I Stand Before You (Judge Me Not #2)
Page 30
The next couple of weeks are amazing. At the risk of sounding completely whipped, I have to say being in love makes every day—every fucking hour—worth living.
Kay is happy and I am too. We take long walks on my property and talk about everything under the sun. More often than not, when we return either to my house or her apartment, we end up naked and loving one another for hours. We savor this happiness that we, two broken people, have somehow found. For the first time in a very long time I feel like life is good, very, very good.
Another bright spot is that my relationship with my brother is continuing to mend and improve. Will and I talk every few days, and we text even more. Little bro sends me more samples of his work and updates me on the progression of his comic book. More importantly, he shares his feelings, like how strongly he feels about his girlfriend, Cassie.
Just as I suspected early on, my little brother is really into this girl. He e-mails me a picture. His little girlfriend is cute—long and pale hair, ethereal features. She’s very waif-like. But also, upon closer inspection, I note this girl appears kind of sad.
I recall my brother mentioning that Cassie’s mother works all the time. He’s since told me his girlfriend’s absentee mom is an executive at some hot-shot company out in Vegas. Cassie has all the money she could want—including the new car Will mentioned before—but is it worth it? From Cassie’s lost expression, it doesn’t seem so.
I think about how Will also mentioned Cassie’s stepdad. He’s some younger guy her mom married not too long ago. My brother calls him “a piece of shit” and an “asshole,” quite often, but he never elaborates much beyond these dispersions. It doesn’t take a genius to suspect this guy is probably making moves on Cassie.
I’ve mentioned to Will that Cassie should talk to her mom and report any inappropriate behavior, but my brother always changes the subject. I don’t think the dude’s actually done anything yet, but it’s probably only a matter of time. Will and Cassie both have trust issues with adults, so I’m sure that’s where the hesitation comes in.
My brother’s way of protecting Cassie is to be around her all the time. They certainly spend a lot of time together. It seems every time I speak with my brother he’s either just returning from being with Cassie or he’s waiting for her to pick him up so they can go somewhere. They also hang out a lot at Mom and Greg’s house, sometimes I hear Cassie in the background when Will and I are talking.
But not today. No, today I have Will all to myself. But he’s just surprised the shit out of me. He just told me he’s staying over at Cassie’s house tonight, like overnight.
“Mom’s okay with that?” I ask.
“Well, not exactly,” he admits. “I stay when Cassie’s mom is out of town, but Mom has no idea her mom’s not there.” He hesitates. “Hey, you’re not going to tell on us, are you?”
“No.” I sigh. “I won’t say anything. But make sure you’re being careful.”
Last thing I want is for my fifteen-year-old brother to knock-up his sixteen-year-old girlfriend.
“We’re careful,” Will says all huffy-like. “I’m not stupid, you know.”
“Not saying you are,” I reply.
We’re both quiet for a few seconds, but then Will starts to share with me details of his sex life.
“Hey, hey, too much information,” I protest.
I have no interest in hearing all the ways my little brother is giving it to his girlfriend.
“Okay, okay, I’ll stop.”
Will then softly adds, “It’s not all about sex, though, when I stay over. I stay there mostly to protect Cassie when her mom’s not there.”
“What are you protecting her from?” I carefully ask.
“Her stepdad, Paul,” my brother quietly responds. “When I’m there he never says anything to Cassie. He keeps his fucking sick mouth shut.”
Concerned, I try to get more out of Will, but as always he clams up and changes the subject.
“Hey, bro, can you loan me some more money?” he abruptly asks, catching me off guard.
Fuck.
He asks for only fifty dollars, so I give in.
This all happens on a Monday.
Two days later, Wednesday, late afternoon, I am walking into my house after work and my cell buzzes.
I glance down to the phone in my hand. It’s my mom calling. I press answer and say, “Hey, what’s up?”
“Chase,” Mom begins on an exhaled breath. “Sorry to bother you, honey, but I think we have a problem.”
