suffocating hatred I feel toward the man who wrote them. I couldn’t care less what he has to say. He lost the opportunity to tell me a long time ago. I slam the drawer and head for my room.
A small part of me wishes I could let go of the toxic feelings I have for my father, to finally be free of the loathing that coats my insides when I think about him. It consumes me, but I’m just not ready to release it. Not now and maybe not ever.
CHAPTER SIX
Paige
“Is there anything you’d like to talk about?”
I stare blankly across the desk at Marilyn Hopkins, Ph.D., her name etched into the gold, rectangular placard facing me from the edge of her desk. The slender blonde’s laser-sharp gaze walks a fine line between interest and concern.
“No, I don’t think so.”
“How are your classes going?” She breaks eye contact long enough to inspect the contents of the file spread open on the desktop in front of her. “I see you’re taking several honors classes. Very nice. Quite a workload for a new student.”