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“You don’t have to worry, Father. I’m not a little kid anymore.”
He sighs and shakes his head. “You will always be little K-bird to me.”
My cheeks heat, but I can’t help but laugh at the memory. Between the ages of thirteen and fifteen, I was obsessed with Grease 2 and insisted on being called K-bird. Shameful, I know. His eyes crinkle with his smile, and he pushes his glasses up his nose. He’s the only adult in the world who’s ever shown me anything akin to love.
We walk to the supply cupboard to get the paints, and he clears his throat. “How’s Phoenix?”
I swallow down a knot of guilt. I can’t lie to him, not about her. “She’s… she’s surviving.”
“She still refusing to take her meds?” His concern rests on my shoulders like a lead weight.
“Yeah.”
He sighs heavily.
“I’m trying. She says she doesn’t feel herself when she’s on them.”
He takes my hands in his. “I worry about you both.” Father Mike knows I’m a thief, and that I’m damn good at it too. How else would I support Phoenix and me? Still, I’m careful to live within meager means, squirreling money away for when all of this is over.
“I’m capable of looking after myself,” I remind him.
He shakes his head but doesn’t argue with me. “You were always so much more resilient than she was.”
I roll my eyes. “You mean I went to all that therapy you forced me to endure because I hated to disappoint you?”
“Going to therapy and facing the demons you both have is brave, Keres. Confronting the things that keep us chained in the past is healthy. She won’t even consider—”
“She won’t go back to one of those places, Father.” I’m barely able to hide my annoyance. We’ve been over this a hundred times. “It almost killed her.”
“They only want to help her, Keres. They’re professionals trained to deal with people like Phoenix.”
“Broken people?” I’m being unfair, but I’m so sick of going around in circles and getting nowhere. It isn’t that I think he’s wrong. It’s that I know Phoenix can’t be helped until she decides she wants to get better.
“People who’ve experienced significant trauma and have issues as a result,” he replies calmly. That’s his most enduring quality, and the thing that had the strongest impact on me growing up. He was always calm, always soothing. No matter how many times I raged at him or got in his face because I couldn’t process all the anger inside me, he remained steadfast and compassionate. Never losing his temper. Never once giving up on me. Father Mike rescued me from a life of slavery and hell when he brought Phoenix and me here to his church.
The foster family who took us in shortly after was okay. They clothed and fed us and gave us a safe space to sleep. For kids like Phoenix and me, that was more than we ever could have hoped for. But this man right here gave us the true family we sought, and for that I will always be grateful.
I chew on the inside of my cheek and wonder how to tell him I’m going out of town for a few weeks, but I have no idea how to avoid answering his inevitable litany of questions. Lying to his face doesn’t sit right with me, but telling him the truth is not an option. Maybe I’ll just leave tonight and call him from the road. Lying on the phone is easier.
“Where do you want these, Father?” A volunteer I don’t recognize interrupts us, holding a full tray of freshly baked cookies.
“On the table near the front, Josie. The kids will be hungry when they finish school.”
Smiling, she nods and goes to put them where he indicated.
“You’re such a good man, you know that?”
He tugs at his collar. “I hope so.”
“You are,” I assure him.
His eyes narrow. “You’re a good person too, Keres.”
I force a smile. I’m really not, Father. Not even close.
I kill the bike’s engine and it purrs to a stop. Lifting my visor, I train my gaze on the house a few hundred yards ahead. The Moretti mansion cuts an imposing figure against the midnight sky. Lorenzo, Dante, and Joey Moretti sleep soundly in their beds, surrounded by opulence and grandeur while the rest of us have to forage for the crumbs they leave behind. So arrogant in their belief that they have the right to be safe while the rest of the world burns outside their gilded walls.
Do they have any idea of the pain and suffering they cause? Any idea of the horrors their legacy is built upon? I wonder if women like me are merely commodities to them, but I guess I already know the answer to that.