We? Okay. “And what would that be?” I cautiously venture.
Mom sighs. “Sweetie, have you been giving money to Will?”
There’s no reason not to be honest, so I admit I have.
Another long sigh and a loud huff, I guess for good measure. She’s obviously not pleased with my answer.
“Don’t give him anymore, okay?” Mom doesn’t give me a chance to respond, she simply adds, “Your brother used that money to buy drugs, Chase.”
I swallow, hard. The last thing I’d ever purposely do is enable my little brother. But I guess I did exactly that by agreeing to his requests for cash without asking questions. I had a feeling, of course, but still. Fuck. I guess I was hoping for the best, hoping Will was on the up-and-up. Damn, I should have told the kid no. I don’t want Will going down the same path I so unwisely followed.
“What did he buy?” I hesitantly ask.
“Weed,” Mom says. “I went through his room earlier today when he was out and found his stash.”
I am not thrilled to hear this, but I breathe a sigh of relief that she didn’t find anything hardcore, like coke, meth, or motherfucking heroin. Mom, however, is far less calm than I. She’s going off like she just discovered a meth lab in Will’s bedroom.
I try to put things in perspective for her. “He’s fifteen, Mom. He’s bound to experiment.”
“Ha,” she snaps, “look where experimenting got you.” She’s got me there.
“Did you punish him, then?” I ask.
“You bet your ass I did. He’s grounded from seeing any of his friends for the next week. And that includes that girl…his girlfriend…whatever.”
This last is said dismissively and with disdain, like the idea of Will having a girlfriend is ridiculous. I imagine Abby rolling her eyes. She still thinks of my brother as a little tiny kid. That’s part of the problem, even I can see that. From talking to Will these past few weeks it’s become obvious part of his bad behavior, part of his acting out, is due to our mother. She treats my brother like a little boy, but yet she’s severely lax on setting boundaries, if she even bothers at all. Like the sleeping over thing, she probably doesn’t suspect for a minute that my brother and his girl are having sex. After all, she so willingly assumes that Cassie’s-mother is home when those two are together. She’s so out of touch. Maybe Mom has this attitude because Will used to be so clumsy and awkward. I don’t know. But what I do know is her acting as if Will is still a small child is only bound to make things worse. And not acknowledging that he’s dating a girl who is very important to him will definitely backfire on Abby.
I try to rectify this now, before it becomes a much bigger problem, as it inevitably will. “Mom,” I begin carefully, “her name is Cassie.”
“Who?” Mom sounds all clueless and distracted, but I know her avoidance game.
This woman exasperates me, but I somehow stay calm. “His girlfriend, Mom. Her name is Cassie. Jesus, don’t you pay attention to anything?”
“Hey,” my mother warns.
Okay, that last was maybe a little harsh, but come on.
“I don’t need shit from you too, Chase,” she continues. “Why don’t you try dealing with Will for a while? You think it’s so easy, don’t you?”
I stay quiet and just let Mom vent. She’s really angry at Will, but it’s better if she takes it out on me. What she just said gives me an idea though. Maybe Will can visit me here in Ohio, get away from Vegas for a while. Not for the
whole summer, Mom’s not getting away with that shit, but a few days stay would be nice. Will’s been saying he’d like to visit soon. He’s even expressed interest in meeting Kay. I told him she liked his comic book drawings, and he said she sounded “cool.”
I throw my suggestion out to my mother and she says, “I don’t know, Chase. Wouldn’t letting him go on vacation be more like a reward? The kid’s supposed to be grounded.”
“Aw, come on. Don’t you really just want him away from his friends for a few days? If he’s here in Ohio he won’t be sneaking out to go be with them. Plus, I really want to see him. We’ve been getting along great lately.”
Surprisingly, with no additional fuss, Mom agrees to let Will come to Ohio. I think her capitulation is partly because she’s truly happy her boys are back on speaking terms, but I also know part of her hopes I’ll talk to my brother about the weed. I plan to, I’ll set him straight before he moves on to something harder, which—with our genetics—he inevitably will.
