Rem

Pretty sure I couldn’t douse a kid in turpentine.

I plunked Mellie into the tub instead, drummed up some bubbles, and debated getting the paint stripper to peel the not-so-temporary tattoos off my niece.

Mellie giggled and picked at the blue stain under her fingernails. She waved her hands at me and sighed.

“Mess. Mess. Mess.”

“You said it.” I filled a Tupperware container with water and tipped it over her head. “Look out. Tidal wave.”

Mellie puffed her cheeks and held her breath while the water dumped over her hair.

Green hair. Red hair. Yellow hair.

I’d inadvertently tie-dyed the kid. The courts probably wouldn’t want the girl showing up in any color but their normal hue.

Mellie didn’t care. She pinched both her nose and the nose of her favorite tub buddy. The toy needed to be stuffed down the drain. Bath-time Barbie was becoming Black-Mold Barbie. CPS wouldn’t like that either.

I’d get her a new one if she went back to Em’s.

When.

When she went back to Em’s.

The thought weighed me down so heavy I worried about leaning over the water. Already felt like I was drowning. Guilt. Hope. Rage. Resignation.

God, I was a bastard. I should have been thrilled. Emma had recovered. She’d stayed sober for three months. That was a fucking amazing accomplishment—something the girls could be proud of.

Wished I had that much to offer them. All I could do was dump some water over their heads with a beat-up Tupperware container.

“Tidal wave!” I teetered the container in my hand. “Whoa!”

Mellie scrunched up. Unfortunately, she wanted to protect Barbie’s nose and forgot about her own. She sucked in a breath just as the water passed over her face. Her laughter turned to coughs, and she hacked up half of the water.

“Uh-oh.” I waited while she sputtered. “Are you okay?”

She shook her head.

“Just water up your nose?”

The coughing subsided. “Yeah.”

“Good.”

I dumped another container of bathwater over her with a splash. Mellie giggled, kicking in the tub and creating more multi-colored bubbles.

“Uncle Rem!”

“What?” Another waterfall. “I thought you liked…tidal waves.”

She laughed. “Stop!”

“Don’t you want to get clean?”

Another splatter. She splashed me back. “No fair!”

“Nothing’s fair during…tidal wave!” Two dunks this time. “You just gotta hold your nose.”

Another splash. Mellie practically dissolved into giggles. A giggle would have been easier to clean. Getting the paint off her body was a goddamned Herculean task.

Tabby shouted from the living room. Soon, the bathroom door burst open and she toddled inside, muttering a furious story of babble and gibberish under her breath. Cassie followed.

And reluctantly spoke to me.

“Tabby wanted to see what the commotion was.”

“Bath!” Tabby pointed excitedly at the tub. “Bath!”

Sure. Two and a half weeks ago, the kids were allergic to water. I bargained with a one-year-old, selling my soul to get her butt to stay put in the tub with a bribe of chocolate. My range of talents now included hunting, tracking, carpentry, and protecting a candy bar from some shampoo.

“You’ll get a bath later.” I poked her chubby belly. “Right now, your sister looks like a Picasso.”

“Pikachu?” Mellie gasped.

“Sure.” I dunked another ladle of water over her. “Give me an arm, Mellie. I gotta scrub you down.”

Mellie scrunched up her nose. “I like it.”

So did I, until I realized no one else in the library thought the paint tattoos were as adorable as me.

“Well, we gotta get you clean.”

“Why?”

I glanced at Cassie. She was no help. Then again, I’d blindsided her with the court date. At least she wouldn’t get angry around the kids. Hopefully Mellie would have a nightmare tonight and sleep in our bed. Cassi wouldn’t suffocate me with a pillow in sight of the kids.

“Tomorrow…” I swallowed. The words were harder to spit out than I thought. “You get to see Mommy.”

Mellie leapt to her feet. Half of the water surged out of the tub and onto me and the clean towels I’d set out for her. She made a break for it, but the excited dance slowed her down. I plunked her into the tub while she squealed.

“Mommy!” She celebrated by kicking her feet and knocking every shampoo and soap into the bath with her. Everything, including me and the towels and the water and the soaps, tinted a strange shade of blue. “I miss Mommy!”

Tabby pounced in the puddles, unsure of the cause for such excitement but pleased by the mess at her feet. She stomped twice before slipping. Cassie caught her as she fell, but Tabby wiggled enough so she could sit in the dampness and slap it with her hands.

