by Tawna Fenske
But Tony could see the exit plain as day. That’s when he’d known it was only a matter of time before the other shoe dropped.
“So what happened?” Kayla asked. “Did the social worker’s report help?”
“No. Case closed, no wrongdoing found.”
“What? But how—”
“Bud was right; a man has a right to discipline his kids.” Tony clenched his teeth again, still livid after all these years. “Joel told the cops himself that he could still breathe. That he wasn’t in danger of passing out or anything. As far as anyone was concerned, it wasn’t much different from a guy spanking his kid.”
“That can’t be right.” Kayla shook her head, tears glittering in her eyes. “It can’t be. Aren’t there laws about this stuff?”
“You’d think. Corporal punishment is legal in all fifty states, as long as it doesn’t cause injury and is considered ‘reasonable’—whatever the fuck that means. It’s different in every state.” He shook his head, too disgusted to continue down that path. “Anyway, things went back to normal for a while. We didn’t really talk about it after that. If it ever came up, Mom was quick to change the subject. To say something about ‘putting that silly business behind us.’ It was like someone went in and erased her whole memory of that night.”
“I think that’s how it works,” Kayla said. “A really skilled manipulator throws in things like positive reinforcement so the victim lives in this constant state of uncertainty. Soon, there’s no way to tell what’s real and what’s not.”
“I guess.” Tony looked down at the table, recalling how Bud brought home a brand-new car for his wife the day after the social worker’s visit. “Anyway, things seemed to get better for a while. And then they got worse. Bud crossed the line.”
Kayla sputtered with fury. “You mean he hadn’t already?”
“This was different. Joel got caught skipping school. It wasn’t that big a deal. He and some buddies wanted to catch the new Star Wars movie. Just stupid teenager stuff. It wasn’t like they were shooting heroin in the parking lot.”
“But Bud found out.”
“Yeah.” Dread curdled his gut the same way it had all those years ago. “The school called my mom, and my mom—well, she told Bud.”
Kayla stared. “She could have protected him.”
“Maybe.” At that point, he honestly wasn’t sure the mother he’d known was even in there anymore. She’d been such a hollow shell of herself.
“When Bud pinned Joel against the wall this time,” Tony continued. “When he grabbed him by the throat—maybe she could have done something. Maybe not. Bud’s a big guy, and my mom—well, you saw her.”
She’d never been a big person, not even before Bud came along. But after, she was dandelion fluff. Not just her physical body, but her whole self seemed to flutter off into the wind.
Kayla looked troubled. “Were you there? That second time Bud went after Joel, were you in the house?”
“Yeah.” Only that time, he hadn’t been too afraid to do anything.
Kayla must have picked up on the shift in his voice. “What did you do?”
“I punched Bud. Hard.” Not a glamorous shot—not like he’d seen in the movies—and it hurt like hell. “It startled him more than anything, but that was enough to get him to let go of Joel.”
“Oh my God.” Her voice was breathless, equal parts fury and pride. “Good for you.”
But nothing inside Tony felt good about what happened. “I grabbed my brother by the arm and pulled him away.” His heart was thudding, hammering in his ears like he was right back there in his mother’s living room. “I had a bag packed already for camping, and Joel started throwing things in a duffel while Bud was back in the kitchen yelling. That’s when our mother came in.”
“Did she try to stop you?”
“Yeah.” He scoffed, not bothering to keep the scorn down. “She kept telling us to calm down. That if we’d just go back in there and apologize—”
“Oh my God.”
“Yeah.” Tony swallowed hard, hating this next part of the story. He’d never told it before—not to anyone. “I told her we were leaving. For good. I made it clear we were never coming back, and if she wanted to come with us, she could.”
“What did she say?” The flicker of hope was fading from her eyes. Kayla knew where this story was headed.
“She said—” His voice cracked, and he hated himself for being weak. For still giving a shit about any of this. “She said every family had its struggles. She said I needed to think hard about everything Bud had done for us. That if I did that, she knew I’d see he was a good man who only wanted the best for his family.”
“No.” A tear slid down Kayla’s cheek, then another. She didn’t bother wiping them away this time. “I can’t—I just—” She swallowed, collecting her thoughts. “Where did you go?”
“I found a room for rent near the college. I’d been working at the gas station, so I had some money. Figured we’d be there a few days, maybe a couple weeks before our mom would come for us.”
He remembered the stupid, pathetic hope bubbling in his chest. His certainty that she’d finally come for them when she knocked on the door of the shitty little apartment. He and Joel were sharing the place with a trio of drunk college guys who thought it was funny as hell to rent a room to a couple high school kids.
The instant he’d seen his mother through the peephole, his heart had surged. She’d worn the purple scarf he’d saved a whole quarter to buy her that first Mother’s Day after his dad left. His aunt had taken him to the thrift store to pick it out. That day on the porch, she’d even worn the earrings Joel made for her in art class. Didn’t that mean something?
“So she came?” Kayla’s voice was gentle, so gentle.
Almost as gentle as his mother’s gaze that cold February afternoon. He’d been so sure what she was there to say.
