Sparky
I left the club last night with Cas out of it in his old room. He needs us even more these days and we’ll be there for him. I wasn’t surprised to get a call from a prospect in the night to say he had left to go home. So now I’m riding out to his place to check on him. I hear bits from Bonnie that her and Alannah have spoken about and what I’ve heard isn’t good. His bike is in his usual spot on the drive and I pull up beside it.
I cut the engine and I can hear Leo from the back yard. If he’s out back Alannah and Cas are never far. Instead of knocking on the front door, I walk around to the back and Alannah is sat on a blanket as Leo runs around. Cas is nowhere in sight.
“Sparkyyyyy…” Leo calls and I kick his ball over to him.
“It’s a little cold to be out here, isn’t it,” I say, sitting down beside her.
“It’s better than being in there,” she says, nodding towards the house.
She sounds tired and sad and I don’t like it.
“How is he?” I dare to ask.
“He’s not good. I brought his mother here last night, I thought if he would talk to her he could find some peace with his past. I was wrong, he lost it after he told her to leave.”
She doesn’t look at me as she speaks, and it makes me nervous. Alannah is a fighter, she fights for everyone and everything she loves. She’s resigned and down beaten.
“Lost it how?”
“Go in and take a look for yourself.”
I heave myself up and let myself in the back door. The house is quiet. Nothing is out of place in the kitchen. I cautiously walk through the hall to the living room and push open the door. What I’m seeing is not what I was expecting.
Every piece of furniture is turned upside down. The mirrors are smashed, the TV is face down on the floor, and the front window is broken. The only pieces still intact and where they’ve always been, are their family photos hanging on the walls.
I step fully into the room and find Cas passed out in the armchair. I backtrack to the kitchen and pour him a black coffee and take it in to him.
He doesn’t want to wake up but I’m not giving him the choice. It takes him a beat to keep his eyes open and he groans when he takes in the destruction around him.
“Where’s Lana?” he asks, clearing his throat.
“She’s out back with Leo.”
I hand him the coffee and pick the table up, I set it right and take a seat on it.
“You’re destroying your home now? I never thought I’d see the day you’d put Alannah and Leo in harm’s way.”
His head snaps up and he’s angry. He’s more than angry, he’s border line raging.
“I would never harm them,” he growls, coldly.
“Yeah, I used to believe that. But, I’m looking around and all I’m seeing is rage in your home caused by you. It would’ve scared your boy to hear you trying to destroy the place right under him.”
He briefly looks above him to Leo’s room and he sighs.
“You don’t understand…”
“Don’t I? My mom left me too, you’re not the only one. At least yours come to find you.”
He jumps up from the chair and glares at me.
“I didn’t ask her to show up.”
“Well, she’s here so deal with it, don’t do this. You’re not the guy who takes his anger out at home around his family.”
This seems to get through to him, he loses the anger and sits back down.
“She gave birth to me alone and in a basement.”
“The only change about your past is now you know it, it doesn’t change who you are.”
“I don’t need a pep talk, Sparks…”
“What do you need?”
“For everything to go back to normal.”
“So, get showered and freshen up and we’ll get back to business.”
While he drains his coffee, I make a start picking up the furniture and what isn’t broken, I set right.
“Leave it, it’s my mess. I’ll sort it out.”
“I’ll wait out back for you.”
Cas
I head downstairs feeling fresh after a shower and slip into the living room. Alannah is still out in the yard with Sparky and Leo and I make quick work of righting the furniture and dump the broken bits out on the porch. I’ll have the prospects come by and get rid of the lot.
Satisfied, I grab my smokes and keys, and head outside. Alannah and Sparky have their backs to me and I catch what they’re talking about before I make myself known.
“You went to see her?” Sparky asks her.
“I wanted to check her out and I, um, may have offered her twenty thousand dollars to leave and never come back.”
She did what? Jacqueline didn’t mention it last night and nor did my wife. Then again, women never tell the truth, I just thought my wife was different.
“Barbs,” he groans, “You shouldn’t have done that.”
Damn fucking straight she shouldn’t, what the fuck does she think she’s playing at?
I’m about to open my mouth and ask questions of my own but Sparky’s next question stops me.
“Where did you even get that kind of money from? I know you’re not stupid enough to pay her off with Cas’s money.”
“It was from my own stash, and it would’ve been worth every penny if it meant Cas…”
“If it meant I what?” I growl, stepping closer to them.
She jumps up and spins around, Sparky pulls himself to his feet and releases a long breath.
“You tried paying her off with cash from your own stash? Why do you even have that much? Did you plan on leaving me one day and thought you’d burrow away savings?”
“I’m sure that wasn’t her intention,” Sparky jumps in, defending her.
He’s always defending her. No matter what has happened or what she has done, he jumps straight to her defence.
“This is between me and my wife,” I warn my brother and he holds his hands up in surrender.
He spins on his heels and heads for the side gate and disappears out of sight.
“Why would you hide so much money from me? I married you because you were the one woman who was always straight up with me, you think because you have my ring on your finger, you can start hiding shit from me and go behind my back?”
I’m trying to keep my voice down and keep this fight from Leo’s ears but it’s fucking hard.
“Don’t you dare spin this on me, none of this is my fault. I’ve always been up front with you.”
I snort, “Just not with your money, which is my money unless you’ve got yourself a secret job you’ve kept from me. Do you, babe? Do you have a secret job?”
“Cas, stop this. You know I don’t have a job, you know everything…”
“I’m trying to get to the truth, apparently, I don’t know everything. Why are you keeping shit from me?” I yell, and she steps back.
She doesn’t stop moving, she goes over to Leo and swings him up into her arms. She brushes past me, saying nothing, and storms into the house leaving me and my rage alone.
I don’t bother following her inside. If she wants to keep hiding shit from me, she can do it in the open when I’m not here.
Sparky is already on his bike, waiting for me. Wisely, his mouth remains shut and I climb on my bike as the front door slams open.
“Fuck you, Cas,” she screams, and it starts raining hundred-dollar bills. She throws a second wad of cash and then a third. Scattered around us is the twenty thousand dollars she had to pay off Jacqueline I imagine.
“There, have your fucking money.”
I bite my tongue and watch her walk inside and slam the door with as much gust as she has.
I stare at the house, but she doesn’t come back out. The cash lays on the ground, every bill I look at, I wonder why she didn’t take it and flee.
“I don’t think she’s coming back out, do you wanna hand picking it up?”
I look to my brother and while twenty thousand dollars is a lot of money to blow away in the wind, I couldn’t give a fuck about it.
“Fuck the cash.”
“Fuck the cash? Cas, this isn’t a few bills…”
“It’s money I didn’t know I had,” I shrug, “Are we going or not?”
I ignore his raised eyebrow and bring my bike to my life. Too much is starting to get to me and I don’t like it one bit.
Alannah has never hidden anything from me before and it turns out, she has been the whole fucking time.