“Okay, so we gotta scrub you down and get you clean,” I said. “Sound good?”

“Yep!”

A half-hour and two drained and re-filled tubs later, the kid was still shaded like monopoly money, but she seemed essentially cleaned. Good enough for court.

She buzzed around the cabin with a doll, letting Tabby toddle behind, and we set to making dinner.

Silently.

Cassi hadn’t spoken. Hadn’t really looked at me.

I knew it was coming. I braced myself for it.

What was I supposed to say?

She tossed some chicken in the oven, but she lowered the knife to the cutting board halfway through the broccoli. That was fine. Mellie had an aversion to green. After today, I shared it.

“When were you going to tell me?” Cassi stared at the counter. “Was I just going to wake up one day and assume the toddlers had moved out?”

“Would it have worked?”

“Don’t you dare joke about this.”

Fair enough. “What do you want me to say?”

“How about…the kids’ court case is on Thursday, and we should get ready for it?”

“Topic never came up.”

A lame excuse. Cassi knew it. She thumped her hand on the counter and gave her fingernails a rat-a-tat-tat against the wooden cutting board. Probably would have been smart to move the chef’s knife away from her.

“You lied to me,” she said.

“You didn’t ask.”

“Don’t play that game, Rem,” Cassi said. “You didn’t tell me—deliberately. Why?”

Because since the minute my life got babyjacked, I’d been wondering when I’d be on my own again.

Counting days. Estimating the time.

Letting the little ankle-biters get under my skin and into my heart.

“I never thought Emma would recover.” The truth hurt. “Now she has, and she has a right to take them home. I didn’t want you to worry about the custody issue.”

“You should have told me.”

“Probably.”

Her voice hardened. “No. You should have told me.”

“Yeah.”

Cassi exhaled. “Think she’s ready to take them back?”

I had no idea. It had taken me a hell of a lot longer to kick my additions—and I had to run a lot farther away to avoid the temptations. But Emma did her rehab. She passed the blood and piss tests. She was sober when I’d talked to her. What else was there to discuss?

“That’s not my decision,” I said.

“But you know your sister.”

“I’m not a judge.”

“Rem.”

The cabin suddenly felt far too small for a conversation this huge. “It’s not up to me. I’m not CPS. Christ, I’m not their father.”

“Do you want to be?”

I snorted, hand running through my hair, trying to find the closest exit, closest highway, closest anywhere that wasn’t my not-so-isolated mountain. “Just stop, Cas. I’m not going there.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s a stupid fucking question.”

She straightened, her lips puffing into a kissable pout. “Excuse me?”

“You really think those kids are any better here with me than they are with their mother?”

She didn’t blink. “Yes. I do.”

Christ, she was naïve. How hadn’t I seen it before? “Cas, you’re smarter than that.”

“So now I’m stupid too?”

“I’m not a good guardian to these girls, and you know it.”

“Why not?”

“Do you need a reason besides the gallon of paint that’ll be clogging my septic system? Don’t be polite. Don’t play pretend. Don’t bullshit me. I’m a terrible uncle, a shit parent, and everyone in this town is right about me.”

“I can’t believe you’re letting them get into your head.”

“Jesus. Look at the kids. Listen to the kids. They’re swearing. They’re getting in trouble. Mellie wants to emulate me. What sort of three-year-old wants tattoos?”

“She doesn’t want tattoos,” Cassi said. “She wants to be like you.”

“And that’s the problem. I am the worst example for these kids. Always have been, always will be.”

“You said you’ve changed.”

“Do you think that’ll matter when they’re old enough to know the kind of man their uncle is? When they hear the stories? Realize he’s got the same problems, the same tendencies as their mother? When they realize it’s because of me that their name is continuously dragged through the mud?”

“You’re their family.” Cassi tried to take my hand. I didn’t let her close. “You can’t change family, believe me. But there is nothing stronger in this world. Even when they punch holes through the walls with each other’s heads. Even when there’s no room in the house to take care of a family member who’s been seriously wounded. Families make it work.”

Yeah. Some of them.

Families like the Paynes, which, until five years ago, had been a model family. They’d loved each other. They’d cared for each other. And they’d taken in kids like me to share that wealth of warmth and comfort and support. Nothing was more important than protecting that goodness.

And that’s why I didn’t belong anywhere near it.

I didn’t recognize the catch in my voice. “They deserve a better family than me.”

