Chapter Twenty-Eight
Avery
At home that evening, my heart was still racing from the incident at lunch. As I stirred the pot of noodles, squashing them down with the spatula to see if they were soft yet, my hands were shaking so bad, I could barely hold onto the utensil.
“Hey, bug, What’cha cooking?” Mom asked, entering the kitchen.
She had no idea about the fight at school. Parents of the kids involved in trouble were supposed to be told via phone call of what happened, but since Mom didn’t have a phone, I’d gotten a letter instead that she had to sign. The principal believed me when I said I hadn’t started the fight, but it was still procedure anyway so the parents were informed.
“I looked up cheap ways to make Ramen noodles fancier,” I said, being sure not to look at her. She’d see my swollen lip and scraped chin if I did.
Mom knew me too well, though, and she gently turned me around to face her. Seeing me, her face scrunched and her eyes watered.
“What happened?” she asked, going into Mama Bear mode. “Do I need to go to that school and give some evil child a piece of my mind?”
So, I told her everything. I considered leaving out the details that involved her, but she needed to know the full truth, especially since David had threatened her. Whether he’d act on that threat, I didn’t know, but I didn’t want to take that chance.
She started crying before I finished, and it was as if someone took a hot branding iron and jabbed it into my heart. There was a lot I could handle, but seeing my momma cry wasn’t one of them.
“Mom, I’m okay. Everything’s okay,” I said, hugging her and moving my fingers through her hair like she did to me when I was upset.
“I’m sorry, Avery,” she cried into my shoulder. “I’m not proud of what I do, and if I could leave it for something better, I would.”
“Don’t go in tonight,” I said, holding her close. “We’ll figure something out and get by somehow, but I don’t want you goin’ back.”
I’d start visiting every store, fast-food place, and restaurant; anywhere and everywhere I could. I’d been going around to places once a week seeing if they were hiring, but I’d bump it up to every freaking day. Maverick had driven me around lately when I’d done it, and I was certain he wouldn’t mind taking me.
“I have to go to work,” she said, stepping back. “We can’t fall behind on rent. Same with utility bills and groceries. It’s just not an option, bug.”
The discussion ended after that, and she went to take a shower and get ready for work. I focused back on the pot of noodles and added in the chicken flavoring as well as some cheese before switching the heat to simmer. I waited until I heard the hairdryer shut off before going and knocking on Mom’s door to tell her it was ready.
Then, I went to mine and Declan’s room.
He was sitting on his bed, doing homework, and glanced up at me. “Yeah?”
“Dinner’s ready,” I said.
When I didn’t leave the room, a hateful expression crossed his face. “Is there something else you want?”
“Yeah,” I said with the same amount of snap he’d used. “I want you to sit with me and mom and have dinner together like a normal freaking family.”
Without another word, I stormed out of the room. I’d had a crappy day and the last thing I needed was to get attitude from my baby brother. Back in the kitchen, I grabbed some bowls from the cabinet and filled them with the cheesy noodles. I placed a slice of bread on top of each one before carrying them to the table.
Mom sat down, wearing a simple sweater and jeans. Her makeup was really heavy, giving her that nightlife look most guys loved: the long, fake lashes, thick liner, and dark eyeshadow. She’d wait until she got to the club to finish the getup of hardly-anything-there clothes and bright red lipstick.
“This looks great,” she said, smiling at me. “Is D going to eat with us? I’d love to have both my boys at the table.”
Declan rounded the corner and plopped down in his chair. He looked at the food before scoffing. “What the heck is this supposed to be?”
“Declan Michael Kinkead, you will not insult your brother like that,” Mom chastised him. “If you don’t like what he cooked, then maybe you should learn how to cook and make the next meal yourself.”
“Sorry, Mom,” Declan said, looking down at the bowl. He had no problem being a jerk to me, but he would never be one to her.
Luckily, we got through the rest of the meal without any more hostility. We made small talk about how school was going, and that was about it. Declan noticed my face, but he didn’t ask about it. I doubt he cared.
The days when we used to walk home from school, laughing and talking about our days seemed like forever ago. It’d been back before I’d somehow pissed him off and made him hate me.
“I don’t hate you,” he had said weeks ago when I’d confronted him about his attitude. “A better question is why the hell do you hate yourself so much?”
I didn’t know what he meant by that, and once Mom left for work, I was going to finally ask him. He had other ideas, however, and distracted me. Right after Mom left, Declan gave me a smartass look.
“What happened to your face?” he asked without an ounce of sympathy.
