“Look, I don’t know what happened to you two at eighteen, but, Mer, it’s Ryan. He was there when Mom died. He was there when Dad took a fall at work, and he helped around the house. He’s always been there. So, as much as you want to hate him, you don’t.” He sighs heavily into the phone. “You and I both know you don’t hate him. So, please, it’ll just be for a few weeks. At least until he can get back to work and sit at his desk.”
“I can’t.” My tone wavers.
“For me, Mer?”
“I just can’t, Eli.” I won’t. For several reasons. “I can’t.” And I hang up the phone.
Two
Merit
Granite Harbor, Maine
Fall 1994
Age Ten
Ryan chokes his red flannel hash down, but in his last bite, I swear on my life, his eyeballs turn green. Eli has eaten his, too, but not without gagging.
“Merit Young, you’d better finish your supper, or there’s no dessert,” my mother calls from the sink, her back to us, like she has eyes in the back of her head.
Mothers have superpowers.
Mind readers.
X-ray vision.
Arms that can stretch into the back seat of a minivan and flick your cheek.
Bionic hearing for the late-night cookie jar runs.
Built-in lie detector.
I’d rather die than eat red flannel hash—corned beef and cabbage mushed with beets. I’d rather swim with sharks in the deep Atlantic or shovel snow every day in winter than eat red flannel hash. I’d rather have the flu even.
“Mom, I don’t feel well.” I’m not lying. Just thinking about taking a bite of this makes my stomach hurt.
“Mom, can I be excused, please?” Eli asks.
She doesn’t have to turn to look at Eli’s bowl to know he’s finished because, with her X-ray vision, she already knows he’s done. “Yes. Rinse your bowl.”
Eli gets up and walks to the sink.
I roll my eyes and look at Ryan, still across the table, his face the color of a Venus flytrap. He attempts a smile.
The phone rings, and when Mom goes to answer it in the living room, Ryan whispers, “Trade me bowls.”
“What?” I whisper back, quickly glancing into the living room, checking on the authority.
“Trade me bowls, Mer.”
“You want mine?” I start to push it across the table while taking Ryan’s empty one.
“No, I don’t want yours. But chocolate cake is your favorite.”
My tummy starts to twist and turn, and I wonder what this feeling is. Ryan slides my bowl to him and shovels seven big bites into his mouth. He gags. Twice.
I look back into the living room, but Mom doesn’t know any better.
“Are you all right?” I ask.
Ryan wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and nods. But he’s not. His shade of green is even darker than it was after the first bowl.
“Thank you.”
Eli comes back to the table after rinsing his bowl, and Mom enters the kitchen again, stopping behind me. She stares at my bowl, and I give her a smug look—a look that says, So, there. I ate it.
“See, Mer? It wasn’t so bad, was it?” Mom bends and kisses me on the cheek.
I don’t dare answer her for two reasons. First, if I agree it wasn’t that bad, she’ll expect me to eat it again, and two, I’m a terrible liar.
“I’ve gotta go home. Thanks for dinner, Mrs. Young.”
Ryan stands and attempts to take his bowl to the sink, but I stop him.
“I’ve got your bowl tonight.”
“You can’t stay for chocolate cake, Ryan?” my mother asks.
“Nah. Early morning fishing trip with my dad.”
He’s lying. I can tell he’s lying because his eye is twitching. I’m not sure that everyone notices this, but I do.
Like the time he said his mom just went on vacation for a second time—eye twitch. Eli and I found the note in the garbage. Not that we were looking through the garbage, but we were helping Ryan take it out, and the note somehow floated to the ground with a puff of air. We never asked Ryan about it. We knew it’d hurt too much, so we pretended to believe the lie he’d told us.
Or the time he said he was sick and couldn’t go to school—eye twitch. We saw the bruises his dad had left behind, periodically making an appearance out from underneath his shirt.
Eli and I walk Ryan out.
“Going fishing with your dad tomorrow?” Eli asks, surprised.
“No, I don’t feel good. Just didn’t have the heart to tell your mom. Didn’t want her to think it was her red flannel hash.”
“Why not? It’s disgusting,” I say.
