by M. Leighton
Tommi doesn’t ask me who I texted, though. Her mind is elsewhere. I shift into gear and pull out, heading down the street then across town toward Colonial, toward where Chaps has a place and where we might find Travis.
After a couple of minutes to settle down, I reach for Tommi’s hand, giving her comfort as I press her for more.
“Where’s your other brother now? Maybe he could tell us something. Help us out. Is he still involved with Tonin?” I’m thinking he may be in prison. Finally got busted or something. But I can work with that. I am a cop after all.
“No, he can’t help us.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
She leans her head back and closes her eyes. “Can’t.” She exhales and adds softly, “He’s dead.”
Oh shit.
“God, Tommi, I’m so sorry. I…I…”
“It’s okay. You didn’t know. It happened a long time ago.”
“What happened? How’d he die?” I ask gently.
She turns eyes to me that are both wary and tired. She doesn’t answer me, which is an answer in and of itself. And that pisses me off.
“After everything, everything that’s happened and all that we’ve shared, you still don’t trust me.”
“Sig, I...”
“Ain’t that a bitch?” I snap bitterly. I’m frustrated and a little stung by it.
“I…I just…” Her voice breaks like she’s going to cry, but she doesn’t. At least not that I see. Maybe she’s crying on the inside.
“Please, Tommi,” I plead sincerely. “I can help you. But you have to trust me.”
She’s quiet for a couple of long, tense minutes. When she finally speaks, her voice is low and robotic.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN- TOMMI
“My father left when Travis was just a few years old. Left and took his income, half the furniture, and most of our stability with him. My mother held it together for as long as she could. She had two jobs waiting tables. Worked all kinds of crazy hours just to put food in our mouths. It was tight, but we were making it. She wasn’t around much, though. My brothers and I were practically raising ourselves. We all started getting into trouble. I guess I wanted to escape. That was my reason for most of the stuff I did. For Travis, I think only part of what he was doing was acting out. The rest was because of his condition. But my older brother…well, he was mad. Just plain ol’ mad. At Dad, at Mom, at the world. I didn’t really know how bad it was until I was thirteen. That’s the year Momma had her wreck. She lost both of her jobs, couldn’t really do much in the way of hard work, so she got on disability. Things went from tight to miserable, and everything just went downhill from there. Downhill fast.
“My brother started using drugs first. Experimenting, I think. Then he started selling. To try to get extra money. He was busted a few times. Minor stuff mostly–petty theft, breaking and entering. But then he got busted with enough coke to get him into serious trouble. Spent a year in juvie when he was sixteen. When he got out, he was like a totally different person. He was bitter. Careless. Barely graduated high school. That’s when he really started dealing. I mean, seriously dealing. I think that’s when he gave up. He was dead by the time he was nineteen.”
“How’d he die?”
“Drug-related accident,” I answer vaguely.
Sig is silent for the better part of at least two minutes. I pray that he’ll stop asking questions and just focus on getting Travis back.
But I’m not so lucky.
Never have been.
“Tommi, look. I know you know how things work. In this business, we have to do everything we can to keep the upper hand, to avoid doing time. In most cases, that means finding a dirty cop to put on the payroll. Eyes and ears where we need ‘em. Just because I’m new here doesn’t mean I’m stupid. Or unprepared. I’ve got sources. Everybody’s got sources.”
I turn my frown on him. “What are you getting at?”
“I got info, dirt even on everybody associated with Lance. Know your enemies, know your friends. When I found out I’d be protecting you, I had a friend look into you. Something turned up on Tommy Lawrence. A juvenile record.” Sig pauses, drawing out the tension until I think I will burst before he continues. And when he does, one of my worst nightmares comes true. “Who’s Tommy Lawrence? The real Tommy Lawrence? The boy?”
The dull ache of panic fills my chest with so much tightness that I feel like I might explode. My heartbeat is thundering inside my head, like the thump of a thousand bass drums reverberating through a dark, shadowy forest. Behind my eyes, the old crashes into the new, the past into the present, in a fiery collision that threatens to incinerate me where I sit. Oh God, oh God, oh God!