“Why?” Her question turned plea. “Rem, why are you treating yourself like this? Don’t let what my brothers or the Sherriff say change how you feel about those girls. You aren’t a terrible person. Five years ago, you were wild, a bad boy with a bad reputation who liked trouble. Now?” She moved before me, her hands on my chest. “Now you’re a good man who is hurting. You don’t want the girls to go.”

“Cassi, for Christ’s sake, I can’t even take care of them by myself. I need you here to help.”

“There’s nothing wrong in asking for help…” Her words softened. “Just like there’s nothing wrong in loving them.”

“And that’s why I want what’s best for them. Emma’s recovered. She wants her family, a family I don’t want to ruin…and don’t look at me all doe-eyed. You know who I am—who I really am.”

Cassi whipped from zero-to-pissed-off in the time it took to pull her hair into a ponytail.

Dinner was forgotten. The fight had only just begun.

“Yeah, I know you,” she said. “You’re the one who broke my heart five years ago because you were too scared to take responsibility for your life and your decisions.”

“No. I left because I was afraid I’d ruin you, your life, and your family if I stayed. I would have destroyed your future…same as I’ll destroy Mellie and Tabby’s.”

Cassi huffed. “So that’s it then. You aren’t even going to try?”

“They’re not my kids.”

“They’re still your family. And if you have any doubt in your mind that Emma—”

“There’s none. Emma is fine. Better than fine. I talked to her. I talked to her sponsor. She’s clean. She’s sober. She’s got her life back on track.”

“So then what?”

What else was there? “What do you mean?”

“When they go home?” Cassi narrowed her eyes. “What will you do?”

“What should I do?” I extended my arms. “I gave them food and a roof over their head.”

“You gave them more than that.”

“Yeah, a new colorful vocabulary and potential lead poisoning from that paint.”

Cassi raged but her voice stayed even, trying not to alarm the kids. I didn’t have the same tact.

“You know you did more for those little girls than that. Will you visit them?”

What the hell did it matter? The less they saw of me, the better they’d be. “I’ll send gifts. See them at the holidays. Doesn’t matter.”

“I can’t believe you.” She nearly laughed. “You don’t even want to be a part of their life?”

I never said that.

But I knew it was the right thing to do.

“You’re running again, aren’t you?” Cassi stared at me, her voice weakening. “You’re not even going to try. I thought you were better than that.”

“I’m not.”

“Why?”

She wanted the truth?

Fine.

She’d pulled it from me, tortured me with my own guilt. If she wanted to know why I was such a fucking bastard, then I’d tell her.

We’d see if she still felt the same way after.

“I’m the one who got Emma hooked on the junk.”

Cassi’s breath escaped in a slight oh.

She quieted, staring at me with that look of utter mortification I knew I’d have to face sometime.

Why bother sugarcoating it?

Why bother hiding it?

It wasn’t the worst thing I’d done, and it wasn’t the worst secret I’d kept. But it revealed too much to the woman who’d so foolishly trusted me.

“It was my needle,” I said. “I came home four years ago for your mother’s funeral. I hid in the back. I didn’t talk to anyone. Didn’t try to find you or your brothers. But I had to pay my respects to the woman who was like a second mother to me. And the only way I could face this town or your family or that woman who didn’t deserve to be in that casket was if I broke my own damn sobriety. So I did. And Emma…”

I’d been too stoned to even realize what had happened.

“I didn’t know Emma would take it,” I said. “And I didn’t know she was pregnant.”

“Rem…”

“She found my stash at her house while I crashed on her couch. And she got pissed. Raged at me. She took it away. I thought she was trying to get me clean, but I was pissed. I hated what I’d become. How weak I was. I knew better than to go near an Oxy addict with that shit, but…”

Cassi sunk against the counter, her words a whisper. “Rem, it’s not your fault.”

“Of course it is.” I glanced to the kids. “That’s why I had to take the girls. It was my fault their mother got as bad as she did. I had to do something to make up for the past.”

“Then stay with them. Be a part of their lives. Just love them, Rem. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

But nothing I ever did would be right for those kids.

I knew it. The Paynes knew it. The town knew it.

Cassi was the only one who couldn’t see it.

So I knew what had to be done. To protect them. To protect her.

Cassi deserved the truth. All of it. Why I ran. What I’d done. Who I’d protected.

Even if it hurt everyone and destroyed everything.

A lie spared her pain.

The truth would be unforgivable.

And both would forever deny me the woman I loved.