Ryan shrugs and wipes his nose with the back of his hand.
“Want us to ride with you home?” Eli asks.
“Nah.” Ryan gets on his bike. “See you tomorrow.”
“Hey, Ryan?” I call out. “Thanks.”
Ryan smiles, nods, turns, pedals down our lane, and disappears into the quickly fading sun.
Eli and I turn and walk back inside.
“He ate your hash for you?”
“Yeah.”
“Where the heck was I?”
“Doing your dishes.”
“Ryan’s got a crush on you.”
“Shut up. Does not. He’s like my brother. Ew.”
But I remember the way my tummy felt when he said I liked chocolate cake. It didn’t feel like all the times my mom or Pop had said something nice. It didn’t feel like the times Eli had shared his toys with me. It felt nothing like that.
“Why else would he eat your hash? That stuff is disgusting.”
We hear Pop’s work truck pull up behind us.
“Pop!” we both yell.
He rolls down the window, and we hop up on the side step of his truck. Bessie, Dad’s K9, whines in the back.
“Hey, Besser-Boo!” I put my hand in her kennel behind the driver’s side, and she gives me kisses.
“What’s for dinner?” Pop asks.
Eli and I both laugh. Pop hates it, too.
“Steak and potatoes!” I call out, laughing.
“Red flannel hash.” Eli’s voice droops.
“Oh.” Pop puffs up his cheeks and pretends to throw up.
Eli and I laugh harder.
“We ate already. Mom wasn’t sure what time you’d be home,” Eli says.
“Hold on!” Pop calls as he slowly accelerates, creeping toward the house as Eli and I hang on to the side of the truck.
That night, as I lie in bed, I think about Ryan. What he went home to. Eli and I’ve never told anyone what we’ve seen on Ryan’s body or how his dad treats him. It eats me up inside.
I grab my walkie-talkie and press the Talk button. “Eli. You awake?”
“No. Go to sleep, Mer.” His voice is full of static.
“I want to tell Mom about Ryan and his dad.” My stomach turns into nerves.
Eli sighs into the device. “Shit, Mer, I told you, Ryan made us swear. We can’t. Told us, if we ever said anything, his dad said he would kill him.”
I know. I know what he said.
Releasing the Talk button on the walkie-talkie, I set it down at my side.
I remember that day clearly, the day another bruise showed up on his abdomen. The one Eli and I saw when we finished our final roll down the hill. The one where his shirt came up, and I gasped. Ryan tried to cover it up. Tried to make excuses.
“Ryan, why do you protect your dad? He’s a jerk.” I pulled myself up to my feet and followed Ryan’s lead.
Eli said, “Ryan, we’ve gotta tell someone.”
“I ran into my bed.” He pushed our words, our concern, away.
“You’re lying, Ryan.” Eli stepped up, faced him, eye-to-eye. Eli was mad.
Ryan stared back. His fists in balls at his sides. “I ran into my bed.” His jaw was clenched.
What about your arm two weeks ago? And your thigh just last week, I wanted to say, but I wa
s too scared to say it. I wanted to believe that he was telling us the truth. I wanted to believe that his dad didn’t hit him. Hurt him. It was simpler that way. Soft. Not messy. Easier on my heart.
“Come on. We’ve gotta get home. It’s getting dark,” I told the boys and took the lead.
“Stop,” Ryan said.
We did and turned back to face him.
“If you guys tell anyone, he’ll kill me.” He tried to cover up the fear in his voice, but I heard it.
It settled in my veins, and then I grew angry, but Eli didn’t.
That night, in bed, after Ryan went home, I prayed for him. I prayed that God would take care of Ryan.
How could you let this happen? I asked him.
But he didn’t answer.
The next day, Ryan didn’t show up for school at Granite Harbor Elementary.
Or the next day or the next day.
Eli and I decided to go to his house after school. Ryan’s house was just up from Main Street in Granite Harbor. A fishing boat sat, perched in the yard at an angle, set up on stilts, while patches of tall yellow weeds grew up the sides of the boat, attempting to make their attack. The once-white house with green shutters was now a sanctuary for dirt, and old, cheap paint had been begun to curl and twist up the old house. There should be a sign in the yard that said, Keep Out. No Trespassing. Unsafe. But we pushed back the white picket gate and made our way around the old ice chests, fishing poles, and tackle boxes that lay in the walk path.
