by Sherry Lewis
CAMERON WATCHED his grandfather’s hands grip the steering wheel as he guided the truck onto the highway. He tried not to look pleased by Grandpa’s announcement that they were going to his dad’s house, but he figured the old man could probably tell. It didn’t really matter, anyway. Even if Grandpa had tried to make him go back, Cameron would have refused.
He didn’t want to see her. In fact, he didn’t care if he ever saw her again. She’d lied to him. He never should have believed her when she said she’d think about getting back together with Dad.
She’d probably lied about school, too. She probably thought she could manipulate him into doing homework, staying up late and getting headaches for a stupid C. And then she’d start bugging him about college again.
Well, Cameron wouldn’t let her do it to him. Not this time. He knew what he wanted, and he knew he’d find it right here. Not in stupid California.
Thanks to Rick, he had almost enough money for a one-way ticket back from California. That way, even if she forced him to go back, he wouldn’t have to stay.
The trouble was, after this, he probably couldn’t go back to Rick’s. Rick liked her. Cameron couldn’t figure out why, but he could tell. He just wondered how long his mom would wait before she turned on Rick the way she’d turned on Cameron’s dad and on Cameron, himself. It wouldn’t take her long—Cameron knew that for a fact. Just let Rick piss her off once, and he’d find out what she was really like.
Smiling to himself, he glanced over his shoulder at Grandpa. “Thanks for taking me to Dad’s.”
Grandpa shrugged as if the whole thing meant nothing. “I’ll come back and get you tomorrow.”
“I’m not going back there,” Cameron warned.
“I promised your mother I’d bring you home.”
“I don’t care. Unpromise her. I’m not going back there. She hates me.”
His grandfather frowned, and his wrinkles folded over on themselves. “She doesn’t hate you.”
Cameron snorted a laugh. “Oh, no? Well, she sure acts like she does.”
Grandpa’s frown deepened and his mouth disappeared in the folds of his skin. He glanced at Cameron again. “She loves you, boy.”
Cameron wished he could believe that. But if she loved him, wouldn’t she act like it? Wouldn’t she hug him once in a while, or tell him he’d done something right, or...well, something?
Almost immediately, a voice in his head reminded him of the compliment his mother had paid him earlier that evening. Cameron ignored it. Didn’t matter, anyway. One compliment. Big deal. She probably hadn’t even meant it.
“Yeah,” he said. “Sure. Whatever.”
He didn’t need his mom. He had his dad, who told him all the time how great he was, and how much he missed him. He talked all the time about things they’d do and places they’d go once Cameron lived with him for good. And he didn’t have a bunch of dumb rules about how Cameron ought to behave.
Cameron couldn’t wait. He was going to live with his dad, no matter what anyone said.
Grandpa slowed the truck to go around a curve. “It isn’t easy for your mother to show people what she’s feeling. Never has been.”
There he went—sticking up for her, as usual. Cameron rolled his eyes in frustration. “That doesn’t make it right.”
Grandpa’s eyes narrowed and his frown got bigger. “It’s easier for some people than others.”
“Yeah? Well, so’s math. But she doesn’t let me stop trying to do it.”
His grandfather almost smiled at him. “No,” he said slowly, “she doesn’t, does she? I guess you can understand how tough it is for her, then. I mean, since you have to struggle with math and all.”
That idea made Cameron uncomfortable, but he forced an angry laugh and tried not to think about it. “Not even.” He flashed an annoyed glance at Grandpa. “Math’s tough for me, okay?” He unbuckled his seat belt and let it snap back into the door. “So I. guess that means I understand. But that still doesn’t make it right.” He pushed open his door and jumped to the ground before Grandpa even shut off the engine. He banged on the front door of his dad’s house before Grandpa could even make it halfway up the front walk.
His dad answered just as Grandpa climbed the last of the steps onto the porch. He wore his good black jeans, his black boots and a white shirt—the same kind of clothes he always used to wear when he went out on the town.