“I don’t know what you mean.”
I concentrate on taking deep, calming breaths even though my lungs seem to be frozen in terror.
“Don’t lie to me, Tommi. You said you wouldn’t. And considering what we’ve had together, you owe me that much at least. The truth. Who’s the real Tommy?”
For a few tense seconds, I feel as though nothing moves. Time, space, the air, the earth. Nothing breathes. Rather, everything is stopped on a gasp. And for the first time in my life, for as long as I can remember, when backed into a corner, I take a leap. Instead of running or evading or lying, I take a leap and I trust.
I don’t know why I leap, why I trust. I don’t know why Sig, why now. I only know that some part of me needs to be able to trust him, needs to be able to believe in love again. Because that’s what Sig makes me feel. Love. Trust. Hope.
“H-he’s my older brother,” I confess stiffly. Once the words are out, the rest spews out of me like an uncontrollable geyser. The tears streaming down my face are little more than evidence of its eruption. “He came home one night, high on bath salts that he got from Lance Tonin. He punched Travis in the face twice before I even knew something was wrong. He was like a rabid dog. Mad and so strong. I couldn’t stop him. I could only stand between him and Travis. I honestly thought he was going to kill us both. But he didn’t. Instead, he turned and went after Momma. Maybe it was because he blamed her. I don’t know, but one minute he was there with us, the next I heard these awful noises coming from her bedroom.
“He’d jumped on her in the bed and started hitting her. I tried to pull him off, but he was stronger than I could ever imagine a kid being. He slung me off. Sent me crashing into the bedside table. It sort of addled me. When I managed to get up, he was beating Momma in the side of the head with the base of the lamp. She wasn’t even conscious. She was just laying there, bleeding and gurgling. That’s all I could hear other than Tommy grunting and her bones crunching.
“I didn’t know what to do, so I grabbed the bat Momma kept under her bed and I hit him in the back of the head with it. He just slumped over on top of her. I stood there for a few minutes, waiting for him to move. I couldn’t run. I couldn’t leave Momma and Travis alone with him, so I just stood there, staring at them, not knowing what to do. Travis came in and saw them. He freaked out. He was just eleven at the time. He cried for two days straight. Pulled most of the hair out on one side of his head. Peed in his bed both times he tried to go to sleep.”
Even though I’m lost in days I’ve tried hard to forget, I’m hyper aware of Sig’s silence. He hasn’t said a word.
I haven’t looked at him to see what expression he’s wearing either. I’m afraid of what I’ll find. And it’s too late to turn back now. I’ve said too much already.
The only thing I can do is go on. So I do.
“I killed Tommy. I killed my own brother. I didn’t mean to, but I did. After that, I panicked. I knew I couldn’t let anybody find out. They’d put me away and Travis would be left all alone. A ward of the state. Living with strangers. Or in an institution. And for a child with Asperger’s, that would’ve been horrible for him. We were all he had, all he knew. It was up to me to keep him safe, keep him home. Until he turned eighteen and they couldn’t control him anymore, it was up to me. He was up to m
e. So until I could think of some way to get rid of the body without getting caught, I put Tommy in a freezer chest, the one out on the back porch that Momma always kept extra meat in when she could afford to buy in bulk.”
“Momma,” I sigh, swallowing because my mouth is as dry as ash. “Momma was hurt. She was hurt bad. I thought she was going to die there for a while. She didn’t, but she never really woke up again after that day. I took care of her, cleaned her up and did the best I could to keep her alive so we wouldn’t get caught or split up. Everything I did was in order to keep Travis and me together and safe, without anybody knowing what had happened. I stayed home from school for three days. Dripped water in her mouth to keep her from dying of thirst. She finally healed up enough that she could take some sips of water through a straw. Some of her teeth were busted, so I’d mash up Spaghettios and feed them to her. I didn’t know what else to do. Eventually, taking care of her was like after school chores of any other kind.
