: Chapter 22

For a long time, I was happy I was born first. Not because being the oldest gave me more power, or because I didn’t have to share my shit and always got to have my own room, but because I got to leave first. It was the ultimate screw-you to my father, who thought being his son meant I’d help him raise his kids, cook the meals, change the diapers, do the laundry …

As soon as I turned eighteen and graduated, I bolted. I joined the military and got far away with barely much thought to my mother, because over the years and the constant threat hanging over our heads, I stopped believing she was ever going to do it. I didn’t want her to. I just couldn’t stay anymore. It would be fine. Life was getting easier for her. The kids were growing up. It would work itself out.

Joke was on me, though. Five years later I was called home for a funeral and two months later, another one. At twenty-three, I was the sole guardian and provider of four minors, and my parents had left us nothing but this house.

I regretted ever leaving, though. Not because I thought staying would’ve done my mother any good, but because the burden of being the oldest fell to Army when I left. And he didn’t deserve it. I was already angry, fighting the fog in my head every day. But he’s kind and calm, patient and warm. He didn’t deserve the stress. He deserved a brother who wouldn’t abandon him.

And he deserves Krisjen.

I trace the lock of her hair falling down her cheek and across her neck, the end lying over one of my pillows, and drift my eyes back up to her closed ones. My arm is folded under my head, facing her as she faces me, the curtains billowing with the early-morning breeze. She opened my windows last night. Must’ve done it while I was asleep, but the fresh air feels good. The scent of flowers and fresh earth blows in, the sounds of palm fronds rustling in the wind.

But I smell her, too. That perfume in her shampoo and the coconut on her lips, and I want her to wrap her arms around me again, so I can close my eyes and pretend the sun will never come up.

He deserves her. I don’t want to tell her to go, though.

Just then, she blinks, her eyes opening more and more, and I watch as her gaze focuses, and she realizes that I’m staring at her.

We stay like that, and I know she wants to ask me if I’m okay. If I need anything. But thankfully, she doesn’t. I’m so tired.

Propping herself up, she checks the time on her phone and then looks at me again. “I need to get the kids up,” she says softly.

I stay silent as she turns over to climb out of bed, but then … she comes back around, dives in, and leaves a kiss on my cheek.

All of the adrenaline in my body rushes to that one spot.

She flips around, jumps out of bed, and leaves the room, closing the door behind her.

I sit up, a wave of nausea and an ache in my head hitting me. I look over, seeing she left me a glass of water. Grabbing it, I drink it down and plant my feet on the floor, slowly standing. The walls close in, and I don’t know if it’s because I haven’t eaten since before yesterday, or because I’ve been sleeping for nearly a day, but I force myself into the bathroom. Refilling the glass, I drink it and refill it again, drinking until I’m not thirsty anymore.

The sickness rises, though, and I rush to the toilet, vomiting everything I just drank. There’s no food in my stomach, but I lurch and lurch, spilling everything I have until it’s gone.

I rinse out my mouth and drop my ass to the edge of the tub, trying to get my stomach to stop churning.

The house starts to wake. Laughter. Kids. Doors creaking open and slamming shut. I miss my sister in the house. She would keep that shit in check.

I stare at the floor, trying to feel my feet under me. Trying to stand.

Get up. Go. Get up.

Another day. Same as yesterday.

Stand. Don’t think. Stand. Get up. Work. Don’t think. Do a job. Fix something. Build something. A car. A bike. The broken shutter. The door to the backyard. Turn it off. Move.

Fucking move.

Another day. Same as yesterday.

I can’t leave the room. I can’t get my muscles under me.

I squeeze my eyes shut, feeling the wetness under my lids.

I don’t want to see people. I can’t talk. I can’t stomach the conversations. It feels like everyone is on a carousel around me, swirling and laughing, and I’m losing my balance. I sway. I’m going to fall.

How can they just go through their days not feeling how cold everything is? I can’t just act like I’m not cold.

I rub my hands over my face. What the fuck am I talking about? They don’t feel it, because they don’t feel it. Because it’s not happening. Why do I feel this?

Fuck.

Music drifts up the stairs. Krisjen’s dance music. I picture her in the kitchen, dancing. My heart beats.

My feet are under me.

I rise and push down my sleep pants. Pulling on some jeans and a T-shirt, I yank open my bedroom door. I don’t pass anyone as I head down the stairs, slip on some shoes, and leave out the front door. I stand in the street for a few seconds before I veer left, toward the restaurant.

Opening the back door, I head inside the nearly empty place, finding Mariette at the kitchen counter. She’s always here early. Like me, she prefers to work in peace.

She hears me and turns, a paring knife in her hand. Then, she relaxes and returns to her work. I sit on the crates next to the freezer, my head still pounding.

I love her. Blood or not, she’s family.

She was my mom when I needed one. Not when I was five or ten or fifteen. When I was twenty-three and twenty-seven and thirty. When I realized that life only gets harder and we’re all works in progress till the day we die.

