by Lena Maye
Mom. With wide eyes and this look on her face like she’s fallen into freezing water.
The EMT gets my boots and helps me put them on. I lean on him down the steps. Kima follows. The cold that rakes down my throat is somewhere between relieving and painful. He steadies me with a hand on my shoulder.
Blood on the snow. It’s the only thing I see of Greg.
The EMT steers me towards an ambulance and helps me to a seat on the wide ledge. Kima rests her head on my thigh.
“Is there someone you can call?” He presses a white cloth to my face. When he takes it away, it’s red.
I know what he’s thinking. I need help.
He’s fucking right.
“My family’s here,” I rasp. It’s weird to call Sloane and my mom my family. I never use that term because it’s a lie when it doesn’t include my father. But it hasn’t included him for years.
Sloane’s SUV sits in front of Greg’s truck. Another police car sits in the driveway. Slowly turning lights cut across the house in a steady but somehow panicked rhythm.
The tears finally come. Not the ones that have been following me around ever since Kepler slipped away from me. But deep, hot ones tucked down so far below I didn’t know they existed. I clutch the edge of the ambulance and Kima. She breathes in my ear and lets my fingers dig into her fur.
I’m alive and breathing. I’m here and still fighting. As the tears slow and the world comes into focus, the strength seeps back into me.
“Bwa,” Sloane snaps at me. I haven’t heard her speak Korean in so long that at first I don’t recognize the meaning—look at me. She’s got her gun tucked away somewhere and her eyebrows in a line.
“Where's Greg?” I ask.
“Gone.” She smooths her hand down my arm. “Taken to the hospital for his gunshot wound. And you’re too cold.” She gestures towards the EMT. He gets a blanket and places it over my shoulder. As I tug it around me, I realize that my mom's there too, standing next to Sloane. Our faces have lines that weren’t there an hour ago.
I stare past them. Firetruck. Another ambulance. People on their front lawns, gawking. No other cars.
“He’s not here,” Sloane says.
I dig in my pocket and pull out my phone. And the duct-taped battery that popped off at some point. “He didn’t come.” I clip the battery in the phone and power it up.
Sloane snags her phone and pounds out a text. “There. I texted him, and he knows you’re alive.”
“I need to talk to him.” My throat hurts so much that every word is an effort.
“You need to be okay first. You might need stitches for the cut on your eyebrow, so hospital first.” She taps her index fingers on her gun. “Then I’d like you to come down to the police station. If you’re going to…”
“Hell, yes, I’m pressing charges.”
Sloane nods. “You can talk to Kepler when you get home.”
I don’t know if I hate Sloane for making me wait or think that she’s right. But I have to trust in my sister. I reach for her hand before turning to our silent mother. Her eyes are glassy like she’s not here.
“You won’t go back to him.” I nod towards the truck.
She shakes her head. “Of course I won’t. I won’t see him again.”
“No, you don’t understand, Mom. You won’t go back to any of them.”
“Jean, I—”
“You don’t get to argue with me.” My throat is filled with gravel, and the last thing I want to do is push out another word. But I won’t let myself be quiet anymore. “I’ll never understand why you picked all those guys over us.” I glance at Sloane, who nods and squeezes my hand, then I turn back to our mom. “You have to choose.” I take a breath and let out the thought that has been a stone in my stomach for so long. “It’s them or us. You don’t get to think about it. You have to pick now.”
“Pick now? I don’t know what you’re talking about. It’s just…” She fidgets with her coat sleeves and stares at Greg’s truck.
“Mom.” I step in front of her, tugging Sloane with me. “Do you even like being with us?” I bite down on my lip. Why do you like me? The phrase I’ve repeated so many times—words she said to my father so long ago.
Her gaze swings between Sloane and me. “You don’t understand. I—”
“Choose.” Sloane stares steadily at her.
My mom shifts her weight. I’m terrified she’s going to run, so I do something I never thought I’d do. I extend my empty hand. The other one still clutches Sloane’s. My mom stares down at it.
