The Way Home (Lights of Peril)

by Unknown

  I’m berating her with questions in my moment of shock. I just never once thought of Cherry as a user. Not even when Mace hated her because of Shame.

  “God, you’re so fuckin’ naïve, aren’t you? How nice for you to live in that protective bubble that Hem and Shame build around you and your precious girl, Mace. The rest of us don’t live that life, so maybe you need to back the fuck off with your threats and judgments. Go back to your treehouse with your ‘crush.’”

  Wow. Nose candy makes her a raging bitch. Good to know.

  Rather than waste my energy smacking her, something she wouldn’t remember anyway, I stand up and offer my hand to her. She looks up at me like a wounded child that knows they fucked up and is about to get grounded. She won’t take it, so I just continue standing.

  Her face turns to reflect the sadness she’s about to relive. “They got me high that night. They kept pushing and pushing me into accepting more. I didn’t have a choice. There was so much pain, I couldn’t take it. All I thought about was making the pain stop, letting my mind escape, so I wouldn’t feel his hands, or the objects of torture, on me.”

  This is all new information she’s sharing. I don’t think anybody knows. “Oh, Cherry, God, I’m so sorry.” This is all I can say.

  “The questions about you, Hem, and the club were relentless. When I would get an answer right, they would give me more. When I would get an answer wrong…well, you saw me after. I didn’t know what they wanted to know. I never talked to you and I had only fucked Hem a few times when he asked me for it. The night they took me though, they were prepared. They knew my past. Greyson actually did his homework on how to effectively fuck up a whore’s life more than it already was. He was skilled and he did a fantastic job. Who fuckin’ does that, Sadey?”

  “Cherry, I’m so sorry.” Jesus, I know I’m on repeat, but I have no other words to offer. I did see her afterwards. She was a mess, unrecognizable.

  “No, don’t…fuck… just stop sayin’ that. I can’t handle any more pity. I was clean for three years. After losing my son, Decklan, to my parents, I came here to start new. I didn’t know what I was looking for, Vegas had always been my home. I was passing through and I found Kegs. She was as lonely as I was, but she didn’t have a special friendship with cocaine to keep her company. I would use in Vegas during those long nights of nameless faces that would use my body as a receptacle to expel all their fucked-up-ness into. When Greyson had me, I went back to being that person. It was the only way to survive it, I thought. This makes me not feel anything. Not feeling anything makes me happy.”

  As she says the last, she holds up a bag filled with white powder. I’ve been around the club. I know they do a lot of unethical things, but I’ve never been a part of it.

  She’s giving me more personal information about her than I believe anyone has ever known, other than April, and I’m not sure what to do with it. She’s high as a kite and her eyes are evidence of her self-inflicted damaging therapy session.

  “My son, he’s four. He turned four…just two days ago. I miss him. Fuck I want him back, but look at me. I’m broken from the inside out. I can’t have any more kids because of what Greyson did to me. I’m no longer a woman. It took him just twenty seven hours to work me over hard enough and leave me so that I’m just a shell of a person who has nothing to give anyone, ever again.”

  Damn it, this is a lot to handle with a headache and at eight thirty in the morning. I can hardly see her through the water in my eyes, as she wipes the powder off her nose with her thumb, then rubs it along her upper gums. I’ve seen people do this, never understanding what for, but now I get it. She’s not about to waste a fragment of this high that she’s on.

  I rub her back as I sit beside her. I have no words to offer her in comfort, no experience to draw from, because in essence, she’s right. Hem and Shame have carved out this peace and harmony that Mace and I have lived in over the years. I’ve never appreciated it more, until this very moment.

  “Honey, you can start by not leaning on this for comfort.” I grab it from her hand. It’s all I can think to do because, it seems to me, this is what’s causing her problems. I’ve no experience in it and no idea the effects of it being taken away could cause.

  After I remove it from her grasp, the raging bitch surfaces again in reaction.