Grandpa must have noticed that, too. “Did we catch you on your way out?”
His dad started to shake his head, then stopped himself with a shrug. “I was thinking about going down to the Lucky Jack for a couple of beers. Why? What’s going on?”
“Cameron and Marti had a bit of a tiff,” Grandpa said. “They’re both pretty upset still, so I thought it would be best if he stayed here with you tonight.”
His dad nodded quickly and motioned them inside. “Of course. Sure.” He stepped aside to let them enter and clapped one hand on Cameron’s shoulder as he passed. “What happened? What did she do?”
Cameron stopped inside the door and unzipped his coat. The house looked different to him. Smaller. It didn’t smell like home anymore, but it did smell like his dad. “She’s been lying to us,” he said. “And making up all sorts of crazy stuff about you.”
His dad’s expression sobered. He glanced at Grandpa and back again. “About the factory?”
Cameron nodded. “She says you want to marry her again to get the Lazy M and sell it so they can build the factory by the river.”
His dad rolled his eyes and shut the door behind Grandpa and let out a heavy sigh. “I swear, I don’t know what’s gotten into her lately. See what I’ve been telling you, Henry? This is exactly why you don’t want a woman running the place for you. They’re too damn emotional.”
Grandpa nodded. To Cameron’s surprise, he didn’t look angry. “You’re right, of course. You always have been. But I can’t help wishing things could be different. Marti was the only one of my kids who even wanted to take over the reins for me. I wonder sometimes if I’m making a mistake...”
Cameron sat in front of the fireplace and let the heat work its way over him. Everything was going to be all right now that he was in this house.
A second later, his grandpa’s words hit him. He glanced at him and thought how funny it sounded for him to say that. He’d heard his mom complaining that Grandpa wouldn’t let her run the Lazy M. Was she making that up, too?
His dad dropped into his favorite armchair and kicked his feet up on the footstool Cameron had sat on as a kid. “Well, she probably could if she had a steadying influence.”
“Maybe,” Grandpa said slowly. “I don’t know anymore .”
Cameron’s dad shook his head slowly. “I know. I know. But I’m still here for you, Henry. Don’t forget that.”
Grandpa tried to smile, but it didn’t work. He still looked sad. “I know, son. Don’t think I don’t appreciate it.” He glanced at Cameron, tried once more to smile and turned back toward the door. “You two will be all right, won’t you? I don’t want to leave Marti alone for long.”
“You bet.” Groaning as if his jeans were too tight, Cameron’s dad stood again and followed Grandpa to the door. “Don’t worry about us.”
“Good.” Grandpa glanced at Cameron again, and this time he managed a smile. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Sure,” Cameron said with a nod. But he didn’t mean it. By morning, he’d have convinced his dad to let him stay here forever.
He waited inside while his dad walked Grandpa out to the truck, trying to rediscover the feel of home and replaying the argument with his mom over and over. He couldn’t understand why she hated his dad so much or why she didn’t realize that the whole divorce had been Cameron’s fault in the first place, not his dad’s. It had been Cameron’s stupidity that broke up his parents’ marriage—that’s why it was his responsibility to fix it.
His dad came back inside, but instead of coming back to the armchair, he put on
his jacket and stood in the archway between the foyer and the living room, looking impatient. “I’ve got to go out for a little while,” he said. “You know where the sheets and blankets are upstairs, don’t you? Just make the bed in your old room.”
Cameron couldn’t believe his eyes or his ears. “But I want to talk to you.”
With a shrug, his dad crossed to the front door and opened it. “And we will. In the morning.”
“But, Dad—”
“Look, Cam.” His dad didn’t even let go of the doorknob. “You’re tired and upset. Now’s not the best time to talk about anything.”
Was he kidding? He was really going to leave now? Cameron tried to look as if he didn’t care. “Sure. Fine.”
His dad smiled. “Good.” He glanced at his watch and checked out the door, as if he expected to see someone there. “I’ve got to run. You’ll be okay...right?”
