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chapter 35
Jess
Dad walked out today. He packed a suitcase, grabbed my favorite owl picture off the wall, and drove away. Mom melted into hysterics. When her sleeping pills kicked in, I called T. He took me to the zoo, bought me funnel cake, and stayed glued to my side. Tonight, I stole Dad’s bottle of Jack, drank too many shots, and hid the rest in a shoebox in my closet.
~ from the diary of Elizabeth Sara Thorne (age16)
If Gabe hugs me any tighter, I won’t be able to breathe.
But I don’t want to forfeit my chance to behislifeline. So I stand on the walkway in front of the memory care center and settle for shallow breaths, desperate to say something, anything, to make him feel better.
Except nothing I say will change his mom being here. In place of worthless words and a lameI’m sorry, I press my cheek against the rapid pulsing of his heart.
When he buries his face in my neck, it takes me a second to register the dampness on my skin. His silent tears scrape me raw.I know how it feels to have your life ripped from you. To be almost crazy desperate to get it back. To suffocate in the restless ache of losing someonewho’s still here.
A few minutes later, I feel him fighting for control. It’s in his choppy breaths, the multiple times he clears his throat, the fist he makes against my back. “Sorry,” he mumbles against my skin. “Not cool to go off script and cry on my girl.”
Those last two words catch on my heart. Am I his girl? Because I think I really, really want to be.
Wiping his face on his shoulder, he settles his hands on my waist, his eyes glossy. “When Mom realized what was happening, she made me promise to bury her disease like some dirty secret. Because how the world sees her is so damn important.”
“It’s not a dirty secret,” I whisper. “Not like my mom’s drinking.” That’s the deep end of dirty. I look at the building he can’t make himself enter and realize I do have something to offer that isn’t worthless. Something I’ll never have. “Your mom didn’t choose what happened to her. She didn’t... do something that took her away from you.” The scar on my chin aches even though I know the pain is in my head. But today isn’t about me. “One day you’ll be ready, and she’ll be waiting.”
His head angles carefully toward the glass door like there’s a monster lurking inside, and he’s waiting for it to bare its fangs and charge. “Not today.”
Taking his hand, I tug him toward the Mustang. As we cross the pavement, his posture reminds me of Atlas. Except the weight of Gabe’s world doesn’t just sink his shoulders, it bows his back.
In front of the passenger door, he squeezes my fingers. “You know you’re the only person I could bring here.” He weaves his fingers through my hair, and it surprises me again how easily he gives his trust.
The wind rustles through the branches of the trees lining the parking lot, scattering a few birds. “You barely know me, Gabe.”
“I know you, Escalator Girl.” He traces his fingers over my cheek, not lookingatme, butintome, sifting through things no one else sees. “You wrote a kick-ass book.”
Not the way he thinks. Not the way everyone thinks. I look away, exhausted by my lies and omissions.
“One day you’ll probably OD on mint tea.” He turns my face back. “You’re into mismatched flip-flops, butterflies on your toes, anythingHello Kitty, and”—he skims his thumb over the indent on my jaw—“you have the cutest scar right here I’ve been dying to kiss since the bottom of the escalator.” Raising my chin, he presses the sweetest, softest kiss to the mark I’ve hated for two long years. The reason Dad made Mom leave.
Embarrassed at my sudden rush of tears, I swipe my eyes with my sleeve.
“While my kissing skillsareinsanely wicked, I think you’re supposed to wait until I kiss you other places before you’re moved to tears.”
I know he’s trying to tease out a laugh, but I’ll be happy not to cry.
“You listened to me. I want to listen to you.” He presses against me, his chest to my back, solid and strong like he knows exactly what I need. “Do you want to talk about your mom?”
“I don’t know.” Blinking against more stupid tears, I breathe slow in and out until I’m sure they won’t spill over.
Crossing both arms over my upper body, he whispers in my ear, “You’re safe with me, Jess.”
Being wrapped in Gabe does feel safe. But that’s not why I decide to tell him. I decide to tell him because I know he’ll listen when no one ever listens. He doesn’t just hear what I say, he hearsme. “My parents fought. All the time.” I grip his forearms, still clueless as to how everything between them fell apart when they were so in love in the diary. What happened to them? And why won’t they try to fix it?
Gabe sets his chin on my head.
“Before Dad started writing, he was a career marine. Mom hated moving all the time. Hated being alone. She... drank more when he deployed. And he left a lot. On purpose. When he came home, she’d be okay for a while.”A cutting voice inside me reminds me I was never enough to keep her sober. Never enough to make her happy. And I hate how much that truth adds new wounds to the old scars inside me.“When he retired from the military, the deal was he’d be around more, not less.”
“That didn’t happen.” Gabe exhales into my hair.
“No. Even when he was home, he wasn’thome. He still isn’t.” I close my eyes against the pressure growing behind my lids. “She screamed at him all the time for locking himself in his office to write. He was making decent money by then. He bought her a new car, a new house, a dog. By the time the dog took over his side of the bed, and she started disappearing for days, he didn’t even notice.”