Then she untangles her hand from her bangs and looks at her palm. I don’t know what she sees there. Perhaps the faint imprint of where her wedding ring used to be. She drops her hand into mine. Sloane takes her other hand and closes our triangle.
I don’t know if it’s out of some forced responsibility or if it’s an actual decision. Maybe she’ll change her mind tomorrow. I can’t control that. But I’ll keep hanging on to her—as long as she starts choosing us.
And that, I can control.
Sloane’s radio crackles, and she steps away from us to answer it. I take a shaky breath and glance down at my phone. Why didn’t he call? There’s a weight in my stomach. Something’s wrong.
Sloane’s hand on my shoulder interrupts my thoughts. “It’s Kepler,” she says. “He’s in lockup.”
Thirty
The Detention Center sits on the edge of a campus that includes the courthouse and police station. A square silver building surrounded by icy sidewalks. Glass and metal doors open to a white-tile hallway lined with chairs. The sign points towards reception, even though there’s nothing receptive about it. A desk sits behind thick glass with a circular speaker hanging half a foot above me.
The place feels abandoned, but I’m guessing there are more than a few people hidden behind the walls and thick glass. My mom’s money is still stuffed into my blood-splattered pocket. Sloane said I would need it.
I wish she had told me why he’s here. If he knows I’m coming. If he wants to see me. I curse her ambiguity and press a call button.
Long minutes later, a uniformed man rounds the corner. He barely looks at me.
“Who are you here for?” he says into the speaker.
I stand on my toes and press the talk button. “Kepler Quinn.”
“Visiting or bonding out?”
“I don’t have to do both?”
He finally looks at me through the glass. Deep lines of exhaustion carve his face. He’s been here too long.
“You don’t have to do either.” He yawns, which forces me to cover my own sleep-deprived response. “I can set you up for a visit. Or you can bond him out using the kiosk. Then you can either wait or leave before he’s processed.”
I hadn’t noticed the blue kiosk down the hallway—the only place where chairs aren’t set against the wall. A camera stares down at it from the ceiling.
A few clicks later, I pull up Kepler’s name and bond amount. The charge is under his name: driving under the influence.
I step back from the kiosk. He was coming to see me. I hate that he would put other people in danger—people like Cassie’s little sister. I hate that he would put himself in danger.
I feed $1500 into the kiosk, and it spits out a receipt.
I stuff it in my pocket and drop into one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs. The silence extends, and I’m stuck with myself and my thoughts for the entire time.
It’s not unlike therapy.
An hour later the door buzzes and whooshes open.
The tired lines under Kepler’s eyes are deeper than the officer’s. A door slams shut, and it’s just Kepler and me with twenty white tiles between us.
He clutches his coat and a piece of yellow paper. “You’re okay?” His gaze travels down to my shoes and back up again, lingering on my coat. “Fuck, what happened?”
“I’m”—fine doesn’t feel like the right word—“here. I’m just…” All the things I’d planned to say to
him retreat. I don’t know if it’s because of the distance between us. “I can take you home.”
Kepler squeezes his coat in his hand, but he doesn’t put it on. “You don’t have to. You look…”
“Don’t be stupid. What are you going to do? Walk? Call someone else? I’m already here.”
He pulls on his coat and shoves the paper into his pocket.
“I’ll write you a check for the bond.” He takes a step closer. “Thank you.”
I want to fall into him—have his arms wrap around me and forget everything else. Instead, I give him my bravest, fakest smile. “What are friends for?”
His eyes narrow. “Is that what we are?” A step closer. Then he stops, as if he’s remembered something, and his feet glue to the tile floor. Even though there is less distance between us than a moment ago, it feels like more.
I take my keys out of my pocket. “Let’s go.”
“Okay, Jean.” His footsteps follow. He catches the door and holds it open. His face lingers a foot from mine. Snow settles on his hair. I remember the snowflakes above him.