Come home. Bud’s gone. We’ll be a family again.
“She came.” Tony closed his eyes against Kayla’s gaze, breathing through the slow sinking in his chest. “She came to tell me Bud had filed a report. That the police wanted to question me about punching him in the face.”
“What?”
“Apparently, I gave him a black eye.”
“Tony, my God.” Her fingers clenched around his. “I don’t even know what to say.”
“I got off with a warning.” He snorted—a sound more angry than mirthful. “At least the cops were consistent. No one got more than a slap on the wrist for any of the physical stuff.”
“But the emotional stuff—” Kayla shook her head, eyes wide with concern. “That’s horrifying. The verbal abuse, the abandonment. I can’t imagine what that would do to a kid.”
He felt his jaw clench. “I raised Joel myself for the rest of high school,” he said. “Got another job, worked my ass off to keep us both fed with a roof over our heads.”
Joel had worked, too, picking up odd jobs and eventually slinging burgers when he was old enough for a work permit. Tony spent half his time watching over his shoulder, waiting for his mom or Bud or, hell, that social worker from DSHS to come drag him away.
But no one ever did.
“We both graduated,” he said. “Leo had all these connections to the Forest Service through his family’s air-tanker business, so we got on as wildland firefighters. That’s how we paid for college.”
“Tony, I’m just—I’m dumbfounded here.” She tightened her grip on his hand. “You raised your brother. Yourself. You did that, Tony—you. That’s a huge deal.”
He shook his head, failing to see any good in this. “I should have gotten him out sooner. I should have forced our mom to leave.”
“You can’t force something like that.”
“I went back once.” He glanced down at the table, remembering that day like it was yesterday. �
��Maybe a year after we left. I knew Bud would be out elk hunting, so I showed up when my mom was home alone.”
He remembered the shock in her eyes, and, for just the briefest moment, joy. Then it all vanished. “She tried to invite me in, but I couldn’t do it. Just couldn’t set foot in that house.”
“I don’t blame you.”
“We sat outside on the porch, and I calmly, rationally spelled out a plan. Joel and I had an apartment to ourselves by then. Two rooms, but he and I could share if she wanted to come live with us. To get away and make a fresh start.”
Kayla’s lashes fluttered, holding back the tears. “She didn’t take you up on it.”
He shook his head slowly. Maybe if he’d known more about gaslighting, he would have grasped that his mom was way beyond hearing him. That she’d lost all sense of self-preservation, self-worth.
But, like a dumbshit, he’d missed that.
“She laughed and said I was being silly,” he said. “That everything was just fine. That Bud was good to her and she liked her life. That she was sorry about the misunderstanding.”
“Misunderstanding.” She spit the word out like it tasted bitter. “That’s how she saw it?”
“Yep.” He pushed his plate aside, no longer interested in the burger. “That was the last time I set foot on my mother’s porch until today.”
He watched her face as she processed that. As she realized what a shitty son he’d been, leaving his mom in that situation. She’d never say that; Kayla was much too kind. But she had to know. It was fucking obvious.
Just like it was obvious to Tony that he had no business attempting to have a normal relationship. What the fuck did that even look like? A father who walked out on his children? A stepdad who got off on making kids feel small?
Those were the examples he had at hand.
Sure, he had teammates who’d paired up happily, just like Joel had done. But all of those marriages seemed like a mirage. Like Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny—a charming idea, but not real. Not in any practical way he could wrap his brain around.
No. Relationships weren’t for him, and deep down, Tony suspected he’d always known that. If that’s what had made him a commitment-phobe, well…then Kayla won her bet.
Kayla tightened her grip on his hand, bringing him back to the present. “I’m so sorry, Tony. For everything you’ve been through. For everything you’re still going through.”
He shook his head. “I should have tried harder. Hell, I could have called more. Talked her into leaving somehow.”
“She’s a grown woman, Tony. You can’t just kidnap someone whose sense of reality has been wiped from her brain by a narcissistic manipulator.”
“I should have fought harder,” he said. “Maybe if I’d—”
The buzzing of his cell phone stalled that thought in his throat. He glanced down at the screen and saw a number he didn’t recognize. It was a local area code, so he picked it up.
“Hello?”
A voice he didn’t recognize answered back. “Is this Tony Warren?”
“Speaking.” Dread pooled in his gut, but he swallowed it back.
“This is Dr. Sprangler. We spoke a couple hours ago?”
“Right, yes.” He dragged a hand down his face. “Do you have an update on her condition?”
There was a long pause. “I’m afraid we have some bad news about your mother.”
Chapter Nineteen
Discharged against medical advice.
That was the official word on Tony’s mother. She’d somehow managed to regain consciousness, get herself dressed, and walk right out the door.
“How could this happen?” Tony was addressing the on-duty nurse, who looked frazzled and a little frantic.
“We have two dozen other patients on this floor.” She straightened her shoulders, eyes darting between Tony and Kayla. “She must have waited for us to do rounds and then slipped out.”