Mom asks me to hold on while she goes to get Will. In no time the kid is on the phone. He tries to play it cool, but I can tell he’s excited to visit. While we talk about shit we can do when he gets here, Mom checks flights. She finds one from Vegas to Pittsburgh (the closest major airport) for this Friday.
“Book it,” both Will and I say together as he puts me on speaker.
We hang up, and I am elated. Two more days and I will see my baby brother again. Kay will get to meet him too.
I put together a quick plan, one that will require me to leave work early on Friday to get to Pittsburgh in time to pick Will up. His flight comes in at seven, and I need time to drive to the airport and park. Unfortunately, if I leave early, Kay won’t be able to come with me. But maybe it’s better if I spend the ride back alone with my brother. It will give us time to discuss him scamming me for money, and then using what I gave him to buy drugs. Art supplies, yeah right, I knew that sounded suspect. But I am not going to worry about any of that bullshit until I have Will face-to-face.
I run my hands through my hair and scan the living room. There’s so much I have to do, like get one of the upstairs bedrooms ready for my brother. But first things first, I want to tell my girl about my brother’s impending visit. I can’t wait to hear her reaction, so, without further ado, I head next door.
As I’m walking up the steps to the apartment above the garage, I think about how I thought things were good earlier. Well, shit just got a whole lot better.
My brother, my girl—the two most important people in my life—will be here with me, all three of us together, in just two more days.
Could life get any fucking better?
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
KAY
I go into work a little later than usual on Friday morning. Truth be told, I am still catching up on much-needed extra rest. See, Chase came over Wednesday evening to tell me about his brother coming into town. My boy was so happy he couldn’t quit hugging me, even while I was fixing dinner. All that hugging led to kissing, and kissing led to touching, and since it seems we can never get enough of one another, dinner went onto the back burner, literally. We didn’t get to my homemade chili till hours later. And then yesterday evening I was over at Chase’s. We never even got to dinner. We spent the entire evening in bed.
Love, it sure makes you silly…and kind of horny, I think as I settle in at my desk, yawning.
I suppress an out and out laugh, but my lips remain curved up in a ridiculous grin as Father Maridale walks in. When I see his serious expression though, my smile falters.
“What’s wrong?” I ask.
“Kay, I don’t know if anyone has told you yet, but Mrs. Wilson was in a fairly serious car accident yesterday evening.”
“Oh, no! Doug’s mother?” I am not sure I heard correctly, but Father nods in confirmation.
I may not like my ex-boyfriend all that much—in fact, I kind of despise him—but I wish no harm to his mother. She may have been a bit meddling in the past, but she was always kind to me.
“That’s terrible,” I say. “Will she be all right? Is there anything we can do?”
“I don’t know if she’ll be okay,” Father answers sadly, “but I know she could use our prayers.”
“Of course.”
The Wilsons aren’t part of the Holy Trinity congregation—they belong to another parish—but that doesn’t mean Doug’s mother won’t be in all of our prayers these next several days. My heart goes out to their family, and I feel bad for all of them, even Doug to a degree. But I still send up a selfish prayer that I don’t run into my ex-boyfriend. Surely, he’s in town, probably over at the hospital right now with his mother.
My stomach twists at the thought of coming face-to-face with Doug Wilson. He’s a walking reminder of the poor choices I made the night Sarah died. Not to mention he’s the entire reason why I even found myself in that position to begin with. Worst of all, I’ll never forget that he left, he ran off as Sarah lay lifeless in my arms.
Father Maridale gets a call and leaves, which is just as well since my hands have begun shaking. I squeeze them together. There, that’s better…for now.
It’s no mystery why all of this is hitting me so hard. It’s because of what day it is. Today is an anniversary of sorts, but not the happy kind. Quite the contrary—Sarah’s horrible accident occurred four years ago today.