I wonder what he remembers.
The dusting of snow on my car flies off as we cross town. Kepler keeps his head down until we pull up to his house. The dark windows reflect a white sky. I park in front of the door, but when I go to get out, his hand falls on my knee.
“Stay here.” He yanks his hand away like I might burn him. “I’ll bring out a check for you.”
“You want me to wait in the car? It’s freezing in here. My heater barely works.”
“I don’t want—”
I’m already getting out of the car and shoving the door closed. “I won’t invade your precious space. I’ll stay in the entryway.” The snow falls in fat flakes. I refuse to sit in the car, shivering, while Kepler searches for his checkbook.
He plods up the steps with me behind him. Inside, the pale morning seeps through tall windows. Carryout boxes dot the sitting area. Sheets and blankets hang over a leather couch.
“You’re sleeping out here.” I step into the tornado of textbooks and Post-its and legal pads.
“I can’t seem to sleep anywhere else.” The hallway drawer rattles. “The bedrooms—they’re claustrophobic.”
“I never knew you had a problem with that.”
“I didn’t.” His lighter hisses, and a sweet smell fills the hallway. Smoke curls above his head. He inhales and holds it in his lungs, the final puff of smoke a shadow that crosses his face.
There are so many things I’ve wanted to say to him. But as I watch the lighter catch again, something becomes clear to me.
Kepler is my friend. And that’s what he needs—a friend. Mackie and Sebastian never question his smoking. He’s got the money to do it. He’s got a cushion around him to keep everyone who questions him at a distance.
Except for me.
Maybe that’s the reason for all of this. Happily ever after isn’t being together. It’s both of us healing. Both of us walking into the tunnel and coming out the other side, maybe not together, but whole.
“What happened?” I pull off my scarf and shrug out of my blood-splattered coat, dropping them on the floor. “Why were you driving high? You weren’t high when I called you.”
He takes another drag. “I kept driving and looking for you. And I…”
I wrap my arms over my chest to try to hold on to something. “You were smoking and driving.”
He turns and walks towards the couches, picking up a legal pad and looking under it. “It was a mistake.” He sets it back down and scans the room.
Flame, inhale.
Flame, inhale.
A rhythm to start the day. My father’s rhythm was soup. Kepler’s rhythm is a drug.
I walk into the living room. On the coffee table, a scale sits atop a quantum-mechanics textbook. “A DUI isn’t a mistake.”
He stalks down the hall and into the kitchen. “I’ll find my checkbook, and then you can be on your way.”
I follow him. “How long has it been since you’ve gone a day without smoking?”
He throws his coat and the yellow paper on the counter. He pulls open a drawer and shuffles around in it.
“How long?” I repeat.
He flops a checkbook on the granite. “Is there something you want to say?”
I take a breath. “I don’t like seeing you need something. And I hate that you picked it over me.”
“That’s not what I did.”
“Are you sure?” I don’t dare step any closer to him. The tension running across his shoulders and into his arms looks as if it might snap at any moment. “I’m not saying I’m faultless. But if it wasn’t for the smoking, would we be together right now?”
“You lied. That’s why we aren’t together. I’ve smoked since before we started dating. It’s not the reason. It’s just green. It’s not like I’m smoking crack.”
“It may not be crack, but it’s still hurting you. I don’t want to see you hurt.”
His palm hits the countertop. “Then you shouldn’t have lied.”
I flinch from the hardness in his words, but I also recognize it for what it is—an attack designed to get me to stop talking. He picked the wrong girl if he thinks I’ll go away silently.
“Why did you stay in Rock Falls after high school? Why didn’t you go off to one of those East Coast colleges? You can afford it. Abby went. Was the reason weed then too?”
He rubs the back of his neck. “Do you think I’m stupid? Do you think these questions haven’t crossed my mind at one point or another?”
He rakes through the drawer and pulls out a pen. He grips it with so much ferocity, I’m surprised he can write out the check.