“Mom would have a fit,” I whispered to my brother, who was almost to the front door.
Pop had told us this place was off-limits to us. And I thought, if Pop could get custody of Ryan, he’d have been at our house a long time ago.
We knocked on the door, but Ryan never answered.
I sneak downstairs to see if Mom and Pop are still awake, but I don’t want to talk with them. I just want another piece of cake. I hear them whispering at the kitchen table instead, so I stop in the hallway just before the kitchen and peek in.
“Ruthie walked by last week on her way downtown and said Dubbs was screaming at Ryan. Screaming nonsense. So, Ruthie marched up to the door, but no one answered. The screaming stopped. Didn’t stop her from calling the state police,” Pop says.
Mom takes a sip of her tea. “And they couldn’t do anything?”
Pop shrugs. “Ryan said it didn’t happen.”
“You know good and well it happened if Ruthie Murdock heard it.” Her lips were in a firm line.
Pop nods.
The stupid floor creaks as I take another step closer. My parents look to the doorway to the kitchen.
“Mer, what are you doing up so late?” My dad, still in his uniform, beckons me to him.
I crawl up into his lap. So badly, I want to tell Mom and Pop what I know. What I’ve seen.
My dad pulls my hair back and kisses my forehead as I put my head to his chest.
“Were you guys talking about Ryan?” I ask.
Mom looks at Pop and takes my hand. “Yeah. We’re worried about him.”
I don’t say anything, but if my stomach could talk, I’d scream out my anger and my hatred for Dubbs Taylor and what he does to his son when no one’s looking.
Ryan does a really good job of covering up the bruises, so no one sees them. Except for Eli and me. We lie to protect his safety. Our safety.
A web grows in my throat, and my heart stops the truth from coming out. I don’t want Ryan to die, and I know every ounce of what Ryan said about his dad killing him would happen.
“Do you know anything about what’s happening at his home, Mer?” Pop asks in his slow, calm game warden voice. The leader of our family. “Has Ryan said anything to you and Eli?”
I can’t tell.
I won’t lose his trust.
I can’t lose Ryan.
So, I tell the best lie I know. Not out of spite for Dubbs, not out of hurt for Ryan, but out of fear. “No.” I look down the hallway, too scared to look my parents in the eye, and I see Eli standing in the darkness. A tear streaming down his nine-year-old cheek, he eases back into the darkness.
Sometimes, there are secrets we keep so deep that our minds forget, not wanting to remember what the quiet chaos feels like against our hearts. But I’ll keep this secret. I will hang on to it if it’s going to keep Ryan safe.
Safe from his own secrets.
Three
Merit
San Francisco International Airport
Present Day
“All right, Mer, remember, no talking to strangers, and call me when you get there.” Abbey slaps me on the shoulder and then winces. “I’m sorry. I’m no good at this.” She pulls me in for an awkward and stiff hug. She whispers, “This is the right decision. It might not feel like it, but whatever you and Ryan need to work out, I think you’re getting a sign that it’s time to get in the weeds.”
I curl my lip. “Get in the weeds?”
“You know, like get to work.”
Eddie pulls me in for a side hug. He drove me to the airport since Abbey doesn’t drive. “We’ll be fine. Just go. Jesus H. Christ, family is family.”
“This isn’t a vacation,” I clarify. “This is an act of guilt, Eddie.”
I can’t believe I let my brother talk me into this. I haven’t spoken to Ryan, if I could help it, since the day I left Granite Harbor when I was eighteen. When he shattered my heart. So, maybe this isn’t an act of bravery. Maybe it’s stupidity.
Eddie’s silvery hair glimmers in the open light the airport provides. “Give ’em hell, Mer. Give ’em hell, sweetheart. And don’t let the octopus get you.” His eyebrows rise.
“The octopus?” I ask quizzically.
Eddie shrugs. “Means, don’t get wrapped up in it. Just ride it out. Those tentacles will let go eventually. You just need to slow down, ride it out.”
