I’ve already tried pretty much everything.
The SUV rumbled into the night as Cory sat in silence next to him. For a few minutes Clay kept his word and didn’t say anything. But all the thoughts in his head nagged at him like a dog scratching at the door to get out. Eventually he couldn’t help but open the door.
“Man, what’s going on?”
“Here we go,” Cory said in disgust.
“I’m just asking.”
“Why? So you can try and fix your broken brother?”
“I want to help.”
“Oh, okay, that’s right. How noble of you.”
“I’m not trying to be anything here,” Clay said. “I’m just—I want to know what I can do.”
“You can just keep living your pretty little life that’s all fixed up and clean like you got the farmhouse looking. You just need a picket fence to go with that nice snapshot you’re going to send out at Christmastime.”
“That’s unfair.”
“Is it? You’ve been on my case for ten years to come back home. To come back to all this. So here we are. I’m back. But you don’t want me in your life, little brother. You want some fairy tale. Now that you have a son, you want to have Uncle Cory throwing a ball in the backyard, right? Post pics on Facebook and show the world what a tight-knit, loving little family we are.” Cory looked out his dark window and cursed.
“What is wrong with you?”
“Well, you can’t blame the drinking tonight, Clay.”
“You’re some walking, talking time bomb.”
“You don’t get it,” Cory said.
“What don’t I get? Tell me. Help me understand.”
Cory swore again and appeared to be in no mood to help Clay understand. They rode in silence until they got to the motel. Clay had offered to have Cory spend the night, but Cory had refused. Once again.
Putting the SUV in park, Clay left the engine running. He turned and faced Cory.
“Look—I’m sorry if I’m trying too hard or doing the wrong thing. It’s just … I’m the only family you have now.”
“Yeah, I’ve kinda noticed that.”
“I know I don’t fully understand,” Clay said, trying to find the right words this time, trying to leave things on a hopeful note. “But I’m really trying to.”
His brother’s face didn’t try to hide anything. The signature smile was nowhere to be found. Cory didn’t have to hide behind it. Not with Clay.
“You don’t have to try and figure out anything, because there’s nothing to figure out,” Cory said. “I’m a lost cause. You just gotta let it go.”
Before Clay could say another word, Cory was out of the car and walking to his motel room.
Clay had said and done everything he could. But once again, it hadn’t been enough.
His shoes crackle over broken glass. Not one glass, but all of them. His kitchen cupboards are open, and the shelves are empty. Dents and cuts in the wall show the scars of her anger.
Cory doesn’t bother to start cleaning up. He just examines all the debris, the tiny shards of glass everywhere.
Nicole is long gone and will never be back. This is her going-away present. Not that he especially loved all those glasses she broke, but it’s the message.
This is your life you’re stepping over, Cory thinks.
He can’t avoid the shards of glass.
These are the pieces that have been blasted and can never be put back together again.
He’ll get this mess cleaned up and find a new selection of glassware and move on. Nicole will be out of his life, and by that time Rene probably will be too. He’s not too worried about it. It doesn’t annoy him. It just makes his head hurt.
He hears her last words, at least the ones he could make out.
“All you care about is yourself, that’s all, and you’re going to die with that smug smile still on your face.”
For a second he thinks about Okmulgee and Clay and Emma. Just for a moment.
Then he knows Nicole is probably right.
He finds the keys to his car and gets out of here before all the shattered pieces start cutting into him and reminding him. Before they begin to start hurting.
Chapter Thirty
Relief Pitcher
It was a little after lunch when the doorbell rang. Emma immediately suspected who it might be. It wasn’t like she and Tyler got a lot of guests.
She glanced out the window and saw the old truck. Sure enough. Emma braced herself, not knowing what condition he’d be in or what he wanted with them. When she opened the door, the first thing her eyes found was a tiny puppy bouncing around in the middle of her porch.
“What’s this?” she asked.
Cory smiled and raised his eyebrows. “Sort of impulsive, I know. But I wanted to give him to Tyler.”
“What?”
She wanted to shut down time and hold off so that Tyler couldn’t see what was outside. Too late.
“Is that a dog?”
Tyler rushed out past her to the porch. Cory scooped up the puppy and handed him to Tyler. White paws that looked like gloves moved frantically, as if they were waving at him. Another white spot covered half the pup’s perky nose.
“For you,” Cory said.
“No,” Emma said, just as Tyler shouted, “Whoa! He’s mine?”
“No,” Emma said, repeating the word over and over.
Tyler held the Lab-beagle mix up to his face and was embraced by little kisses. Ignoring Emma and Cory, he carried the puppy onto the lawn to play.
“I got all the stuff you need for him,” Cory said. “Leash, food, a training crate. You name it.”
You’re out of your mind.
She couldn’t believe it. Of all the things Cory had done so far around here, this was the most insane and infantile.