He scribbles the numbers. “I get what you’re doing. I fucked up with the driving. I won’t do it again.” He rips out a check and slides it across the counter towards me.
“It’s not just the driving. It’s—” I bite down on my lip.
“You’re asking me to quit.” Kepler puts both his hands on the counter and spreads out his fingers as if he needs it to keep upright.
“I—I don’t know.” I hadn’t thought that far ahead.
He closes his eyes like it’s too hard to look at me. “I don’t think that’s possible.”
“That’s what I thought about me. For the longest time, I thought I was just boyfriends and fighting. I’m not, Kepler. And you aren’t this.”
When his eyes open, the gray is so clear and present it feels like the first time he’s looked at me.
“We don’t have to be tied to what we do.” I search for the words. I’m not sure any of them are the right ones.
Kepler sighs. “I’ll try, okay?”
I don’t believe him. I push the check—made out to Jean Lo—towards him. “My name isn’t Jean.”
He blinks. “What are you talking about?”
“I picked Jean from an Elton John song my father liked. I wanted an American name.”
He stares at me, those gray eyes clouded with thought. “What’s your name?”
“Min-Sun.” I smile. “And get this—it means kind-hearted.”
He leans his elbows on the counter. “It suits you.”
“Sure it does. Pretty and nice?” My laugh doesn’t contain a shred of joy.
“Exactly.” Despite the weed, his eyes are clear and focused. And stuck on me, making that bitter laugh trail off. “What you’ll do for Cassie and Sloane. You’re beautiful. I’ve never met anyone so kind and strong for the people you love.” He tilts his head. “Min-Sun.”
It’s a name I haven’t heard anyone say in so long, like a long-returned echo.
I close my eyes. “And you.” I’m not ready to see his expression. But I need to tell him. “You’re one of the people I love.”
The floor creaks. I squeeze my eyes so tight the blackness is edged in white. His hands fall on my shoulders, and then I’m wrapped in him. My heart grows with hope, but there are still words caught in my throat.
I have to know. “Do you love me back?”
“I wouldn’t know how to stop.” His voice rolls over me, pushing away the coiled fear of being without him. “I’ve loved you for so long that it’s just part of who I am.”
He leans on me like he doesn’t have the strength to stand on his own. So I stand strong for both of us. His lips find mine. A soft kiss that shifts the world. The smoking, the breaking, Boston, all of it seems so far away, like none if it will matter if I hold on to him.
He leans back. “There’s something else. When I was in Boston…”
Abby. I suck in a breath. I grip onto him to keep myself standing. Please don’t tell me he slept with Abby. I can’t take that right now.
“I was in Boston when I spoke to your dad.”
I blink, trying to jump off of the dark he-cheated-on-me path my mind was taking. “Why?”
Kepler tilts his head, his lips pulling tight. “I’m aware that I need to ask for an official meeting with him. To offer my commitment.”
Holy fuck.
“We started talking.” Kepler swallows.
I shake my head, still caught in holy fuck.
“Since then, he’s been calling me every few days. We talk about you and Sloane. He asked me not to tell you. That’s why I didn’t call right away when I went to Boston. I didn’t know how to lie to you. I couldn’t come up with a plan for how to do it. And now it’s one more lie between us.”
I filter through the information, but only come up with one question. “My father. He’s—is he okay?”
Kepler nods. His eyes dart around my face. “He misses you and Sloane. He regrets…”
“He’s not the only one.” I press my forehead into his chest and try to center my thoughts. Kepler knows where he is. “How did you find him?”
“Mr. Yim at the country club.”
My head darts up. “Seriously? I hadn’t even thought about asking him.”
“Why not?”
“Not all Koreans know each other, Kepler.”
Kepler smooths back my hair. His hand lingers on my jaw. “Yes, I’m aware. But Mr. Yim’s lived here for twenty years. And the people who live in Rock Falls for twenty years all know each other. He wasn’t the first person I asked. It didn’t take much effort to form the question.”