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“I was so angry with the things that he said to me that night. I didn’t feel like he deserved you and was certain that you deserved better than a foolish man who played games with a teenage girl’s heart.”
“So, you lied.”
“Over and over, and the lies just got bigger and bigger, and I didn’t want you to be disappointed if you knew who he really was, the way he was when I walked away from him that last night. I wanted to save you any pain that he’d cause.”
“Growing up thinking my dad wasn’t only dead but a gangbanging drug dealer was painful, Mom. You should’ve picked better lies.”
“I hated him too much to make you think he was some kind of hero, Alex. I can admit that was a mistake. I should’ve been mature enough to tell him about you that night, but that’s not how things worked out.”
“He deserved to know.”
He sounds exactly like my damn mother right now.
“I knew we were leaving. He may not have thought he could ever escape south Houston, but Pop assured our way out, and I didn’t ever want to look back.”
“You didn’t expect to get caught in a lie,” he corrects.
“That, too,” I agree. “But please know that I wanted to give you more than Ignacio Torres could’ve offered you by staying. I imagined a better life for both of us, and we had that for a while.”
“Until Pop died.” I nod my head in agreement, but the pain of losing my father stems from more than just his death. We lost everything—the house, financial security, our biggest cheerleader. We weren’t rich by any means, but we also weren’t living on ramen three days before every payday either.
“You made a mistake,” he says, anger being his go-to instead of showing pain and vulnerability.
“I know.”
“I don’t think you do, Mom. He went into the Army for eight years. The man speaks over thirty different languages. He works for some security firm in St. Louis. He isn’t a drug dealer. He isn’t a gangbanger. Did you see his truck? His clothes?”
“He told you all of this today?”
I did notice his clothes and his truck. I noticed how handsome he still is and how other than thin laugh lines at the corners of his eyes, he doesn’t look much different than he did in high school. His face isn’t worn and tired, betraying hard years of struggling the way mine does. Although I should probably be grateful the man who showed up to demand access to my son isn’t a strung-out criminal, I’m also bitter that he’s done so much better for himself than I ever could’ve imagined.
Instead of answering me, Alex stands. “He’s doing just fine. We could be doing just fine, living in St. Louis instead of this shitty house in this disgusting town, but no. You had to fuck it all up because your feelings got hurt. Thanks a lot for ruining my life before I was even born.”
He storms away, slamming his bedroom door before I can even get on to him for his foul language. The tears, now a familiar part of my daily life, begin to fall. Despite my kid only ten yards away in his bedroom, I already feel like I’ve lost him.
I want to rail on Ignacio. I want to put all the blame for this entire situation, for every messed-up thing in my life on his shoulders, but how fair would that be? I’ve been living behind my lies for years and years, and I only have myself to blame. Alex is right. I ruined everything because my feelings got hurt. As much as I’d like to think I’d do things differently if I were a little older, a little more mature when that confrontation happened with Ignacio, I know we’d end up right back here. My stubborn streak is a mile wide, and my broken heart would make me act the very same way.
Chapter 11
Ignacio
I hate to admit the amount of time I spent sitting in my truck around the crappy gas stations in town just waiting to see if Alex showed back up. I hate that I haven’t seen him in three days, but I’m also ecstatic that he isn’t out on the street dealing. I wouldn’t put it past Cedric to have relocated him, though. Poppa always had a plan to keep business rolling when heat was coming down in different areas. I don’t imagine things have changed much since I’ve been gone. From what I noticed, there is much less police presence around here than I remember, but I was a diligent, paranoid kid, and probably felt like I saw more cops than I did. Also, as a man wanting more cops around, of course it doesn’t seem like enough. There could be two on every corner and I’d still spot areas that could use three.
