I’d never be seen again.
But he motions with his hand for me to keep going.
I don’t want to go. My bare feet are freezing, and splinters of wood from the stairs poke them.
But then I stop, and my heart jumps into my throat.
I see Jax.
I see them.
And then I see the blood.
I parked my car in the lot near the back entrance to the park. Eagle Point had two ways in. A drive-in front entrance and a rear one for walkers and bikers. But the back entrance offered a parking lot to leave your car and walk through. It was this gate I chose.
The one closest to the pond.
How I got here escaped me, but when I drove, I zoned out. Sooner or later, I always ended up where I wanted to be.
Sometimes, I wound up at Fairfax’s Garage to fiddle with my car. Other times, I ended up at Madoc’s house to party. And a few times I’d found myself at some girl’s house.
But tonight? The park? The fishpond?
The hairs on my arms shot up, and I felt acid burning a line up my throat. I wanted to be here about as much as I wanted to see my father tomorrow.
But I walked in anyway. Through the gate in the middle of the night. And down over the rocks to the pond I hadn’t seen in years.
The pond was man-made, and the area was accented with sandstone rocks which made up the footing around the pond, the cliffs surrounding it, and the steps leading down to it. A path made of the same stone led away from the pond, into the woods where you could walk to a lookout over the river.
It was private, quaint, and special to Tate and me. We’d come here for picnics, a neighbor’s wedding, and just for hanging out on late nights when we’d snuck out of our houses.
The last time I was here was the last time I cried.
“Tate? Come here, honey,” Mr. Brandt calls her, and my heart jackhammers in my chest. I can’t wait to see her. To hold her.
And tell her what I should’ve told her before. That I love her.
My stomach shifts and growls with hunger, and I look down at my hands, grime in the creases. I wish I’d cleaned up before I came to look for her, but I know Tate won’t care.
Moving down the stone steps, I see her plop down on the blanket, leaning back on her hands with her ankles crossed.
She’s so beautiful. And she’s smiling.
Jax flashes through my mind, and I feel my muscles tense with urgency. I have to tell someone.
But first, I need Tate.
I start to walk to her, but then I see my mother, and I duck behind the boulder.
Anger and disgust grips me.
Why is she here? I don’t want to see her.
I’d called over the summer. I’d tried to get her help, but she’d left me there.
Why is my mother here with them?
I try to get my breathing under control, but I feel my throat tighten like I want to cry.
Tate is my family. My real family. My drunk of a mother has no right to be here having fun with them.
“I can’t wait for Jared to get back.” I hear Tate’s smile in her voice, and I cover my mouth to choke back the cry creeping up my chest.
I want to go to her, but I can’t make a move with everyone around. I don’t want to see my mother, and I don’t want Mr. Brandt to see me like this. Dirty and bruised.
I just want to grab Tate’s hand and run.
“You can show him the moves you and Will learned at Karate this summer,” Mr. Brandt says, and I stop breathing. The sob held hostage in my throat turns into a fire in my belly.
Will? Geary?
My eyes shift left to right like I’m searching for an explanation, but I can’t find one.
She was still seeing him?
“Well, it’s nice that you had someone to spend time with while Jared was gone.” My mother pops the top on a Coke. “And I think the distance is a good thing. You two were getting pretty close.”
My mom smiles at Tate and nudges her leg. Tate looks away, embarrassment in her eyes.
“Gross. We’re just friends.” She scrunches up her nose, and my breath catches.
I duck completely behind the boulder, leaning back and dropping my head.
Not now. Don’t do this to me now!
I shake my head from side to side, the filth on my hands grinding with the sweat on my palms as I clench my fists.
“You’re a good girl, Tate.” I hear my mom say. “I’m not good with boys, I guess.”
“Girls are tough, too, Katherine,” Tate’s dad chimes in, and I hear him unpacking their picnicking supplies. “Jared’s a good kid. You two will figure it out.”
“I should’ve had a girl,” she responds, and I clamp my hands over my ears.
Too many voices. My head feels like it’s in a vice grip, and I can’t shake free.
My eyes burn, and I want to scream.
I blinked and looked around the pristine, shining water. I haven’t stepped foot in this park in over three years. When I was fourteen, I was sure this would be the place where I kissed Tate for the first time.
But then it just became a reminder of what I’d lost. Or what I thought I’d lost.
On the last day I came here, I had reached a point where I couldn’t be disappointed anymore. I couldn’t listen to anyone else not want me.
So I shut down. Completely and immediately.
That’s the thing about change.
It can be gradual. Slow and almost unnoticeable.
Or it can be sudden, and you don’t even know how you could’ve been any other way.
Becoming hard at heart isn’t an intersection in your brain where you have a choice to turn left or right. It’s coming to a dead end, and you just keep going, over the cliff, unable to stop the inevitable, because the truth is you just don’t want to.
