“No mother ever hates their child. Not deep down,” he protested.
“You haven’t met Marlene.”
Alex felt like someone gut-punched him. “Before, though, was she like this?”
“Not from what Mama says. She and Uncle Jeff were happy and loved Josie and wanted to have more kids but tried and couldn’t. Marlene stayed at home and Jeff worked. After, she got on disability, because she had—what’s the word? Not amnesia. The kind where the words don’t come out right?”
“Aphasia?”
“Yes! That, and a bunch of executive…something…problems.”
“Executive functioning?” The tight feeling in his chest intensified. Whatever part of the brain had been injured in Josie’s mother, it must have affected her personality as well as processing.
“Yes. Her mind still worked—she’s sharp in a lot of ways—but they’re the wrong ways. Like, she can manipulate the hell out of a person, but she has no conscience. It’s like she hit her head and turned into a sociopath. That’s how Mama explained it to me.”
Alex’s blood ran cold. “How did Josie cope?”
“She spent every bit of time she could at our house. Mama always let her. Marlene would get mad if Josie didn’t keep the house clean, or work enough babysitting jobs when she was younger to give her cigarette money. When she was sixteen she got a job at the library, and Marlene took most of the paycheck. So Josie worked and stayed away from home as much as possible.”
“Child services didn’t intervene?”
A derisive snort. “You ever seen child services do anything good for a family? Mama said she called once, and they told her unless Josie had bruises, they wouldn’t do anything.”
Alex swallowed hard. “Except her bruises are on the inside.”
“Yep.”
“She told me once that her mother is the town barfly.”
Darla pinkened, opened her mouth, then shut it tight. On second thought, she appeared to reconsider. “Marlene’s the town whore.”
“Okay,” he said as he exhaled.
“Don’t judge Josie for that,” she said, narrowing her eyes with an accusing look.
“Of course I wouldn’t!” he objected. “Jesus, none of this has any reflection on Josie!”
“That’s the part Josie needs to figure out, Alex,” she whispered.
“How’d you turn out okay?” he asked.
She raised her eyebrows. “Alex, I finally moved out here after picking up a na**d hitchhiker on the interstate, and then ended up in a threesome. The jury’s still out on whether I turned out ‘okay.’”
“I vote for a verdict of ‘okay.’”
“Plus, I didn’t have a mama who brought strange men home all the time.” The words came out in a hoarse voice. “Thank God.”
The implication of her words took a few seconds to sink in, and he stiffened. “None of those men ever…” Fists clenching, his insides shook with righteous anger on a young Josie’s behalf.
“I don’t think so. She’s never talked about it. Just that her mother would scream at her to leave. Or, once, made her watch.” Darla turned away as she said the words. “I think I’ve said too much.”
He reached for her wrist. “No. You haven’t. And this just makes me admire Josie even more.” A lump in his throat made his voice sound like wet gravel. “Anyone who can live through that and thrive as an adult is strong as steel.”
Darla nodded, tears in her eyes. “She is. Except all she knows is how to be strong, Alex. To make herself safe. Josie has no idea what it feels like to be weak and safe.”
“Where is she? It’s time for me to tell her that I want her to be all those things. That I love all those things about her.”
“She shot out of here earlier and said something about the library.”
Knock knock knock. Alex looked up to find Trevor in the doorway. “Sorry to interrupt, but we’re done and Sam and Liam need to take off.”
“Tell them to load some up for their families to take home.”
Liam popped his head in. “We don’t have a cat.”
Darla wiped one eye and laughed. “So what! Your neighbors have cats, right?”
“If I showed up at my parents’ house with cat litter for an animal we don’t own, they’d think I was tripping.”
Joe appeared. “Hey, I have to get to work.”
“Take some home! I know your mom has a cat!”
“My mom only uses some organic, lavender-infused stuff made from the shaved hair of reincarnated holy men turned into lambs or something like that. And it’s Fair Trade. No way she’d let me come home with this.” Joe sniffed.
“She realizes all the cat does is piss and shit on it, right? We’re not talking about an alchemy process that turns the kitty’s waste products into gold nuggets,” Darla said.
Joe shrugged. “Don’t argue with me—I’m not the one who buys that stuff.”
“Dissecting the elimination habits of pampered pets is a fascinating topic, but I have to go. Where’s the nearest library Josie goes to?” Alex paused, then smacked his forehead.
“Never mind. I know where she went.”
Chapter Fifteen
Josie hadn’t been to this particular library in a few months, but it was the garden that drew her in. Underneath an ivy-covered pergola, surrounded by overgrown Rose of Sharon bushes, every flower was in full bloom, and it felt like a little womb of blossoms. What she needed most right now was a sense of wonder and a place where no one else would disturb her. The library was closed; the garden was open.
Nestling herself on a bench, she took the clutched paperback and stared at the cover. Willing herself to open it, she found page one and began the slow process of unfuckupping herself.
It was a dark and stormy night, the book began, and she groaned. How ridiculously silly. And then…she just became the book.
Within a short time she discovered that Meg, the main character, had a missing father. Josie’s chest seized, a shocked sob stuck in it. Oh, shit. Had Daddy, just days before he died, given her a book about a pre-teen girl who loses her father?
Awkward, bookish Meg—like Josie. Annoying twin siblings and a curious, genius little brother—nope. Darla was the closest thing she had to a sibling, and while she’d call Darla clever, “genius” was a stretch.