Page 79 of True Blue

“Indie,” I choke on her name, my throat tight. “Indie, Indie, Indie… no, no, no…”

Tears sting my eyes, and I rub at the tearing pain in my chest. The world was spinning too fast, too much, too much, too much.

My hands shoot to my hair and pull harder and harder, like I’m trying to tear it out, like if I punish myself, maybe she’ll reappear. Maybe I’ll hear her sweet husky voice again or see those beautiful, true blue eyes teasing me.

Mrs. Morris peeks out of her front door across the street, curtains on the houses next to her shifting. Let them witness my pain, I don’t care.

She’s gone.

And it’s all my fault.

“Theodore James, what are you doing—get in this house, now!” Mom appears on the front porch, shirt and pants changed, smiling tightly at Mrs. Morris, who’s standing across the street watching me fall apart. “Oh, hello, Deb! I’ll see you later for the party?”

Mrs. Morris smirks, waving with one hand while the other dials her house phone to gossip with one of the other neighborhood women. It’s what my mother would do in this situation if it were anyone else. But it’s me—her baby boy—so she can’t abide by the humiliation.

It doesn’t matter.

Nothing matters anymore.

Because Indie is fucking gone.

And it really shouldn’t be that surprising because what did I even expect to happen?

That she would hang around after I was backing out on the move? That she would come back from vacation totally fine with doing the long-distance relationship thing for a bit?

Just until things settled down. Just until Mom was through her grief. Just until I could get this guilty voice out of my head telling me that I was abandoning my family, just like my sisters.

Just until I was sure Mom wasn’t going to…

And you know the most fucked up thing is?

Yes, I was.

I was expecting Indie to just bend and go along with it, because Indie was the most caring and accommodating woman I have ever met. She would do anything for me.

But I wanted Europe so bad, ever since she first spoke about it to me. I wanted Cape May—that fixer-upper that made her eyes shimmer with want. I could work on it bit by bit while she was at work, and she could come home every day to one piece of her dream being made real.

I want Indie.

Forever.

After Nana died, I started thinking I had to choose between Indie and my family. I didn't realize there was no real choice.

It’s Indie.

Always.

But saying that is a hell of a lot easier than actually doing it, especially when the person making you feel like you have to choose is your mother.

“Theodore James, get in this house. Now!”

Mom’s voice is a low hiss behind me, edged with an anger I’ve never heard from her before.

I turn my head and look at her, really look, and her smile looks painfully stretched across her face. Her green eyes bore into my skull, twitching around the edges. The lines around her eyes and mouth are pulled tight. Nana would tell her to lighten up, or she was going to give herself wrinkles. Because those were the things Mom worried about.

How we appeared. How we acted. What other people thought, and how to keep them from looking too closely.

Mom couldn’t let people know that Dad barely comes home most nights anymore, let alone that he doesn’t even sleep in the same room as her when he does.