“For a few months, Travis and I got into this weird new routine. Almost normal, I guess. We both went to school. Came home and did our homework. I fixed dinner. Mostly soup for a while, but then I started taking the bus to the grocery store using some money I found in Tommy’s room. That didn’t last very long, so I started forging Momma’s signature and cashing her disability checks. It was weird, but no one even noticed that our family had fallen apart. I guess that’s what happens to the poor kids. The world…life…just sort of forgets about you and you fend for yourself. However you have to make do.
“Surprisingly, we did all right for a while. But then, during the fall of that year, Travis got in a fight at school. He just went nuts. Ended up putting the other kid in the hospital. Paralyzed him from the waist down. The parents pressed charges. He went to juvie for seven months. There was nothing I could do.”
I feel…tired. I’ve never told anyone my whole story. And while I’ve relived parts of it in my head over the years, I’ve tried not to dwell on it because it’s full of bad memories and counterproductive emotions. I learned a long time ago that feeling sorry for myself wouldn’t get me a damn thing. So I’ve made myself focus on planning–a way out, a better life, how to keep Travis safe. I’m always planning. It’s the only thing I’ve got going for me in life. A plan.
“Then what happened?” Sig asks softly. Still, I don’t look over at him. I don’t think I can bear it.
My face is tight and wet from my tearful outburst. The neckline of my shirt is even soaked. I haven’t cried like this in a long time. I haven’t let myself. Even now, I don’t think I allowed myself to feel, per se; I think I just couldn’t hold it in any longer. Somewhere deep down, I feel like I’ve been waiting half my life for someone like Sig to come along, waiting for someone to care enough to ask. For someone to unlock the door and let it all out.
“It was while Travis was gone that I realized how vulnerable we were without a legal guardian. How things would be different if only I was eighteen. In my head, I guess I thought that would fix everything. I was already thinking it when Travis finally got out of juvie. But when I saw how…broken he was, when I started listening to what he’d say during his nightmares at night, when he’d pee the bed and cry in his sleep, that’s when I knew I had to do something. He’d been sexually abused in juvie. It’s hard for him to make friends, but it’s not hard for the bullies to find him. And they did. I wasn’t sure he’d ever be all right again. That’s when I decided that I’d be eighteen one way or the other. I had to be able to drive, to get a job, to keep Travis. I had planned it out in my head that if anyone ever asked about Momma, we’d say that she left. Like Dad. And I’d file for custody of Travis and we’d be fine. But only if it ever came to that. I don’t know if that actually would’ve worked, but I was just a kid. I was doing everything I could to survive. So, out of sheer desperation, I took Tommy’s social security card and got my driver’s license. His name, his birthday with my picture on it. An insignificant little card for most people, but for me, it said that I was almost twenty years old, the age Tommy would’ve been. That square saved our lives. It bought us time, time until Travis could turn eighteen, time until we would be able to run away somewhere and start over. Never look back. That was my plan anyway. But that was before I met Lance Tonin.”
“How did he come into the picture?” Sig asks.
“He’d been looking for Tommy. I guess he’d been watching the house for a while. Probably wondering if Tommy took off with his money or his drugs. He caught me outside hanging laundry on the line one day. He was asking for my brother. Must’ve thought I was lying to protect him when I said I didn’t know where he was. He got a little rough. Forced his way into the house. I suppose he’d been watching long enough to think no one lived there other than Travis and me. Which no one did. Not really. My mother never counted.” I sigh wearily. “Anyway, he searched the place for Tommy, for the money and the drugs that Tommy never made good on. Unfortunately he did find Tommy. Dead. In the freezer. It didn’t take long for him to realize he had a unique opportunity. And that’s when the threats started.”