“I fell,” I answered, not wanting to get into it. I rinsed out the bowls from dinner before grabbing the pot I’d cooked the noodles in.
“I’m surprised your meathead boyfriend didn’t catch you like the damsel you are.”
“Don’t talk about Mav like that,” I snapped, tossing the pan into the sink. “You don’t know him. And quite frankly, you don’t know me either. It seems he’s the only one who does.”
Declan’s expression turned mocking. “Ah, my name’s Avery and no one understands me. I’m so alone in the world. Boo hoo. Go cry me a damn river and then go drown in it.”
I flinched at the amount of venom in his voice.
I felt like crying, but I didn’t want to give him that power. Having someone I basically helped raise—someone I took care of, helped with his homework, put him to bed, held him when he cried and was scared—treat me like I was the dirt under his shoe, hurt way more than I could even process in that moment.
A tear fell anyway.
And that feeling deep inside awoke. An itch I hadn’t scratched in almost two weeks begged for attention.
There was no fighting it. The urge was not only strong, but unavoidable. Kind of like an addict who’d gone way too long without a fix, and even though they knew they shouldn’t give in to the craving, a part of them preferred the guilt of giving in to the pain of a sober mind.
Once I’d made the decision, that weird numb feeling went through me, almost like I was having an out-of-body experience. A void lingered in the pit of my stomach and I felt like I was on auto-pilot—there but not really there.
I brushed past Declan and left the kitchen. He said something from behind me, but I didn’t catch it.
Everything seemed muffled. Or maybe the fog in my brain just drowned everything out. After walking through the living room, I started heading down the narrow hall and toward the bathroom.
That’s when he grabbed me.
“Stop!” he exclaimed. His tight hold on my arm was painful, and I spun around to him. The harsh expression he’d had earlier was gone. His face was crumpled in pain; the internal kind that ate you up from the inside out. “Don’t, Avery.”
“Don’t what?” I asked, not following him. My voice sounded odd to my ears, like I was under water.
I tried pulling away from him, but he held on tighter.
“I know about the cutting,” he said with such agony in his tone that I finally started breaking through the haze in my head. “I found you that night, Avery! I woke up needing to take a piss, and when I went to the bathroom, the door was locked. So, I waited for a while, but when you never came out, I got a knife and popped the lock.”
The blood drained from my face, and my skin got a cold, prickly sensation.
“When I saw you in that tub, my heart stopped,” Declan continued. He was crying now. “I thought you were dead. I tried shaking you to wake you up, but you were like a freaking corpse, Avery. Cold and pale. I was about to scream for Mom when you groaned and moved your head a little. I didn’t want her to see you like that, so I cleaned you up as best I could and put you to bed. Then, I went and cleaned the tub.”
“D, I’m—”
“No,” he growled, squaring his jaw. “You don’t get to talk right now. I was so pissed at you. Angrier than I’ve ever been.” More tears streamed down his face, and he roughly wiped them away. “You’re the one person who’s always been there for me, Avery. Mom tries and I know she loves us, but it’s always been me and you. When I had a problem, I came to you. The nights Dad went on his violent rampages, you’re the one who held me and told me it was gonna be okay. You’re the one who jumped in the way when he tried to hurt me.”
Tears stung my eyes as he talked.
“And when I discovered your sick secret, it put all these damn thoughts in my head that I couldn’t shake.” Declan’s eyes were red around the edges, but he’d stopped crying for the most part. “I thought you were goin’ to leave me, and it pissed me off. Instead of trying to talk to you about it, I got mad. As dumb as it is, I wanted to punish you for it.”
I was speechless. Not that I didn’t have anything to say; I had too much. Most of them were excuses—like it’s not something I can stop, it makes me feel better—but maybe this was what I needed. The confrontation. A wake-up call.
“Promise me you won’t do it again,” he begged. “I don’t know if you’re doing it with the intention to kill yourself, or if you’ll accidentally go too far one time, but I can’t lose you, Avery.”
“I’m not trying to kill myself,” I said, giving him the most honest answer I could. “There are just times when I get too overwhelmed, and it helps me release it all. Like there’s all these voices in my head and the only way to get them to quiet is by doing that.”
It was hard to grasp that I was actually talking to someone about my cutting. No one had ever known before Declan, and something about finally getting it all off my chest made me feel… invigorated. The itch to cut was also lessened.
“Can you do me a favor?” Declan asked. “When the voices get too loud and you think you’re gonna hurt yourself… will you talk to me instead?”