I think most people have forgotten the exact date, no one has said a word as of yet. But I will never forget—July nineteenth is burned in my brain, seared into my soul. I know Chase would want to know the significance of today—and I should have told him—but I couldn’t bring myself to burden him with the information that the day his brother is coming into town is the four-year anniversary of Sarah’s death. So, while Chase is picking his brother up at the airport this evening, I’ll be at the cemetery, spending time with Sarah. And my guy has no idea.
I had originally planned to ask Chase to come with me tonight, especially since he’s the one who’s been helping me come to terms with the fact that not everything that happened the night Sarah died was in my control. But when Chase came over the other night, so hyped up about his brother’s impending visit, I couldn’t ruin his happiness.
I try to work on a few things to get my mind off of today’s significance—like getting started on organizing next month’s activities calendar—but I can’t concentrate at all. I can only think of Sarah.
My little sister would have turned ten this year, but she’ll forever remain six. Sarah will forever be a child, a child who never was given a chance to grow up. She’ll never someday find love like the kind I’ve found with Chase. Usually I can accept a sad fact such as this, but today it just makes me feel guilty.
I try to distract myself from these morbid ruminations with more work. I spend over an hour updating the bulletin, then keep busy finding other mundane tasks to occupy my time. But the guilt doesn’t fade completely; it only recedes from the forefront of my mind.
When I hear someone come into the office, I glance up from my seat at the desk to find my blue-eyed boy. “Hey.” I check the time. “It’s only eleven. Aren’t you a little early for lunch?”
When I look into Chase’s eyes, I know immediately that Father Maridale has told him about Doug’s mother’s accident. That means he is well aware that Doug is in town.
Chase walks over to my desk and kneels down next to my chair. “You okay?” he asks.
I nod, but my observant boy doesn’t miss my hard swallow.
“Hey…” He pivots my chair so we’re eye level. Cupping my chin, he rubs my cheek with his thumb. “Why don’t you come with me to pick up Will? No one will care if you leave a little early today.”
Clearly, Chase doesn’t want me running into Doug while he’s gone. But I have to stay put; I have to spend time with Sarah this evening. I wish I could just tell my guy why I need to stay, but he has an obligation too—picking up his brother—and I don’t want him driving to the airport and worrying abou
t me anymore than he already will be.
So I say, “I’ll be fine, Chase. I’ll stay here on the church grounds, and then go straight back to the apartment.”
He frowns, and I snatch up his hand. I hold it close. “I know you’re worried about me running into Doug, but I’m sure he’s staying at the hospital. Pick up Will, okay? Everything will be fine.” I squeeze his hand. “I’ll be waiting for you and Will back at the house. I can’t wait to meet him.”
This brings a smile to my boy’s face. I try to lighten things up from there by talking about all the things he and I can do with Will over the next few days. I don’t know what fifteen year-old boys like, but I suggest we take his brother to see one of the summer’s big action-adventure movies. It’s based on a comic book, so that’s sure to be a plus.
Chase agrees. “That’s a great idea. My brother will love it.”
Everything is good for now, back to normal. Well, as normal as things can be under the circumstances.
Chase and I go to lunch, and afterward, on the walk back, my boy teases me a little. He’s trying to get me to smile bigger than he is at the moment. He’s so happy today, anticipating seeing his brother. I wish I could share more fully in his enthusiasm, but my heart feels burdened. Even so, my boy gets me to smile a little here and there.
When we reach the church office there’s nobody around. Chase pulls me to him and kisses me, far dirtier than he should on church property. Still, I love every second. I love it even more when my incorrigible boy whispers all the filthy things he’s planning to do to me later tonight. “You’re brother will be at the house,” I remind him.
He runs his hand down my back, cups my ass, and moves me to where I can feel he’s getting hard. “He won’t be over in your apartment, baby,” he whispers huskily into my ear.
Good point.
We kiss and grind shamelessly for the next several minutes, but then we hear a noise and stop. It turns out to be nothing, just the air conditioning coming on, but in the interest of “better safe than sorry,” we separate, but not before promising one another this will continue later.