Thirty-eight
The other night dear, as I lay sleeping
I dreamt I held you in my arms
James’s voice filters into the black hole I’m lying in like fine, powdered snow, and settles in drifts in the corners of my mind.
When I awoke, dear, I was mistaken
So I hung my head and cried.
The drifts get bigger, taller, until they’re high enough for me to climb out of the blackness. When I finally come to, I’m in a soft bed and someone has dimmed the lights, or maybe it’s nighttime, because my retinas don’t burst into flame when I open my eyes.
My head hurts so bad, it might kill me.
As soon as my eyes are shut again and the headache dims a little, I become aware of other things. Unfamiliar things like the cool, sterile air and crisp cotton sheets. Nice things like my brother’s hands clutching one of mine and his soft hair brushing my wrist. Horrid, painful things like my burning throat and the million shards of glass stabbing my left hip. When I shift and whatever I’m wearing brushes against those shards, I wish whoever saved me from my father would’ve let me die.
My bed moves ever so slightly in a rhythmic pattern as familiar to me as breathing. James’s breathing. I slide my fingers from his hand and comb them through his hair. He stirs, rubs his cheek into my palm, and blinks up at me. “Hey.”
“Hey.”
This might be the worst I’ve ever seen him look. Eyes red-rimmed with circles so dark they could be bruises. Stubbly beard. Hair a grimy mess. When I force myself to meet his gaze, everything that’s happened between us these last few days doesn’t matter anymore.
The last tiny thread of sanity I’ve managed to hold onto snaps.
James climbs onto my bed and holds me like he’s done hundreds of times while I sob into his chest. The whole story spills out of me in ragged gasps that probably don’t make any sense to him but I try anyway. Lasagna. The leather belt. The pot handle sticking out over the edge of the stove…
When I’ve cried myself into exhaustion, he scoots closer, slips his arm around my shoulders, and awkwardly nestles my body against his. Maybe he knows how badly my hip hurts, because he’s careful to keep the heavy hospital sheet off that side of my body.
“So…Dad’s in jail.” There is zero happiness in his voice, even though we’ve spent most of our lives waiting for this to happen. “We’re finally free.”
He blows out a breath that borders on a sob. It takes him a moment to be able to look at me again, and when he does, a single fat tear rolls down his cheek. My heart breaks. I reach up to cup his face in my hand, blocking out as much of the pain as I can so my arm doesn’t tremble.
“James,” I say softly. “I’m okay. We’re okay.”
He shakes his head and rests his forehead against mine. “This is all my fault. If I wasn’t being such an asshole about everything, I could’ve stopped him.”
I don’t see how, though my mind flashes to the gun hidden on the top shelf of our closet. Not even Sam could’ve stopped this.
Sam. My heart aches just thinking about how he must be feeling right now. If he even knows. I squint at the windows. “What time is it?”
“It’s quarter past eight.”
Then he doesn’t know. I’m contemplating stealing James’s cell phone and lying about having to use the restroom when a nurse slips into the room and gives James a meaningful look.
“How about you go down to the cafeteria and get a cup of coffee?” she says. “I’d like to talk to your sister alone for a few minutes.”
For a second, I think he’ll say no. He holds my gaze, his eyes screaming just how badly he doesn’t want to leave me alone, but then he gives in and slides off my bed.
I lie there silently, watching her leaf through my chart as James trudges out of my room. When his footsteps fade away and the elevator at the end of the hallway slides shut, she closes my chart and gives me a concerned look.
“How are you feeling?”
I manage a weak smile. “Everything hurts.”
“I’ll bet it does. Give yourself a few days and you’ll feel good as new.”
She smiles and shifts her weight from one foot to the other, but the smile doesn’t reach her eyes. I know exactly what that smile means. No way am I spilling my secrets to this woman when I’ve got a headache the size of Alaska and my throat feels like I swallowed an entire desert. Closing my eyes, I wish for the nurse to leave and James to take extra long getting coffee so I can pass out.
“Sarah?”
I ignore her.
“I know you can hear me and you don’t have to answer, but if you need to talk to someone about what’s been going on at home…”
The nurse hesitates. I can feel her body heat and concern, thick like too-sweet honey, hovering beside my bed. When I don’t acknowledge her offer, she sets something on my lap. “Both the police and Child Protective Services will be by in the morning. Press the call button if you change your mind about talking to someone before then. I’ll listen.”
The only person I want to see right now is Liz—a startling realization, but not even my discomfort changes how I feel. I want her warm hugs and her shoulder to cry on. I want her to tell me she loves me and that everything will be okay.
I want a mother.
I wait until the nurse’s footsteps have faded before opening my eyes, just in case. On my lap sits a pile of colorful pamphlets. The one on top is for a crisis center a few blocks from the hospital. Abuse Victim Services it says in bright yellow and purple graphics. Frowning, I stuff that one under the bottom of the pile. The next, printed on a far less colorful piece of paper, Abortion Clinics in Oregon.
What the heck?
But then I keep reading. Suicide Awareness, Coping with an Unwanted Pregnancy, Gray Haven Home for Battered Teens… By the time I get to the fourth pamphlet, Incest and Pregnancy: Know Your Options, I’ve figured out what’s going on and the world drops out from under me.
They think my father raped me. Maybe more than once since, if they gave me an internal exam, the doctor would know I’m not a virgin. And James would’ve told them I’ve never had a boyfriend if they bothered to ask.
A few minutes later, James walks back in with a paper coffee cup in each hand. I stuff the pamphlets under my sheets and wipe away the tears that started falling again. If it’s even possible, he looks worse than before he left for the cafeteria. My eyes linger on his sad face, his broad shoulders hunched in defeat beneath his thin white t-shirt.
When he hands me the second cup of coffee and flops into the plastic chair beside the bed, my heart breaks all over again. He’s been crying, not that anyone else would be able to tell. I touch his arm—the best I can do without moving too much—and try to look reassuring.
“We’ll be okay,” I say.
He nods and stares at my fingers tracing circles on his bicep. “I’ve gotta convince them not to take you away from me. I can’t lose you. I won’t.”
His eyes get watery and he takes a big gulp of coffee to keep himself under control. Guilt tears me apart from the inside out when I think of Sam and what I promised. Even if CPS doesn’t toss me into foster care for the next five months, one way or the other, James will lose me. I’ll break the promise I made to him when we were little, back before I knew what it meant to grow up and fall in love and want to be with someone other than your brother.
I shouldn’t feel guilty about wanting a normal life.
Except…watching him fall apart, giving up on his coffee and burying his face in my stomach when he finally breaks down, I’m not sure I’ll be strong enough to choose Sam if I’m forced to pick between him and my brother.