“What are you doing? You can’t just come over and give my son a dog.”
The man who had been freaking out last night in the middle of a barn because of some silly lost baseball cards now looked like the picture of cool. He grinned.
“Well, I wanted to apologize to him for getting upset last night.”
“And you do that by heaping a ridiculous responsibility on him—and me?”
“Mom, I want him.”
Emma had known the moment the doorbell sounded that this was going to be yet more Cory Brand trouble.
“Tyler, we are not keeping that dog.”
There was no way. She had enough to deal with—they had enough to deal with. Getting a puppy was out of the question.
Tyler held the dog and gave her a sad and dejected look. “Figures. You always say no.”
“Tyler, give Cory the puppy.”
Eventually Tyler stormed back inside and up the stairs, slamming his door shut so they could know exactly how he felt.
“Come on,” Cory said, as if he had everything figured out. “A dog would be good for him.”
She wanted to take her hands and strangle this idiot in front of her. He had no clue.
Don’t say or do anything you’ll regret. Keep control.
“You don’t get to have a say in what is or isn’t good for him,” she said, only inches away from his face.
That wounded look filled Cory’s face, but it no longer worked on her. It used to when she was a girl, but she’d grown up and gotten over it. The same way she knew that Tyler’s wounded face didn’t mean she couldn’t discipline or decide things for him.
Cory’s just like Tyler. He’s still a silly little boy.
“This whole thing is—”
Insane. Infuriating. Insipid. Ignorant. Irritating.
She couldn’t come up with one single word to cover it all.
“—so not okay,” she
finally finished. She regained control and shook her head, facing Cory. “I gotta go. Take the dog with you.”
Emma shut the front door without waiting to hear a response or see how dejected Cory would look. She had seen and heard it all from this man and wasn’t willing to put up with it anymore.
It’s May 16. Cory tries to forget, but once he sees the date on his computer it’s impossible.
Emma’s birthday.
It’s been a little over five years since he saw her.
He doesn’t understand how one day two people can be talking about love and marriage and a future together and then the next just …
Gone. Like you.
It’s early, and he doesn’t have a game today and he knows it will be impossible not to think of her.
For a moment, he imagines what life must be like for the happy little trio. Then he wonders what Tyler looks like. If he looks like his father.
Cory spots his cell phone. He thinks of maybe—just dropping a line or maybe an email or something …
But of course he doesn’t.
He turns the music up loud, and then he makes plans and heads off to work out.
You can leave people behind, but you can’t leave memories.
Wherever Cory goes, they follow him. Sometimes quietly and in the dark, but they’re always there. At every game and in every bar and in every hotel room and on every plane.
Happy birthday, Em.
Chapter Thirty-one
Fastball
Cory entered the sanctuary and slipped into the last pew. The room was nearly full, but he was glad to be the only one in the back row. He thought with mild humor that he’d spent more time in church since coming back to Okmulgee than he had in the previous decade. For a moment he checked out the others in the room, then noticed someone who looked a lot like Clay sitting in the front row.
It was Clay.
He wondered if Clay was waiting on him to arrive. But they hadn’t talked about it, and Cory sure didn’t want his hand held during a Celebrate Recovery meeting.
Then he noticed Karen and Emma sitting next to Clay.
What are they doing? It’s not like I’m speaking.
As J. T. introduced himself and welcomed everybody, Cory thought about leaving. He didn’t want his family here spying on him or whatever it was they were doing.
And then J. T. asked Karen to come to the podium.
Are these testimonies from women who’ve been traumatized by their famous brothers-in-law?
The confident and angry woman Cory was used to seeing wasn’t standing there behind the podium. It was someone whose voice shook and whose hands trembled as she stood there facing everybody.
“My name is Karen, and I’m a grateful believer in Jesus.”
That I already know, Cory thought as everybody else welcomed her.
“I celebrate recovery from sexual abuse by my father from the time I turned eight until I was sixteen.”
The room suddenly felt like it was spinning around him. He felt confused and on the end of a really bad joke. He looked at Clay to see if his brother was equally as confused and shocked, but Clay just sat there giving his wife an assuring smile.
She’s not kidding.
“While going through these experiences I felt alone with no one to reach out to, not one person to tell.”
Cory let out a ten-year-long breath and then closed his eyes.
He didn’t want to hear this. This wasn’t happening, not here, not now. This wasn’t some crackhead or porn addict speaking out. This was Karen. Clay’s Karen. Their Karen.
“My whole life I had carried a burden of pain and shame from my past. And even though I had been a Christian for years, I hid my pain and shame from everyone I knew.”
Cory opened his eyes again and could see Clay giving Karen an encouraging nod. She smiled, and Cory felt something toward her he had never felt. He saw her in a whole new way. She wasn’t that cute and annoying girl that Clay had fallen crazy in love with, the one who didn’t like Cory’s actions and always seemed so defensive. She wasn’t the prude anymore or the uptight and sour woman he thought her to be.