There is freedom in the fall.
“Jared,” a hesitant voice sounded behind me.
My shoulders straightened, and I turned around.
Oh, what the hell?
“What are you doing here?” I asked my mother.
And then I remembered that her car had been in the garage when I got home from the race. I’d thought she’d been gone for the weekend as usual.
She was hugging herself against the evening chill, dressed in her jeans and long-sleeved cardigan. Her chocolate brown hair—same shade as mine—hung loose to her shoulders, and she wore brown boots up to her knees.
Since getting sober, my mom was beautiful all of the time, and as much as she pissed me off, I was glad I was the spitting image of her. I didn’t think I could stare at my father’s eyes in the mirror every day.
Lucky Jax.
“The front door was open.” She inched closer, her eyes searching mine for a way in. “I heard what happened with Tate.”
Not going to happen.
“How in the hell did you know I’d be here?”
Her small smile confused me. “I have my ways,” she mumbled.
I wondered what it was, too, because my mother wasn’t that clever.
She sat down next to me, our legs dangling off the small cliff with a five foot drop to the pond.
“You haven’t been here in years.” She acted like she knew me.
“How would you know?”
“I know a lot more than you think,” she said, looking down to the pond. “I know you’re in trouble right now.”
“Oh, come on. Don’t start acting like a mother now.”
I pushed off the ground and stood up.
“Jared, no.” My mother stood up and faced me. “If I ever ask anything of you, it’s that you listen to me now. Please.” Her tone threw me off. It was shaky and unusually serious.
I sucked in my cheeks and stuck my fists in the pocket of my hoodie.
“Last year, after your arrest,” she started, “and after I got back from the Haywood Center, I asked you to choose one thing—one idea—that you could focus on day to day. Something you loved or something that kept you centered. You never told me what it was, but then you snuck off around that time and got another tattoo.” She jerked her chin at me. “The lantern. On your bicep. Why did you get that?”
“I don’t know,” I lied.
“Yes, you do. Why?” she pushed.
“I liked how it looked,” I yelled, exasperated. “Come on, what is this?”
Jesus. What the hell?
Tate. A lantern. I associated the two, and when she was gone, I needed her.
Why a lantern? I don’t know.
“On your eleventh birthday, I got drunk.” Her words came out calm and slow. “Do you remember? I forgot about the dinner we were supposed to have at the Brandts’, because I was out with my friends.”
There weren’t many birthdays that sat well with me, so no, I didn’t remember.
“I forgot it was your birthday,” she continued as tears filled her eyes. “I didn’t even have a cake for you.”
Big f**king surprise there.
But I didn’t speak. Just listened, more to see where she was going with this.
“Anyway, I came home at about ten, and you were sitting on the couch waiting for me. You had stayed in all night. You wouldn’t go to the dinner without me.”
Me. In the dark. Alone. Angry. Hungry.
“Mom, stop. I don’t want to—”
“I have to,” she interrupted, crying. “Please. You were sad at first, I remember, but then you copped an attitude. Told me I was embarrassing and that other kids had better moms and dads. I yelled at you and sent you to your room.”
Madman whining at my door. Rain against the windows.
“I don’t remember.”
“I wish that was true, Jared. But unfortunately, that tattoo proves that you remember.” She’d stopped crying, but the tears were still on her cheeks. “About ten minutes later, I went to your room. I didn’t want to face you, but I knew you were right, and I had to apologize. I opened your door, and you were leaning out your open window, laughing.”
She paused, lost in thought as she stared at nothing. “Tate,” she finally said, “was at her open French doors. Her room was dark, except for a Japanese lantern lamp that you and her father had made for her as an early birthday present.” My mom let out a small smile. “She had the Beastie Boys’ Fight For Your Right song blasting, and she was dancing all crazy…crazy just for you. She glowed, like a little star bouncing around her room in her nightgown.” Mom raised her eyes and looked at me. “She was trying to cheer you up.”
As soon as I’d seen Tate at her doors that night, I didn’t feel shitty anymore. Mom was forgotten. My birthday was forgotten. Tate became more of a home to me than my own blood.
And I never wanted to be where she wasn’t.
“Jared, I’m a bad mother.” She swallowed hard, obviously trying to hold back more tears.
I looked off to the side, unable to meet her eyes. “I made it through, Mom.”
“You did… somewhat. I’m proud of you. You’re strong, and you’re not a follower. I know I’ll send you into the world a survivor.” Her light voice turned firm and serious. “I wouldn’t want any other son. But, Jared, you’re not happy.”
The air around me got tight, pushing me from all sides, and I didn’t know where to turn to get out. “Who’s happy? Are you?” I barked.