  “Fuck you, Sadey. You keep it. They make more. Thinking it’s probably a habit you should consider. Hem may turn a blind eye to the girls that use here, but he certainly has been known to enjoy the special effects it has on a woman’s ability to make the man fuckin’ fly in a sexual adventure.”

  She scoffs at me as she removes her eyes from mine and looks to the ground before delivering her final blow. “Hell, look at you, God knows you’re probably in need of a whore’s lesson to be able to keep Hem for much longer. He’s no innocent in the sack, or haven’t you seen that side of him? I remember it, very well.”

  I’m about to throw down right here, at the club, in broad daylight, with or without witness. She’s pushed too far. I’m not oblivious to the fact that Hem could have any woman here on his looks alone. He chose me, he chooses me. Any hurt I could deliver her would be only for my benefit, but hell if I’m not willing to handle it.

  “Cherry, you...”

  “Sadey bug…” Ace catches me before I start to unload. He’s standing behind us, not but three feet away.

  “Go. I have her.” He’s pissed, but I can see his face withholding an untold emotion at this. This is he and Cherry’s silent connection and why she always has his back. He knew about this.

  I’m pissed. “Can I talk to you for a second, please?”

  He doesn’t answer me, just stares down at the broken woman who still holds fury in her eyes, aimed at me. “Ace? A second?”

  He comes out of wherever he mentally went and looks at me as if he’s pissed at me. “Yeah, alright. Make it quick. I need to get her home.”

  We only need to move away a few steps since she’s now holding her face in her hands, appearing to be napping.

  “You knew about this, didn’t you? Why didn’t you tell me? If not me, then Mace? She’s our friend and you’re not helping her by hiding a god-awful habit. Fuck, Ace, she watched Patrick. She was alone with my son and she’s been using.”

  I hold the bag of blow a few inches from his face before he knocks it away and grabs it from my grip. “What the fuck is wrong with you? This shit needs to come out. She needs help.”

  “I’m not hiding it, but I’m not throwing her to more wolves, either. You know damn well if I were to say something, that she would be shunned by these all-mighty hypocrites. They drink themselves stupid on any occasion and they label that ‘okay.’ She doesn’t drink much. This is her vice and I couldn’t just turn her in to Hem. Don’t you think there’s enough shit going down around here?”

  Yes, he’s pissed at me. Wonderful for him, but I’m no less pissed off.

  “I think you need to say something, if not to Hem, then to Mace or Shame. She needs help, Ace.”

  “Workin’ that out, Sadey. Stay out of it.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Bullshit! You can, you just don’t want to. There’s a damn difference.”

  He’s using my words against me. He’s also not finished with his emotional blackmail.

  “Remember when you found out you were pregnant? I promised you time to get yourself together and tell Hem. It went against everything I knew, keeping secrets like that from someone, my President no less, for fuck sake. I did it though, for you. Now, you’re going to return the favor. Shut it, Sadey. I will get her what she needs, but until I figure out the best way to do that, not a word. We good?”

  “Yeah, we’re good.”

  We’re not, but he’s right. I need to let him handle this and by giving him just a few days, maybe he will be able to give her more help than a raging and pissed off Hem could.

  “Good. Now can I take her home? I’m staying there with her until I go. Sylvie
hates her. Fuck she hates everyone, but she has a past with this shit as well, so surprisingly, and thankfully, she’s not making waves about this.”

  “Okay.” Go figure. Sylvie has seen herself on that side of a mirror, snorting herself into oblivion. Damn it, Ace, I hope you know what you’re doing.

  “Cherry, Ace is going to take you home, but you and I aren’t done talking. Got that little sister?” I’m trying not to let myself rip into her for her painful statement about Hem and I’s relationship, but damn, it’s hard.

  She finally takes her hands away from her face. When she does, the personal hell is evident. Her eyes are glassed over and it’s hard to tell if it’s from the emotion of the moment or the high.

  Ace grabs her, using his hands as crutches to take her away. He talks so gentle to her. He likes her, maybe loves her, even with all the problems she’s bringing his way. They are close. I’m thankful she has someone so determined, like him, to help.

