“No. Your father is just at the gym working off a bit of steam. Zac went home.”
“Why? What happened?”
“Nothing happened, Evie. He told Zac he won’t be training him.”
“He what? No.”
“Honey, what did you expect? Your father can’t be involved with all that. He’s got a record. If he gets involved with some illegal fighting ring, he could go back to prison. Do you want that for him?”
“I wasn’t asking him to get involved. I was simply asking him to train a friend to defend himself better.”
“Yes, while he fights in an illegal brawl.”
“Dad doesn’t have to go and watch him.”
“Enough, Evie. What’s done is done.”
“No. I need to go. I need to talk to Zac. Don’t you understand that that Nelson guy is bad news? He’s going to make Zac pay for this not working out.”
“We know exactly who Harry Nelson is, Evie. He’s a man you don’t make deals with. We can’t keep Zac away from him, but we can certainly try to keep you from making the same mistake.”
“I’m not making a mistake mum. I’m trying to help someone.”
I move to grab my bag and my car keys and head for the door. “I need to go and see him.”
“Don’t bother, Evie. Your father made him promise he wouldn’t see you again. And I agree. This situation is too dangerous. You need to be the adult you are and steer clear of this one.”
I shake my head, frowning at her, feeling betrayed. I thought she understood.
“Why are you doing this? Why are you messing with my life like this?”
“For the same reason you were willing to mess with ours – out of love.”
***
Refusing to listen anymore, I rush for my car, and head over to Zac’s. I don’t know his exact address but I do remember Lucas saying what street he lives on so I head over there, figuring I’ll see the van and find the house that way.
When I turn down the street, it’s not hard to find. The block of land is one of those ones that tilt downward, so the driveway is up high and the house is down low. From the street, I can see the top of the flat roof and as I venture down the driveway, an apricot coloured clapboard house comes into view. It’s two storeys but the second storey windows are the closest to street level as the house has been built along the curve of the hillside. From what I assume are the bedrooms, I see two small faces peering out at me from behind the curtain. Lifting my hand to wave, I chuckle a little when I see their faces disappear as if I wasn’t supposed to see them.
As I continue down the drive, it curves down to the first story. A tall gum tree stands over the house, making the walk down the steep drive a little slippery as it drops it’s gum nuts all over the broken concrete, so I need to tread carefully.
When I reach the front door, I’m about to knock but I hesitate when I hear arguing on the other side.
“You let him in here? Here? Are you insane! What did you do? Call him the moment I stepped out the door?”
“So what if I did? You can’t control my life, Zac. Not anymore.”
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going out and I’m leaving you with the kids for a change.”
“Meg. Stop.”
I jump back when she bursts out the front door, her eyes red rimmed from crying and her usually clear pale skin, blotchy. Her emotional eyes meet my startled ones and without speaking, she simply shakes her head and begins the steep walk up the driveway.
Zac bursts through the door after her. “Where are you going?”
“To live a little,” she says, walking backwards as she answers and her head turns to me, alerting Zac to my presence. “Just like you have been.”
“Shit!” He looks after her, running his hand down his face in exasperation before he turns to me. “What are you doing here, Evie?” he growls.
My mouth falls open. I never even contemplated that he wouldn’t want to see me. “I…I’m sorry. I didn’t realise…I’ll just go.”
I turn around and follow the path that Meg just took, too surprised by his reaction to even get upset. I’m more in a daze as I make my way back up the hill.
“Wait,” Zac says, and I hear his footfalls as he jogs to catch up to me. I turn around, colliding with his chest as he catches up to me, then immediately his hands cup my face and he brings his mouth to mine, kissing me with a searing heat that has my toes curling and my mind melting. “I don’t want you to go,” he whispers against my mouth as he just holds me there, breathing together, our lips touching gently. “I’m sorry I growled at you. I’m just…I haven’t had the best day.”
I nod my understanding and he slowly releases me, pulling away just enough so that we can see each other clearly. His hands slide down my arms and wrap around my body. “But seeing you makes it better.”
A smile bursts across my lips, like it’s the start of a cry but is happy relief instead, and I reach my arms up between us and touch his face gently, running my fingertips close to where he’s hurt.
“Did my dad really tell you to stay away from me?”
“Can you blame him? Is it true that you’re planning to move out of home and risk your chance at uni? Why would you do that?”
“I…” I start, not really knowing what to say in the face of the man who is the reason I’m fighting with my parents. I didn’t expect him to understand where my parents are coming from. I expected him to understand that I will do what it takes to be with him. “I just want to be able to live my life the way I choose. I don’t want them telling me who I can see and where I can go.”
“But I’m not worth your future, Evie, I’m not exactly boyfriend material.”
“Is that what this is? I thought we were just living moment to moment.”
He lets out a sigh and he drops his head so his forehead rests against my chest. My fingers move and slide through his hair as he just holds me and breathes deeply. “Every moment I exist, I spend thinking about you.” He says, his voice a mumble against my chest but I hear every word and it fills me with emotion. I wrap my arms around him and lean down, pressing my lips against his hair.
“What’s going on with you, Zac? I mean, besides the fighting.”