“Yeah, right.” Cameron’s stomach ached, as if his dad had punched him in the gut. He knew how to keep his voice tough. He’d been doing it for years with his mom. But if his dad still went out all the time, his mom would never want to get back together with him. And everything Cameron had done would be for nothing.
He crossed to the bottom of the stairs and started up, still wishing his dad would change his mind. Still thinking maybe—
The door closed with a solid click behind him. He held his breath for a second, until he heard his dad’s footsteps going down the walk outside. He battled an almost overwhelming disappointment, but told himself to stop being a baby. His dad was right. He’d feel better tomorrow. They could talk about everything then.
When he reached the second-floor landing, he turned back and looked down the stairs. Without warning, a memory rolled over him. He could almost hear his mother crying and see himself as a child, standing in this same spot begging his dad to stay home, and listening to him walk away instead.
He tried to shake the images, tried to block the sounds from his mind, but instead of fading, they grew even louder: She’d sat on the bottom step with her face in her hands, her stomach swollen so large he couldn’t even see her lap.
He’d been frightened, he remembered that. Especially when she’d arched her back and let out a scream that would have scared anybody—especially a ten-year-old kid. He remembered running down the steps to sit beside her. He’d cried like a baby, begging her over and over to be all right instead of helping her. Much later, when he noticed all the blood, he’d finally dialed the emergency number and asked somebody to help her. But it had been too late then. He’d waited too long.
That was the night his baby sister had come. He knew that, but he couldn’t remember anything else except his father’s face the next morning when he told Cameron the baby had been dead when she got here.
Hot tears filled his eyes. He tried desperately to blink them away, but that didn’t work. He tried wiping them away with the back of his hand, but they just kept coming. It had been his fault. He knew it. It didn’t matter how many times his mom told him it wasn’t. After the baby died, she’d been sad for such a long time, his dad had started going out more and more. Every time his dad went out, his mom got worse, which made his dad want to go out again. Until finally, his mom had filed for the divorce that had ripped the family apart.
Anger grew inside him, like some alien creature. Anger. Frustration. Guilt. Swearing aloud, he forced himself away from the railing and jerked a set of sheets from the linen closet. He pushed open the door to his old room so hard it bounced off the wall, and tossed the sheets onto the bed. But it didn’t help.
He slammed one fist into the wall above his bed and kicked over the chair in front of his desk. But the feelings just kept growing, larger and more out of control.
Sinking onto the edge of the bed, he buried his face in his hands and tried to block the pain by digging his fingers into his face. But nothing—absolutely nothing —would take away the pain of knowing that he’d killed his baby sister. That if he’d only called for help sooner, he could have saved her. That if she’d lived, his parents would have been fine. That if only he’d been smarter, they’d be together still.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
RICK WOKE suddenly in the pitch black of night, aware on some level that something unusual had happened to wake him. He listened closely, uncertain whether it had been real or a dream until the distant pounding sounded again.
He sat up quickly and turned on his bedside lamp. Blinking several times to let his eyes adjust to the sudden glare of light, he stepped into his slippers and tugged on his robe. Possibilities ran through his mind like wildfire as he hurried down the stairs. Something had happened to Lynette or Tom. Kendra had been hurt. Or Ashley.
With his brain still foggy from sleep, he pulled open the front door and flipped on the outside light at the same time. Cameron stood on the porch, clutching his coat close to his neck and shivering.
“Cam? What in the hell?” Instantly awake, Rick pushed open the screen and stepped aside to let the boy enter. He must have had another argument with his mother. “Get in here,” he ordered. “It’s freezing out there.”
He expected Cameron to give him one of his usual flip answers. To his surprise, the boy didn’t say a word.
Frowning slightly, Rick took a closer look at him. Cameron shivered violently and his face was pasty white. He must have been outside for some time. “What are you doing out at this time of night?”
Cameron didn’t answer that. He wrapped his arms around himself and asked, “Can I stay here?”