  Once he has her standing and stable, I hear his words, “Cherry, honey, let’s go back to your place. I can stay with you for a while.” She doesn’t respond verbally, just puts her hand in his and he walks her to his bike.

  Nothing ever stops spinning in my world. I wish it would.

  My parents have Patrick ready for me as I arrive to pick him up. By the look on Dad’s face no one got much sleep around the house. Patrick’s sleep is a complete guessing game. He has no set sleep pattern anymore, just whenever he feels tired, he conks. His dad is the exact same, shocker there.

  “Good morning, Sadey. Bringing me a package? I’m bored and there’s nothing to do around here that Cricket and the others are doing that they shouldn’t be doing. Whatcha got for me?” God, Gunner, find a woman with all the emotional problems that equal the ones around here and I swear you’d never be bored on a Saturday morning.

  “I have Patrick. Want him?” I know he doesn’t. No way does Gunner want to take Patrick on, but I’ll be damned if he doesn’t come to my little guy and take the car seat from my arms.

  Shit, another surprise, but this one is wrapped as a beautiful gift that I’m going to accept. This way I don’t have to take a questionably moody infant to see his definitely moody father. Thank you, Gunner.

  “Give me the little guy. I got him. Go do whatever it is you and Pres. Do. Fuck…wait… never mind. Yes, definitely give me the little guy. You’ve got years to scar him with all the frolicking we hear in the halls from you and Hem. Uncle Gunner will have this little baby’s back today.”

  He smiles and looks to Patrick, who is asleep. “Don’t I, buddy? Mama is going to find daddy and you’re staying put. Uncle Gunner will show you how to load a gun.”

  After I let out a small laugh at Gunner’s ridiculous baby voice, I lift my eyebrows to him in an ornery way and make my way out of the room. Hem is probably so far into sleep, he may not even wake up for me to be able to tell him I’m ready to let the past go and that I want him home, with Patrick and I, for good.

  When I make my way into Hem’s room I can see him sitting on the bed with his back to me, holding something in his hands. He’s shirtless and his back muscles are tense. I can hardly tell if he’s awake.

  I knock on the open door, “Hem, honey.”

  He doesn’t move to look at me, just keeps his head down. Making my way to him I see him holding an old and tattered piece of paper that looks familiar but I can’t place where it’s from.

  I shut the door behind him and move to sit next to him on the bed and sit as still as he is while he continues to read the paper in his hands…his shaking hands. He looks worried and sad.

  Only so much silence a woman can handle before she ruins a moment and I’m about to ruin this one with my lack of patience. “Hem, what is that?”

  He stops looking at the paper and hands it over to me as he puts his elbows on his knees, hands to his head and looks down, waiting for me to respond to this.

  I’m completely taken off guard by what this is. The handwriting is mine and I blush a bit with what I’ve written.

  I remember this note. This was my very first love letter that my desperate teenage-self ever wrote, and it was to him. I reference the date at the top. I was that kid that everyone knew in school that dated everything compulsively, even noting the time of day I had written it.

  God, I was so immature, but he loved me regardless.

  The letter was written in pencil when I was just fourteen years old. This means the note is over seven years old. It looks so used and aged and it makes me question what it’s seen and been put through over these years.

  I start to read the letter out loud for only him and me to hear, “I know the shape of your face and I like how you wrinkle your nose when I say something silly, so I try to be that way a lot. I love you more than you love music and if you would let me, I would sing to your heart.”

  I stop reading, not because I can’t continue, but because he’s astonishing me by continuing my written words, verbatim, without the letter to read from. His voice is husky and quiet. He has my letter to him memorized, word for word.

  “No other person likes me as much as you do. You’re the only friend I have that doesn’t make fun of me when I cry or because I eat my M&M’s one color at a time.”

  As he recites the words to me, he gives my verses a deeper meaning. Being that I was this same fourteen year old girl once, I’m lost in his voice, letting him take us back to our young lives and those memories.