Of course, he uses an analogy like this.
Eddie doesn’t know the story. Neither does Abbey. Nobody does. Nobody needs to know. But, somehow, Eddie’s words slow my heart down a little bit, which allows me to breathe, expand my lungs.
“Remember to text me when you get there, Merit.” Abbey bites her thumbnail. “You’re flying all the way across the United States.”
“Abbs, I’ve taken the trip plenty of times.”
Her eyes grow shifty. “I know. I’m just nervous this time. I-I’m not sure why.”
“I’ll be fine.” I reach for her and whisper, “I’ll text you. Don’t worry.”
Though I’m not so sure I’m ready for all this.
What happened between Ryan and me changed us. It changed me. The only reason I’m doing this is for Eli’s and Alex’s sakes. To ease the burden for them. And Ryan, he’s so damn hardheaded. Nothing has changed since I left and yet everything has. Seventeen years. I’m thirty-five now. He’s thirty-four. Years and time have changed us. We aren’t the same people anymore.
I walk down the terminal and turn back to wave at my friends. Eddie in his board shorts and his white tank top with rough, leather brown skin, flip-flops, and a casual wave. Abbey in a sweatshirt and jeans, her flip-flops a hot pink, blonde hair in two braids down her back, chewing on her nail, and waving with her other hand.
I turn away and make my way to the 747 to Chicago, Illinois, and then on to Portland, Maine.
“Granite Harbor, be gentle,” I whisper as my stomach does a flip. Here’s to facing my past, my present, and my heart. “Please be gentle.”
It’s just after eight in the evening in Maine.
“I’m glad you came.” Eli rests his hand on the wheel.
“Sure glad one of us is.” I give him a sideways smile. “I’m looking forward to seeing my niece and sister-in-law.”
“Funny. You might want to think about kissing my ass because who’s going to take care of you when you’re old? Like feed you? As your brother, I’d assume this responsibility, so if you want to eat …” His voice trails off as he looks out the window.
I allow
this to get under my skin. I know Eli means nothing by it. He doesn’t know why his words cut through me.
I’m in my thirties, and I don’t have children.
“Hey! I found a shortcut.” Eli hangs a left somewhere between Portland and Granite Harbor. A road I’m unfamiliar with.
I roll my eyes. “You know, game wardens always think they know a shortcut. And then it ends up being twice as long. So, really, you mean, detour.”
“No, really, it’s a shortcut.”
“Yep. We’ll see.”
“There’s something else.” Eli scratches the back of his head, and his eyebrows rise. He stares out the window.
“Oh, God. That’s not a good start, E. What?” I sigh.
“Well, Ryan doesn’t know you’re coming.”
I freeze. “What? Are you kidding me, E? You brought me home to babysit him, and you didn’t tell him I was coming?” You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.
“Come on, Mer. You know Ryan. He’ll shut down like a brick wall. First, he’ll be pissed at me for asking you. Then, he’ll be pissed at the world. Embarrassed. I figured, if you just showed up at his doorstep, he wouldn’t be able to shut the door in your face. He needs help, Merit.”
“I get that. You’ve made that quite clear.” Cannot believe I’m in this spot right now. I shake my head. “Where’s he live now?”
Eli coughs into his fist. “Just outside of Hallowell.”
My eyes grow big. “Are you kidding me, Eli? That’s an hour commute to Granite Harbor—one way!” I grit my teeth. “Oh my God! I’m expected to stay there with him?”
“He’s got a big enough house. He sleeps downstairs anyway. Besides, Pop or I can come get you when you need a break.”
“Oh, yeah, like I’m going to make you do that with a new baby and a new wife at home.”
I’m so pissed right now that I close my eyes and let my head fall back to the headrest. Eli has no idea what happened to us, Ryan and me. I’d like to keep it that way. He has no idea what Ryan said to me that night. What he asked me to do. So, to Eli, this is no big deal. He also knows Ryan and I haven’t been the same since I left for college that night, but he doesn’t know my heart broke.
Violet Ugly: A Contemporary Romance Novel (The Granite Harbor Series Book 2) Page 2