“But why did you–”
“Oh, if it had just been me, I would’ve told him to go to hell. I’d rather have gone to jail for murder than spend an hour being nice to Lance Tonin, but it wasn’t just me. There was Travis. I was all he had in the world. The only person who cared, who understood. The only person who would never hurt him, who would always protect him. So I made a deal with the devil. To make sure that my brother would have a home and what was left of his family. To make sure that he wouldn’t have to live the rest of his life with no one to love him. And to make sure that all our secrets were kept until I could find a way out. An escape. I went to prison that day. I just never had to leave home to do it.”
Not for the first time, my heart aches with excruciating regret. With the fervent desire for a do-over, for things to have been different. For me, for Travis, for our family. Sometimes I think I’d give anything…anything in the world to be able to go back and change things. Make Dad stay. Make things better. But there was no going back. There is no going back.
“So who are you, really?”
It seems odd to talk about the real me. Sometimes it feels like she died with Tommy that day. But it’s also a relief to talk about her, to remind myself that parts of my plan are still in place. And that there’s still hope. And maybe, just maybe, someone I can trust with it all.
But still, there’s bitterness. So much bitterness as I think about who that girl is versus who she could’ve been, if only…
If only…
“Tia Lawrence,” I say stiffly. “My name is Tia Lawrence and I’m a twenty-one year old whore to Lance Tonin because that’s the best I could do with the cards life dealt me. At least for a while longer, until Travis turns eighteen and the state can’t take him from me. But on that day…by midnight, on the morning of his birthday, we’ll be long gone from here. We’re leaving, going some place where no one will be able to hurt us anymore. Not even Lance Tonin.”
“Aren’t you afraid he’ll tell the police about your brother? How will you ever be free of him?”
“Oh he might. He took Tommy’s body. I don’t know what he did with it. He says he’s got it buried somewhere safe so he won’t have to worry about my loyalty. The thing is, he knows why I have to be Tommy. I think, in a way, to all of us, I am Tommi. No one has called me Tia since the day I came home from the DMV. It had to be that way. I think even Lance sometimes forgets, so much so that I don’t think he keeps tabs on Tia Lawrence. I never mention her. No one does. For all he knows, she disappeared and won’t ever come back. He thinks he saved me. He thinks he has me. But he doesn’t. Tia got her GED online. She also has almost enough credits to graduate college with a degree in psychology. And when she does, she and her brother will go to a non-extradition country and she’ll be able to get a job helping kids like him and they can finally live a happy life, free of Lance Tonin. Free of our past. Where nobody can hurt us. And no
body can take us away from each other.”
I hear his whispering sigh of understanding.
“Ahhhh, so that’s what you sneak away to do on the computer. You’re getting your degree.”
I nod. “Yes.”
As I always do when I think about my plan, I feel lighter. I can even smile when I think about what our lives will be like once Travis turns eighteen and we can start over somewhere else. It’s like the mental picture alone is capable of lifting away the weight, the shame, the sadness, the fear. Everything that I’ve lived with for so long. For just a few seconds, it fades away.
Only this time, it doesn’t return in the same way that it usually does. Today, only one emotion comes back in full force. So strong, in fact, that it drowns out all the others.
Fear. Fear for my brother. If something happens to him, everything I’ve done will be for nothing. I will have ultimately failed him. And I’m not sure I can live with that. I’m not sure I’d even want to.
Finally, after baring my soul to the only person other than Travis and my mother that I actually care about, I turn to Sig. I wait until he meets my eyes and then I beg. Without dignity or hesitation, I beg.
“Please help me find Travis. Help me save him. Please.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT- SIG
“We’ll find him,” I tell Tommi. “We’ll find him if I have to tear this town apart.”
She falls quiet for the rest of the trip, leaving me to my chaotic thoughts. Holy mother of shit, what the hell am I going to do? I’m a cop, for chrissake. The woman that I’ve been steadily falling for is not only the girlfriend of a drug dealer, which was something I could’ve gotten around, she’s also a murderer with a laundry list of other felonies to her credit. In more than one name.