“Zac, can we come down yet?” a small voice calls from the window above us. “We’re hungry.” The voice causes Zac to lift his head suddenly and adjust his stance so he can look up at the little face at the window.
“Yeah, buddy. I’m sorry. Come on down. I’ll fix you something.” Then he turns to me and takes my hand. “Come on. You can come inside and see for yourself.”
Curious, I follow behind him and when I get inside, I don’t see anything out of the ordinary. Just his younger siblings, clamouring to sit up at the table as they announce what they would like on a sandwich for Zac to make. The kitchen is tidy, as is the lounge room. There aren’t any toys lying around and even the shoes are all lined up neatly along the wall with coats and school bags hanging neatly above them.
“Who is that girl, Zac?” the youngest, a girl, asks as she swings her legs back and forth where they dangle off her chair.
“That’s my friend, Yvonne. You can call her Evie if you like.”
“Hi Evie,” she says with a smile. “I really like your curly hair.”
The boys turn and say hi to me as well and Zac introduces them to me as Tash, Will and Rob.
“Thank you Tash. It’s nice to meet you all.”
I watch Zac as he moves about the kitchen, talking to the kids and preparing their food. And still, I don’t see anything out of the ordinary until he places the sandwiches on the table in front of each child and then goes to the fridge to get some milk to fill a glass for each of them. Because that’s when the conversation starts.
“Can you help me with my math homework? I can’t figure out what the question means.”
“Zac, can you come to assembly next week? My class is singing a song and we’ve been practising really hard.”
&n
bsp; “There’s a permission slip in my bag that I forgot to give you.”
They feed him information in the same way that my siblings feed information to my parents. I look around the house again, seeing certain clues – the shoes by the door; the lack of family photos and the amount of responsibility Zac seems to have. So it dawns on me – there are no parents here. Zac and Meg are looking after them on their own. No wonder he’s fighting for money.
“Can I get you something to eat or drink?” he asks when he’s finished with the kids and I shake my head, continuing to quietly watch him as he interacts with the kids until they’re done with their meal and ask if they can go and watch a movie upstairs.
“Sure. Which one?”
“Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles,” the oldest boy says as if it’s a completely obvious choice.
“Awwww, I want to watch Frozen.”
“Tash, we’ve seen that a bazillion times,” the other boy says as they climb up the stairs together and little Tash agrees to watch what they want as long as she gets to choose next time.
“How long?” I ask Zac when they’ve made it to the second storey and are out of earshot.
“About a year now.”
“And you’re trying to do all this. All by yourself?”
“Well, Meg helps as much as she can. But she needs to stay in school.”
“What happened?”
He takes my hand and leads me over to the couch where he pulls me down with him so we’re sitting together, my hand still in his as he intertwines our fingers and cups his other hand over the top of mine.
“My stepdad. He’s a mean bastard. Always drinking and gambling and getting angry and taking it out on others when he was down on his luck – which was most of the time. He used to beat my mum and when I tried to defend her, he had a good go at me too. Eventually, she got jack of it and she left, said she wished she could take us with her but couldn’t afford to. So she was going to make some money and then come back for us. I believed her. I don’t know why. She was always more interested in herself than she was in any of us. But Meg never believed. She’s smart, she knew she’d gone for good. And my stepdad knew that too. He became a real angry bastard then. Every night, he was drunk and yelling, telling us all how useless we were. He was willing to hit whoever was in his way, so I made sure it was always me so he wouldn’t hit the little ones or Meg. This went on for a couple of years. He was a wreck and there was hardly any food in the house. I used to sneak into his room when he was passed out and take money from his wallet to buy groceries and look after the kids. I learned to look after everything. But one day, he wasn’t as passed out as I thought he was and he tried to give me the beating of my life. But I knew how important that money was and I fought back. I broke his nose and once I saw blood, all I could do was think about all the times he hurt us and I kept going until he was on the floor and he wasn’t moving anymore. For a while I thought he was dead but when Meg checked him over she said he was breathing and had a pulse. So she called an ambulance and he never came home.”
“Did he die?”
He shakes his head. “No, he didn’t die. He just got up as soon as he could walk and took off. We’ve been on our own ever since.”
“Why haven’t you told anyone?” I ask quietly, horrified that someone could have treated him so poorly, and disgusted that parents would just up and leave their children.
“Because of them.” He raises his eyes to the ceiling to indicate the second floor. “They’ve already lost so much and you see how happy they are. I don’t want to take that away from them.”
“And what about Meg? Where does she stand on all of this?”
“She’s with me. But she’s pissed at me for forcing her not to see Sparks anymore.”
“So there was definitely something going on?”
“Yeah. And I don’t want her ruining her life over a guy who should have known better.”
“Do you think that’s where she is now – with Mr Sparks?”
He nods, lifting his top hand to rub at his temples. “Someone sent her a picture of me kissing you and she’s pissed at me even worse now.”
“Someone sent you a picture? From when?”
“When we were out at the drive in for the Rumble match you saw.”
“Well it was probably Sparks himself, we saw him there.”
“He was there?”