“When I learned as an adult that I would not be able to bear children of my own, this was the final blow. I felt completely abandoned by God.”
Heavy eyes full of tears looked up from the paper in front of her. Karen paused and swallowed.
“When I attended Celebrate Recovery, I wasn’t prepared to experience the freedom and relief I would gain by sharing my deep hurt with God and others.”
The sanctuary full of people seemed to disappear. Cory was sitting in an empty pew in an empty church listening to his sister-in-law tell her story. To him and only to him. This wasn’t an act; this wasn’t for show or publicity’s sake. This was real. He was the only one here, and she had his full attention.
And maybe she could have had it years ago if I hadn’t been off being Cory Brand.
“I love that I don’t have to hide who I am here. I can go to my step study and share openly without fear of being judged. I can be completely honest with everyone around me. I’m just me. Banged up and imperfect.”
The thought of Karen being banged up and imperfect was crazy. It was incredible. And if Cory weren’t sitting here listening to her talk, he wouldn’t have believed it himself.
All this time …
“Because of the work of Jesus, I’m no longer living my life in the pain of the abuse and disappointments in my past. Thank you for letting me share.”
Everyone stood to applaud Karen, and so did Cory. But he had to leave. He couldn’t take any more. He didn’t want to face Karen and Clay and Emma. He couldn’t. He didn’t have anything to say to them. There was nothing he could say to make up for or change or erase the harsh reality breaking down around him.
Nothing.
I’m through feeling like this.
So he tells himself.
Tired of feeling like this.
So he tells himself again.
Tired of the sluggish, sickish way his body and skin feel. Tired of forcing himself to get through the aches and the pain. Tired of another day of knowing what came the night before.
Yet the pain goes away, and Cory remains the same.
Another afternoon comes, and the desire with it. He forgets again and ignores it again and decides once again that he doesn’t care about feeling tired. Because he wants the rush. He wants to feel whole again and wants to feel right.
So he takes that first drink and knows he’ll be better.
I’ll stop someday, when life isn’t so stressful.
So he tells himself.
Chapter Thirty-two
Doubleheader
“Go on. Get.”
He brushed the puppy away, but the little thing kept wanting to lick his hands and bounce around in his lap. Cory had thought it was a great idea when he woke up this morning. Now, after sitting in his motel room for an hour, watching some baseball and getting nice and drunk, he was beginning to realize how stupid the idea had been.
Now I’m stuck with Stubby here.
He wasn’t exactly sure what breed the dog was. It definitely had some beagle and Lab. Maybe some corgi or shepherd as well. For a few moments, Cory thought of interesting name combos the mixtures produced. A lorgi or a bepherd or a corgle.
When it was obvious that the pup wasn’t going to stop harassing him, Cory picked it up and brought its face up to his.
“You look about as sad as I am,” Cory said. “Maybe you do belong to me.”
The puppy began to lick his mouth. Obviously the dog liked the taste of vodka too.
“I’m gonna name you Bull. Because that’s what this whole situation is.”
He sat Bull in his lap, and the puppy turned on its
back, then jumped on the side of the bed next to him and began rolling over. Cory wondered if the dog might accidentally pee on the comforter, then thought it didn’t really matter. Nobody would be too bothered. Especially not him.
He drained the small bottle of Absolut Citron and tried not to think too hard about the day.
Karen’s words kept coming back to him. He could see her face and hear her tone.
I’m just me. Banged up and imperfect.
Cory went to get something else from his all-you-can-drink mini-fridge. Every day he’d find something different, like the kid was having fun picking out a variety of alcohol for him. He’d drink the vodka so the kid would get more. Just different brands and flavors.
He cracked open a bottle of beer and then sat on the edge of the bed, watching his team looking awful in the seventh inning. He should be out there with them. He should be anywhere but here.
The puppy’s nose nudged his back. He turned around and took Bull in one hand.
“Maybe you and I can pack up the Ford and then just drive off to Mexico. How’s that sound? Find a little hut and just live on the beach for a few weeks. Or years.”
Bull wiggled free of his grip and bolted back over the bedspread. He seemed perfectly delighted with the idea.
Cory knew he wasn’t going anywhere. All these people and lives he thought he had figured out—he didn’t have a clue. About any of them. Not Emma or Tyler or Clay or Karen or any of them.
The question was whether he wanted to start getting to know them. To start getting to really know them. If they’d even let him.
Maybe it was way too late even to try.
Emma was young and stupid once and had believed that love could conquer everything. She hadn’t thought of the future, only of being with him.
Even after realizing she was pregnant, she still believed. She still hoped.
That was the difference between the twenty-two-year-old version of herself and thirty-three-year-old Emma. She wasn’t a fool anymore. She couldn’t allow herself to be. Not with this young man growing up right in front of her.
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