Walking over, she grabs my chin and raises it, inspecting my face.

Going back to the counter, she grabs a mug and pours in tea from a nearby kettle.

She carries it to me. “Drink it.”

I nod, taking the cup.

I sip slowly, my gulps getting bigger and bigger and thankfully, I’m keeping it down. To be honest, I never liked tea, but the warmth is soothing.

I set the empty cup down while she preps vegetables for the day. “How often are you thinking about it?” she asks.

When I don’t answer, she looks at me, and I look at her.

“Have you tried anything yet?” she presses.

I shake my head, at least giving her that.

If I’d tried anything, I wouldn’t be here.

She scoops the chopped celery into a container and places a lid on it, taking the washed carrots out of the strainer and placing them on the cutting board.

“You should talk—”

“No,” I snap.

I went to a doctor a few times, but I said more to Krisjen last night than I told that guy in three visits. He was smug and entitled, and once I made the mistake of telling him I’d been in the military, that was it. That was the easy answer to what was wrong with me, even though I admitted to feeling bad since I was a kid.

I knew there was other help out there—other doctors—but I never considered it again. I’m too busy, money is too precious, and no one in the Bay would ever trust me again if they found out. Especially the men.

So I pushed it down. I turned off my brain. Some days it wasn’t even an effort. The feelings came and went just as quickly.

Other days were hard. Now, in recent months, they’re always hard. Noise hurts my ears. Rooms feel too tight. Food tastes like sand.

“The last time I saw your mom,” Mariette tells me, “she was smiling and hugging people, and she had put on makeup and looked so good.” She smiles to herself, but then it fades. “That’s when I got scared because I knew she’d decided.” She chops one carrot after another. “She was happy because she knew it was going to be over soon.”

I wasn’t here. Army never told me that. I’d never asked what the days before were like.

“My head is a hellhole all the time.” My eyes burn, exhausted. “Maybe she thought she’d be a burden if she stayed.”

“And yet, no one is happy she’s gone.”

People might be happy if I am. Maybe not.

Maybe Dallas and Trace would be happier if they didn’t feel obligated to stay. Maybe Army would feel like he had a life of his own. Maybe I fucked up Iron.

“You were always different,” Mariette muses. “Even as a kid, you were quieter. You turned inward. You thought about things more than other people. Aware of the darkness and always spotting it first. Sensitive to the world.”

She looks down at me. “But that’s the part of you that saved us. We’re still here only because of you.”

I stare at my lap, shaking my head just slightly.

“My family and I get to stay because of you,” she continues. “People have food in the fridge and are protected because of you. You planned, anticipated, and turned your head inside out in one move after another in order to protect what was ours. You overthink and keep yourself hidden, so no one really knows you. That makes you intimidating and unpredictable. No one can do what you do. Army doesn’t have the stomach. Trace and Iron want other things, and Dallas wants to burn everything he sees. You’re the one we know will always be there.”

I can’t look at her.

“Your weaknesses are your strengths,” she tells me. “What would I have done without you?”

I clench my fists, feeling the muscles in my arms tightening over and over again.

Mariette scoops some soup into a disposable container and hands it to me. I take it, the warmth seeping through to my hand. “Eat it soon,” she orders.

I take a sip and then another, eating bits of chicken and some noodles and getting hungrier the more I eat.

I smile a little. “I like your soup,” I whisper.

She goes back to work. “That’s Krisjen’s recipe,” she says. “She makes all of your food.”

My body warms.

I finish the soup and head back to the house, seeing Trace take the garbage cans out to the road while Dallas loads the truck. Army gets Dex buckled up to go to the sitter, and Mars comes running out of the house with his lunch and backpack.

And I didn’t have to yell at anyone to do any of it.

Army stops and looks at me. I turn away and walk toward the garage, twisting on the hose. Pulling off my shirt, I set it aside and lean over, letting the cold water run over the back of my neck.

It helps. I run it for a minute until I’m so cold, I couldn’t think if I tried, and my body feels a surge of energy under my skin. I turn it off and pull my shirt back on.

I walk to the trucks as they start to climb in. I hesitate for a moment, but I force it out. “I’ll come in with you.”

Army stops just before closing his door. “Huh?”

“I’ll take Fox Hill with Trace.”

I move toward the other truck, jerking my chin at Trace to toss me the keys.

He sighs, walking to the passenger side. “Well, how am I supposed to drink on the job now?” he grumbles. “Shit.”

Army casts me one long, last look before turning on the engine. He drives off, toward the sitter, and I start to climb into the driver’s side, but I hear music. Looking over, I glimpse Paisleigh and Krisjen bouncing around the pool deck to some Olivia Newton-John song.

Pink. She reminds me of things that are flamingo pink. And water guns and treehouses and fresh-cut grass. I can smell sunscreen, all of it reminding me of being a kid.

She’s like it’s summer all the time.

I climb in the truck, excited to go, because she’ll be here when we come home.

She’s sleeping in my room tonight.

Not forever.

Just one more night.