“For the time being,” Rick said, pulling a wool blanket from the coat closet and working it around Cameron’s shoulders. “What did you do? Have another fight with your mom?”
Cameron glanced at him quickly, then nodded. He seemed hesitant to answer. “Yeah.”
That didn’t surprise Rick, but it did sadden him. He turned toward the kitchen. “I’d better call and let her know where you are.”
“No!” The word shot out of Cameron’s mouth like a bullet. “Don’t.” Rick turned to face him, but Cameron wouldn’t meet his gaze, and his next words came out much softer. “She thinks I’m at my dad’s house.”
Rick tried not to look annoyed, but he didn’t like being party to a lie, especially one told to Marti. “Is that where you told her you were going?”
Cameron shook his head quickly. “No. My grandpa took me there earlier—after the fight we had.” He studied the pattern on the blanket. “I...I left.”
Rick could only imagine how Gil would react when he found out Cameron had come here. But he also knew Cameron would not have left Gil’s house unless something had driven him away. Relief for Marti’s sake inched up his spine. Maybe Cameron had gotten a healthy dose of reality at his father’s hands.
But he didn’t say that aloud. He just shrugged casually and suggested, “Maybe I should call your dad, then.”
“Don’t bother. He’s not home.”
“He doesn’t know you’re gone?”
Cameron shook his head.
“How did you get here?”
“I walked.”
“All the way from town? It’s at least ten miles.”
A faint smile tugged at Cameron’s lips. “No, only partway. I walked about a mile, then some guy picked me up and gave me a ride.”
“Some guy? Did you know him?”
Cameron shook his head.
“Well, that wasn’t too smart.” Rick’s voice came out gruff with emotion.
Obviously, Cameron noticed. To Rick’s surprise, the boy smiled. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear Cameron liked seeing him worried.
“I know,” Cameron said. “It was stupid. You don’t have to tell me.”
“The first thing we’re going to do is warm you up,” Rick said. “Let’s get you into a hot shower. Then, I want you to tell me what’s going on.”
Cameron followed him up the stairs, and while the teenager showered, Rick found a pair of thermal underwear, sweatpants and shirt, and two
pairs of thick wool socks. He left them on a small table outside the bathroom, called instructions to Cameron through the door and went back downstairs to wait.
Several long minutes later, Cameron joined him. But he still looked cold and weak, and Rick’s concern grew. “Cover yourself with that blanket. I’ll make something warm to drink.”
Cameron didn’t argue. In fact, a noise escaped him that sounded almost like a whimper. It twisted Rick’s heart. Thank goodness Marti couldn’t see him like this. She’d go out of her mind with worry. Then the thought crossed his mind that when Gil realized Cameron was gone, he’d probably call Marti and she’d be frantic.
Rick thought about calling her from the kitchen, but before he could do anything, he heard Cameron’s voice. “Don’t get any ideas about calling my mom. I’ll just take off if you do.”
So much for that idea, Rick thought wryly. Okay, he’d wait until Cameron fell asleep. He just hoped Marti wouldn’t find out Cameron had run away before Rick had a chance to reach her.
He spooned cocoa mix into two heavy mugs and tried to relax while water heated in the teakettle. But he couldn’t stop wondering what had driven Cameron from his dad’s house in the middle of the night. Why hadn’t Gil been there with him? What could have been more important than taking care of his son?
After what felt like forever, the kettle began to whistle. Rick poured the hot water into the mugs and stirred in the cocoa mix, then carried the drinks into the living room.
Cameron had stretched out on the couch and covered himself with both blankets. Rick handed him a mug and lowered himself into a nearby chair. “Feeling better?”
Cameron sipped carefully and nodded. “Yeah. A little.”
“Good. Now suppose you tell me what you’re doing here.”
Cameron looked at him over the rim of his mug. “I need a place to stay.”
“You’ve got it. You know that. But tell me why you’re not with your mother.”
“We had a fight.”