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“It doesn’t matter.”
It does matter, and I know that Willa spoke to him earlier. She’s the only answer.
“Willa isn’t coming to pick me up, is she?”
He shakes his head. “No, no she’s not. You’re coming home with me so we can talk everything out.” Dad has never been one to reach out a gentle hand with the offer of help. Forceful love and unity are the only options between us, which is why I had to create distance.
“I don’t want to go back home with you,” I say, keeping my voice down since I’m just outside of the police department.
“Okay, well I’m not just going to get back in my car and drive off, leaving you here. We obviously have some issues that need to be discussed and worked out and I think you know me well enough to know I don’t just give up. Your mother and I havegiven you your space and told ourselves you’d eventually come back, and everything would be okay again. Were we really that awful to you?”
His eyes are stained red, but it could be from stress, high blood pressure, or tears. I won’t speculate. “Where is Mom?”
“At home.”
“How did you get Willa’s number?” I ask, keeping my eyes glued to the blurry tree-lined horizon.
“We found her parents’ information online, called them and explained that we were trying to reach you and couldn’t. They gave us Willa’s phone number so I could hopefully get in touch with you. After talking with her this morning, I called back a bit ago to see where I could find you. She said you’d be here.”
I can’t believe Willa let me down. I may not have given all the details behind the reasons I have to keep a distance from my parents, but what I did say to her should have been enough to make her understand that my decision was important to me. Everyone I trust eventually lets me down, which is why I never completely trust anyone. It’s a hard lesson to keep learning and re-learning, but it’s become clear this is my life.
“Please get into the car, Haley,” Dad says, waving his hand toward the passenger side door. He’s wearing an old worn T-shirt displaying a silhouette of a man on a tractor riding in toward a rising sun. His shorts have holes and are frayed at the bottom, and his sneakers are almost worn through the sole. Whenever I ask him why he dresses this way, he says he prefers comfort over style. Even as a landlord and building manager, he didn’t seem to care about his appearance, and I always wondered what tenants thought of him.
We’re in front of the police department and if I argue with him about this, I’ll attract the wrong kind of attention. I don’t need that right now. I’ll give Mom and Dad what they want by going to their house and rehashing everything that’s happenedbetween us. Then we’ll have to go through this ordeal of me putting another wall between us again. People don’t change. Nothing will ever be different or better between the three of us. They’ve proven this fact too many times.
“I can’t stay long. Do you understand that?” I exhale heavily and step closer toward the passenger side door and lift the hot metal handle, feeling the door wobble as I open it. I don’t know how this thing is still running in one piece. The car smells like grass clippings and sweat with a faint scent of coffee. I roll down the window as soon as I sit down and close the door. I almost forgot about picking up my car from the Smiths’ house. I won’t be asking Mom or Dad for a ride after we rehash the past while they act like I’m the one who has torntheirheart out and stepped on it a million times.
“Yeah, sure. I understand. I’m always just supposed to understand, right?”
He knows why, but I’m sure he wishes he could forget the reason I had to push them away.
After fifteen minutes of tourist traffic exiting the hot spot destination, we cross the long metal bridge connecting Newport and the bordering island of Jamestown, where I grew up.
The short, narrow roads are all too familiar. The gray blue shingles, white door and four one-story windows with white shutters are crammed together to give the impression that the house is the size of any old house, except it’s not. There are barely three rooms and a basement only a child could walk through and no attic. We had no secrets in this house because it was impossible to keep anything from each other.
Dad’s one word question is still dangling between us as we step out of the car. Mom will think this is some desired reunion when I was merely cornered at the police station.
I follow Dad inside, finding everything in its place as usual, but something must be rotting in the kitchen, or maybe noone has taken out the trash in too long. There are flies circling around my head and the air is damp between the narrow walls. It doesn’t have to be like this.
Mom is sitting on the couch, staring at the unusable fireplace and doesn’t acknowledge either of us walking inside. “Honey, I found her,” Dad says, as if I need an introduction while I’m just a few steps away.
Mom’s tired eyes sway over to me. Her lips part as if she might say something. Her hair has turned completely white, a drastic change since she would always color her roots every four weeks, without fail. It’s like she’s aged ten years in the last two. Her raggedy clothes tell me she’s stopped looking at her reflection and I wonder why, or maybe I don’t. “Haley, you came back?” She stands from the couch and reaches toward me as if I’m a mirage that might disappear when she makes physical contact. “What happened to your neck? You’re hurt. Did someone hurt you?”
“One of them probably attacked her after she spoke to a reporter,” Dad says.
“One of who?” I recoil.
“Larissa Hoyt—whoever she is affiliated with. Who knows?”
“That menace of a woman,” Mom grunts. “Was it her?”
“I don’t know who did this to me,” I say, rubbing my hand against the swollen bumps on my neck.
“We’ll keep you safe, sweetheart.” Mom must know I’m not here by choice. When it comes to the two of them, I’ve never had a say in what goes on around here. They are set in their ways and believe they raised me with proper care. But I was a prisoner of their control—their pet rather than daughter. No matter how many times I tried explaining my feelings to them or asking them to allow me space to grow and experience life on my own, they continued doing what was “best” for me.
Getting out of this house and living on campus has been life changing for me but even from a town away they still tried to impose their power of control regarding every decision I was making. Their calls were incessant, multiple times a day. The text messages would never stop. They needed to know where I was at all times of the day. They went as far as showing up on my doorstep several times a week.
I got to the point where I had to decide what was best for me, so I told them I needed a break from them. They fought me on the topic until I was forced to give them an ultimatum. I told them if they didn’t respect my wishes, I would have no choice but to leave the state—leave them for good. I blocked their phone calls and moved off campus to an apartment. It was the answer to my issues with them, at least for the last two years.