  “I’m really sorry I embarrassed you. I won’t bother you anymore.”

  The way he says these words lends me the notion of how many times he must have read this letter. My eyes are welling and I’m not considering wiping away these tears. Let them run down my face. I don’t care. They are tears of joy.

  “I’m going to marry you one day and I’m going to love you forever, even if you think that’s gross.”

  Although these words were clearly written by an immature, starry-eyed, little princess, the words still hold true. I can’t listen to this anymore without becoming a blubbering mess and I refuse to let this moment be taken away.

  “Hem, you kept this?” He doesn’t respond. He only stops reciting the words for a second to look at me.

  “Honey, you kept this all these years.” It’s no longer a question, but a statement.

  “I will wait for you.”

  The final sentence at the end of the page says that, even then, I would wait for him.

  Oh my God.

  I’m still holding the letter, my hands now a shaky mess. Drops of my tears have spilled onto the paper. Finally, he turns his body to me and sits up, touching my cheek with his calloused hands and gives me a smile that the fourteen year old girl inside me would have given up her designer wardrobe for.

  “I read it every day when I was gone. I thought if I could read that enough times, I wouldn’t forget your voice in my head. I didn’t know how to stop missing you after the first month, so I just accepted that it was impossible and I had this with me all the time. Sugar, you loved me like that then. You love me like this now?”

  Quickly standing, I move to him, placing myself in between his knees and hold his head in my embrace and let him talk. “I love you, baby. This limbo is killing me all over again. I love you so fuckin’ much.”

  We are both lost in this happy to have each other again, but still lost in the emotions that have left us questioning each other.

  “Hem, you know I’m unsure about a lot, but my love for you is the same.”

  “I know. You just need time. I just don’t want to waste any more of it. Sadey girl, I will tell ya, though, it doesn’t matter how much time you need or if we are never defined again. I will always love you, no matter what you choose.”

  “I want to know something.”

  “Know what, babe?”

  “I’ve known all these years you were for me. When did you realize you loved me how I loved you?” I’ve never even thought to question this until now. Seeing him read my letter, the
letter he saved, has me questioning when it was he decided that he and I were going to be an ‘us.’

  He’s twisting his wedding band around his finger, looking down on it to avoid my stare.

  “Sadey, I never really decided anything. The feelings I have for you now are the same feelings I had for you when we were just kids, they just grew stronger over time. Eventually I saw you as a woman and not a kid, so the love came with more strength.”

  “That’s not an answer. You’re dancing around this and we both know it. Are you ashamed, is that it? I mean, are you embarrassed to tell me? I really do want to know. It matters to me. I don’t know why, but it does.”

  He looks at me, turning his body further to look directly into my eyes. “Sadey, honey, do you really need an exact moment? I woke up one morning and asked myself what my life would have been like without you in it. I remember it was the day you left for college and I knew I wouldn’t see you for a month. We were standing at my mom’s house and you were telling us all goodbye. You were getting ready to get into the car, the same car that you girls had overloaded with all your shit. You hugged me goodbye, as if I was nothing more than an afterthought. When I didn’t want to let you go, I think that’s when I knew. I was afraid to let you go. Now, more than anything, I’m afraid you’re going to let go of something that I just fuckin’ got.”

  His words, they are everything I wanted to hear from him since I can remember…so beautiful.

  “You always did wear your heart on your sleeve, Hem.”

  “For you, I did.”

  He leans to me, kisses me with more love than I think I deserve right now for being angry at him for leaving.

  Unfortunately, we are abruptly interrupted with a knock at the door. Damn, sometimes this place is like Grand Central Station. It’s Cricket and he looks confused and half pissed.

  “Boss, Gunner is upset. He says he has a package for you and that it is important enough for you and Sadey to stop your shenanigans and get your ass downstairs ASAP. He’s serious too. Cussed at me until I got off my ass and came up here to get you.”