My father putting his hand on her knee had silenced her, and while he hadn’t so much as looked at her when he did it, I watched Mom take her first real breath, cover his hand with hers, and fall silent.
Mercifully.
I’d slept in my old room, which was pretty much the same, except that it was painted brighter now, with a bed set only my mother would love, and there was a treadmill in the corner facing out of my favorite window — the one I used to gaze out of as I sketched. It wasn’t any easier to sleep in here, not with memories of high school clinging to the space. I stared at the television that I used to play Xbox on with Leo, heart lurching every time.
I so desperately wanted to get high, but I didn’t have any edibles on hand, and I knew I couldn’t sneak a joint — not in my mother’s house. It didn’t matter if I walked down the street to smoke it, she’d find out.
So, I tossed and turned soberly through the night before Dad knocked on my door at two in the morning, his walking sneakers in hand.
We didn’t talk as we walked, and unlike when I was younger, it didn’t really help me sleep. But it did make me feel marginally better — less alone, at the very least.
And the next morning, I gave my mom all the answers she was looking for.
I also told her and Dad both about Nero.
Naturally, they wanted me to go to the police. They couldn’t see reason, not even when I pointed out that it was his word against mine, that if I moved against him, he’d move against Leo and me both. Mom swore the law would side with me, which made me laugh because clearly she hadn’t paid attention to any similar court cases in the last hundred years. Dad seemed to understand why I was hesitant, but he was like Leo. He wanted to murder Nero. And while my shot of ever working in Boston was already obliterated, I didn’t want to poke the bear that had the power to annihilate my career completely.
It was only after I begged and pleaded with them through my tears that they agreed to let me handle it the way I wanted to.
That’s the thing no one tells you about being a victim to harassment — that not only do you lose power during the assault, but afterward, too, when you’re expected to follow rules put in place by people who have no idea what you’ve been through or what’s at stake.
What my parents didn’t understand was that I needed to take back control of the situation. I needed to be the one to decide what happened next, to determine how much I let this incident impact me and the rest of my life.
All I wanted was to wipe my hands of Nero and the memory and move forward.
I wanted to live on without ever thinking about him or that shop again.
And I never wanted to give him the satisfaction of thinking he’d so much as slowed me down, let alone stopped me.
After the dust settled, once the questioning was done and Dad convinced Mom to leave it alone, I was finally able to breathe.
But each breath was a fiery assault on my lungs, because now all I could think of was Leo.
It was sick, how I knew I needed space from him and yet I stared at my phone all damn day wishing to see his name pop up on the screen. I’d asked him to leave me alone, and he’d listened — even when I knew he didn’t want to. He was giving me what I needed, and my masochistic ass was over here wishing he wouldn’t, wishing that he’d say fuck what you think you need and burst through the door.
But if he did, I knew I’d be upset.
I’d take it as further proof that I couldn’t trust him, that he didn’t care about what I needed, what I asked of him. It would hurt me. It would piss me off.
And yet, not hearing from him at all killed me.
I was a chaotic disaster, one he didn’t deserve to put up with. I was so angry with him, so betrayed by his actions — and yet, he was the only one I craved to make me feel better about it all.
The only one I knew could actually do it.
I’d beaten these thoughts around in my brain so much over the week that it felt like mush, and I sat outside in the cool morning fog with a dazed look on my face, my head floating in the mist, body on autopilot and just keeping me alive.
Someone opened the patio door, and Palico sauntered through it and right up to the couch I was sitting on. She hopped up, meowing before she nudged me as if to say, “Let me inside that thing, I’m cold.” I couldn’t smile, but I did open up the blanket long enough for her to make her way in. I swore, she knew something was wrong. She’d been glued to my side since we first arrived.
I didn’t know how long I had been sitting there when suddenly a hot mug of tea was presented in front of my face.
I blinked, coming back to earth and following the hand that held the mug up to find my mother staring down at me.
The older I got, the more I saw how much I favored my mother. It wasn’t just her long, thick hair that I had, too, or her fair skin. It wasn’t her plump bottom lip that matched mine, or the way our eyes were the same emerald green. It was that I saw the sadness that felt so at home in my eyes reflected in hers, saw the determination that filled me emanating from her, too. She held her chin high, her shoulders square, never afraid to say what she meant or to face anything that scared her.
I was more like her than I ever realized before.
When I didn’t immediately take the mug from her hand, she nudged it closer, and I held the blanket tight around me with one fist as I reached my other hand out to take hold of the handle. Once I had it, Mom sat down primly on the couch next to me, sitting nearly on the edge of it as she daintily lifted her cup to her mouth and took a sip.
Our outdoor furniture was so spotless it looked like it belonged inside, the white cushions crisp and clean, the teak wood that framed it pristine and beautiful. I remembered when Mom picked out the set, when Dad had instructed the movers where to put it all just to have Mom change her mind and Dad and my brother had to move it all around again.
But once she had it the way she liked it, it never moved again.
It also never wore a speck of dust longer than a few hours.
I didn’t have anything to say, not even to acknowledge my surprise at her joining me on the deck. She’d barely talked to me since I’d been home — mostly because I’d holed up in my room — and whenever she did talk to me, it was to press me for what I was going to do next, how I was going to move on.
As if I knew.
But I was thankful for the hot tea, the first sip warming me all the way down to my toes.
“Thank you,” I croaked, my throat in shit shape after all the crying and late nights of no sleep.
Mom nodded, her back still ramrod straight as she took a sip of her own tea and then cradled the mug between her hands.
She looked out over the beautifully curated yard she’d created over the years — the garden that would make Holden have wet dreams, the man-made pond and fountain, the stone walkway through the beautiful trees and bushes and flowers. Birds and squirrels alike made themselves comfortable, eating the seed Mom put out each morning and swimming in the baths on hot days. This morning, however, it was quiet and still, the fog slinking in heavy patches through the space.
“So, are you going to tell me more about this boy?”
I let out a long breath, a moment of regret sinking in my stomach for having told her and Dad about Leo at all. But what happened between him and Nero was part of the reason I wanted to leave the whole situation alone, so it had to be said.