No good would come from playing the blame game, so Kayla edged closer and touched Tony’s arm. “We need to start searching.” Squeezing the muscles of his forearm, she scrambled to think of a plan. “She couldn’t have gotten very far. We could check with cab companies or—”
“Or we could try this.” Tony slipped his phone out of his pocket and set it on the table beside the empty hospital bed. As his jaw clenched, he hit a button.
“What are you d—” Kay stopped as the phone began to ring. Once. Twice.
Connie picked up on the third ring. “Is that you, sweetheart?”
Kayla felt her heart sink. The forced cheer in Connie’s voice was almost too much to bear.
“Mom.” Tony’s jaw clenched again. “Where did you go?”
“Oh, I called Bud to come get me. You know how he is, always worrying. It seemed silly to run up all these medical bills, and he’s back in town now.”
Tony pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’re sick, Mom. You need to be in the hospital.”
“I feel fine,” she said. “Just a little tired, but I’ll be better off in my own bed.”
“You have pneumonia. And a fever. You need to be hospitalized.”
“Nonsense.” A voice mumbled something in the background, and Kayla felt the hair rise on the back of her neck.
Bud. Connie was talking to Bud.
“I’m fine, dear,” Tony’s mother said again, a little weaker this time. “Bud had them call in my prescriptions so he can go get them. He’s so good to me.”
Tony glanced at her, and Kayla fought the urge to step back. She’d never seen such a haunted expression anywhere, ever.
He glanced at the phone. “You need help, Mom.” His voice cracked, but he kept going. “Not just medical help, but help getting yourself out of a situation where you’re constantly—”
“Everything’s fine, dear. I have to go now. Bud’s running out to get me some ice cream. Everything’s fine.”
Everything’s fine.
Somehow, Kayla knew these were words Tony had heard a thousand times before. As she watched Tony’s face, she saw the light fading in his eyes, then slowly flickering out.
“Goodbye, Mom.” He disconnected the call, not waiting for her goodbyes. Not looking at Kayla or the nurse or anyone anymore. He pocketed the phone and walked over to the window, staring out into a cold gray sky.
The nurse glanced at Kayla. “I’ll just—um—give you two some privacy.”
She scurried out without waiting for a response. Kayla watched her go, then moved toward Tony. When she touched his arm, his skin felt like ice.
“What if we called a social worker?” She had no idea if that was an option, but she had to try something. “Or an elder-abuse prevention group. That’s a thing, right? Or maybe—”
“There’s nothing anyone can do if she doesn’t want help.” His voice sounded more tired than she’d ever heard it. She’d watched him come home from fourteen days of around-the-clock hiking and battling wildfire, but that level of exhaustion was nothing compared to this. “I’ve tried, Kayla. She’s not leaving him.”
“But it’s an abusive situation.” She blinked back the tears welling in her eyes. She needed to be strong for Tony. “Anyone can see that.”
“She can’t.” He turned to face her, eyes hollowed out and empty. “Hell, she still insists he’s never laid a hand on her. Maybe that’s even true.”
“But the emotional abuse.” She knew she sounded desperate, but there had to be a way to get Connie out of there. To help her, even if she didn’t think she needed it. “She has to know, deep down, that this isn’t normal.”
He shook his head, his expression somewhere between defeat and resignation. “Even if she does, she’s not leaving him. That’s what this relationship has done to my mother.” His voice shook, and she watched his hands clench into fists at his sides. “That’s what marriage does to totally
sane, smart, caring women.”
He spit out the word marriage like a burned popcorn kernel, and Kayla watched his forehead crease in disgust. Gone was the man whispering sweet nothings to her in the hotel bathroom.
“Not all marriage.” Her protest sounded weak, even to her own ears. “If someone could just get through to her—”
“I’ve tried.” His voice sounded broken and unfamiliar. “Joel’s tried. We’ve all tried so goddamn hard, Kayla.”
Kayla swallowed, taken aback by the pain in his eyes. Okay, he was hurting; that was clear. She had to try another tack. “Maybe if it came from a doctor. Or a best friend—she must have one of those?”
Tony shook his head, hands still balled into fists. “Did you see the cross-stitched phrase hanging in my mother’s living room?”
Kayla blinked. “What?”
“The wall hanging.” He shook his head again, and Kayla wondered if he’d lost it. “It’s this thing she sewed years ago. All lacy and matches the furniture. You know what it says?”
“What?” She wasn’t sure she did want to know.
“It says ‘Happiness is being in love with your best friend.’”
The fury in his voice didn’t match the story, and Kayla struggled to wrap her head around the details. “Did she—is it something she made when your dad was still around?”
He clapped his hands, an angry game-show host saluting the correct response. “You’d think so, right? That would make sense. But no, she stitched the stupid thing for Bud. It matches his goddamn armchair. That’s how fucked up this is, Kayla. She honest to God believes he’s a good guy. That he’s her—her—soul mate or something.”
Oh, Jesus. Yeah, that was messed up. What was the right thing to say here? “I guess I’m not an expert on psychological abuse, but people can convince themselves of anything if they want badly enough to believe it.”
He looked at her long and hard. Stared deep into her soul with eyes that looked like they’d seen way too much. “Exactly.”