“Yeah. I’m sure it was him.”
Zac lets out an angry sigh. “That bastard. I guess he knows that since he’s quit teaching there’s nothing I can do about it anymore. I mean, I can report him and get his license suspended but then we’d be investigated too, and if he’s not teaching anymore, I doubt he’s going to give a damn. Shit. What does a twenty-three year old guy want with a seventeen year old?” I shake my head, not having any answers for him as I wonder how he’s coping with all of this on his own. “I hate this,” he says, lifting his eyes to meet mine. “I don’t know how to get through to her and I’m drowning here. I’m not equipped to be parenting a seventeen year old. Hell, I’m only eighteen myself. I don’t exactly have a wealth of life experience to draw from.”
“So what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know. I guess I just have to trust her to do the right thing. But Evie, I’m trusting you too, OK? You can’t tell anyone what’s going on here or they’ll take them away. Please promise me that.”
I look around the house, seeing that he’s most likely doing a better job caring for them than their own parents did, and after hearing his story, I can understand that he has a great need to protect them at all costs.
“I promise. But Zac, let me help you, OK? You don’t have to do all of this on your own.”
He reaches up and gently runs his hand through my hair, tilting my chin up so he can study my face properly. “Yes, I do, Evie,” he whispers. “But it doesn’t mean we can’t still have our moments.”
“When will we get those?”
“Well, this is one now. When everything is quiet and it’s just you and me.”
“Aren’t you worried your brothers or sister will come down?”
He moves toward me, his hand moving into my hair to cup behind my head as his other releases my hand and slides around my waist. “Disney movies have kissing in them. I think we’ll be OK.”
Then he kisses me for the longest time, and it’s better than any Disney movie I’ve ever seen.
Twenty-Three
Zac
Kissing Evie. Having her in my house. This is the stuff that dreams are made out of. I absorb everything about her, exploring every crevice of her mouth, every curve of her body as my hands move over her clothes and my fingers press into her skin and slide through her hair. I can’t stop touching her. I lose myself in her scent and in her taste and those small noises that escape her throat as we kiss are making me so hard I can barely contain myself.
I don’t know how long we kiss for but when we finally part, it’s because of the slamming of the screen door.
“Seriously?” Meg says, her hands on her hips as she scowls down at us. Evie quickly scrambles to get up.
“I’ll go,” Evie says, straightening her clothes and smoothing her hair.
“No. Stay. I was just coming to get some of my things.”
“What?” I demand, jumping up to follow her up the stairs to her room where she’s throwing things into a bag. “Where are you going?”
“I’m leaving, Zac.” She pauses what she’s doing and stands up to look at me. “I can’t be the standin mother for three kids anymore, and I have to think about myself for a change. Maybe I’ll come back. I don’t know. But right now, I need some space.”
“That’s exactly the kind of thing she said before she took off,” I shoot back, my words hitting her like a slap in the face.
“I am nothing like her. Don’t you dare put me in that box, I would never abandon my own children.”
“You’re abandoning your family. It’s the same thing.”
�
�No. It isn’t, Zac. You and I, we’re the kids too. We didn’t ask for this. I love them. I love you all. But I can’t live like this. I can’t live with this secret hanging over my head. So I’m going.”
“Don’t go. You’ll ruin them.”
“They’re smart kids, Zac. They know I’m not their mum.” She throws a few more things in her bag and then turns back to me, her face turned downward as anger leaves her body and her eyes brim with tears. “I’ll still be there when you need me, Zac. I still care. But I just need a break from this.” She gestures around herself, indicating our living situation. “And you and I keep fighting over the same things and it’s time to stop. Something has to change here. You have obviously decided that you’re going to have your relationship, and I’m going to have mine. And don’t you dare tell me I can’t. You’re not my father.”
“He’s your teacher, Meg.”
“Was my teacher. Was. He quit for me, Zac. He gave up the career he went to university for so he could be with me. And now, well, he’s just like you, fighting for money because his life took an unexpected change.”
“But you’re seventeen, Meg.”
“I am seventeen. Which means I’m older than sixteen, which means I’m above the age of consent and old enough to move out if I want to. We aren’t doing anything wrong here, Zac. I know you see it that way, but it isn’t.”
“Where is he?” I demand, clenching my teeth and trying to keep calm, although my voice comes out a little like a growl.
“He’s waiting for me in the car. But Zac, I swear to you, if you go out there and say a single word to him, I will never speak to you again. Just let me go without a fight for once. Please, care about me enough for that.”
Tears brim in my eyes. “How am I supposed to do this without you?” I whisper hoarsely, my emotion beginning to catch in my throat as I feel incredibly overwhelmed by all that’s ahead of me.
She moves forward and places her hand on my chest. “That’s up to you, Zac. We were never supposed to be doing this. And I know that you’re worried about the kids, but maybe they’ll be lucky, maybe they’ll find someone who can take them all. And if not, that’s what we’re here for – to keep an eye on them and make sure they’re being taken care of by people who aren’t involved with…well, all the shit we’re involved in. I think it’s time to call in social services.”
Drawn to Fight: Zac & Evie Page 13