“I will,” I said, hoping it wasn’t a lie. I’d try to stop: if not for myself than for my little brother. “Sorry you had to see me like that. You know… that night.”
Declan looked away. “It’s in the past.”
If only everything could be so simple.
***
Clackity. Clickety. Clack. I tuned into the rhythm of the train on the rail. The rhythmic sound stopped only briefly before finding another gap in the track and continuing its beat. And then the whistle—three short wails in the air.
I sat back from my usual place on the grass as the train passed. No, it wasn’t just my spot anymore; it was Mav’s too. Maybe that’s why I’d gone out there that night.
I missed him.
Not to be melodramatic, but I hadn’t talked to him much since all of that crap happened Wednesday. On Thursday, I’d reverted back to my aloof self and had barely said two words to him that morning. He’d walked me to biology, and we’d taken our exam—which I think I passed. At lunch, we had made small talk, but we never brought up what happened with that David guy. Even Ricky and Travis stayed quiet about it, and by the looks they got from Maverick, I assumed that was why.
I didn’t go to school Friday. Since it was a free day in basically all the classes, I didn’t see a point… and I might’ve been avoiding everyone.
Maverick had more shows for Beauty and the Beast Friday and Saturday night, which I had attended because there was no way I was missing them. But apart from me helping him a bit between scenes and the—sort of awkward—kiss on the cheek when he dropped me off at home, not much was said between us.
Now it’s Monday night, and I haven’t seen him in days.
We were on Thanksgiving break so we didn’t have school for a week.
I audibly exhaled and stretched out my legs. The train had passed, and not even its horn could be heard in the distance anymore. Everything was silent, as it normally was that time of night. My eyes had mostly adjusted to the dark, but I couldn’t see too far ahead of me due to the lack of light.
Just dark shapes and the tree line. The opening above me allowed some of the moon’s light to shine down, but clouds drifting across the sky occasionally blocked that too.
Snuggling more into my hoodie, I tried to block out the chill of late fall. The ground was cold under my butt, and I shifted around. The lack of meat on my bones was a huge downfall in those situations. It was probably a bad idea to keep coming out there so late, now that the colder weather was coming in, but I couldn’t stay away for long.
Snap.
I flipped around at the sound, searching the darkness for whatever had caused it. Something was ambling toward me—clumsily. I smiled, knowing exactly who it was.
“Avery?” Maverick called. “If you’re over there, please say something. I can’t see well, and I see a black mass sitting near your spot, and if it’s not you, then I’m gonna run like hell back to my car.”
I hadn’t even heard him drive up—or seen his headlights. I must’ve been zoning way more than I realized.
“Oh look, Vladimir,” I said in my best vampiric accent. “Fresh vlood has vandered into our den.”
Maverick’s steps halted. “Um, what?”
“Hear his heartbeat?” I continued like the evil spawn of evil I was. “The vlood that runs through his veins.”
I picked up a stick and tossed it his way, and the scream of horror that followed had me laughing so hard, I cried.
“Dammit, Avery! I almost pissed myself.”
And that, of course, made me laugh harder until I was on my side on the ground with tears streaming down my face.
He slipped his arms under mine and brought me to a sitting position as he plopped down on the grass. As his warmth enclosed me, the giggles stopped, and I turned my face into his neck. God, he smelled good.
I hadn’t realized how much I needed his arms around me until that moment. It was as if all the stress and anxiety fled at his embrace, like light chasing away the dark.
“Did I do something to push you away?” he asked against my ear.
“No,” I answered, looking up at him. It was hard to see his expression, but by the sadness in his voice, I had a good picture of what it probably looked like. “I’m not sure why I’ve been acting so weird. I think a big part of it is I’m ashamed.”
“Of what?” he asked, tightening his hold on me as if he were afraid I was about to bolt. Taking into consideration my history of doing such things, I couldn’t blame him. “So what if your mom works at a strip club. I mean, she deserves way better than that and I’m sure it upsets you that she does. But I don’t think badly of her for doing what she needs to do to get by.” He pressed his cheek to mine. “I love you, Avery, and I’m not going anywhere.”
I didn’t know whether to smile or cry. It was the first time he’d actually come out and said the words, instead of skirting around it.
“You can’t love me, Mav,” I said, despising myself for bringing down the mood. “You don’t even know the real me.”
“Then, show me the real you.” His arms were like barricades around me. “Please.”
Maybe it was because it was dark and I couldn’t fully see his face, but I decided it was now or never. I just hoped he still wanted me when it was over.