They have their shit together.
A knock on my window has me rolling it down. I greet Noah’s teacher.
“Hi.” I’m embarrassed by my appearance. I try and tuck some of my wide curls behind my ears to make myself more presentable, but I know it’s pointless. Her three-second assessment of my state tells me so.
“Just wanted to remind you that it’s Noah’s turn to bring a treat to school this Friday.”
“Thank you, I’ll make sure he’s got something good. Maybe a little less sugary?”
She smiles. “That’s always appreciated.”
“How many in the class?”
Apparently, that’s the wrong question, because she looks at me accusingly.
A horn blares behind us, and I startle at the sound.
“Seventeen,” she answers in a sympathetic tone.
“Thank you.” I look past her as anger simmers; I’m over her judgment. “Have a good day, buddy.”
“Bye!” he says, already in tune with two of his classmates running toward him.
On the way home, I make a mental list of goals that I want to accomplish today. Yesterday was a breaking point for me, and I no longer want to live my life being a survivor. Noah’s reaction and Gavin’s avoidance have slapped me back into my present. The idea of getting my hair done occurs to me as I make my way home. Maybe a little pampering is exactly what I need. It’s an effort, and I can only hope feeling better on the outside may stir up what I need to bridge the intimacy gap between Gavin and me.
When I pull up to the drive, I see a car I don’t recognize parked in front of my house. I pray it’s not another reporter. The calls have mostly died down in the last two months, but the threat still remains as long as we haven’t agreed to any interviews. Briggs hasn’t agreed to any either, as far as I know.
No one is on the front porch, which raises my suspicions. Typically, this would scare me, but as I study the truck with Texas plates, a little hope sparks inside of me. That hope is dashed as I walk down the small grass alley between our house and the neighbors’ and spot a woman on my back porch, peering through our window.
“Excuse me,” I snap. “Can I ask what the hell you’re doing here?”
The woman freezes before she turns in my direction.
The instant I recognize her, all the blood drains from my face. In her eyes, I see her loss mixed with a hint of anger.
Alicia Mullins looks me over before the loss wins out, and an uncontrollable sob escapes her.
“I came to ask you what happened to my daughter, Katy.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Katy
“Jesus, Katy. What the hell?”
The room starts spinning as Sammy slips an arm behind my back, hoisting me up to a sitting position on the floor of my closet. Instantly, my stomach revolts. Hot lava burns its way up my esophagus to the back of my throat.
“Toilet!” Sammy shouts, giving me a shove.
I leave a trail of vomit the whole way, unable to stop the violent eruption once it starts. While my sister holds my hair, I purge every drop of liquor and then some before resting the side of my face on the cold porcelain. I can’t even allow myself to think of how disgusting it is to have my cheek pressed to the toilet seat because right now, it feels too damn good.
“You text me begging for a girls’ day, so I knock off work and drive over to find you like this?”
Everything inside me starts to crumble as I recall my earlier conversation with Mullins’s mom.
Her weepy eyes find mine as she asks the question I’ve been dreading since the shock of her sudden arrival. She’s driven nearly three hours, from Arlington, to ask me this question. Guilt, fear, and a hundred other emotions race through me as I join her on the swing Gavin installed for me.
“What happened?”
Her presence only makes what happened more real. I haven’t visited her because I wasn’t prepared, and by the way I’m feeling, I never will be.
“Alicia,” I whisper mournfully, “she was hurt really bad after the explosion. Those injuries were grave.”
I’m hoping for cloudy skies.
The clear image of Mullins on her knees, visibly shaking, with that monster above her, has me reeling. Her mother studies me with red-rimmed eyes.
“Did she suffer?”
“Not long,” I say, without adding more detail. I can’t do this, and I know I can’t, but I’m being cornered, and there’s no way around it.
“I’m so sorry I missed the memorial.” She jerks her chin, dismissing my apology. She’s not interested in that. She came for answers.
“Katy, please tell me about my Jessica. I can’t keep wondering about how my daughter died.”
Biting my lips, tears come easily as I think about my best friend, about the way she looked at me, giving me permission to end her life to save my own. I’ve avoided this for so long, and that avoidance was countering a destructive tidal wave. Alicia takes my hand in hers. “Mija, take your time, but please tell me.”
Mija. Daughter. She’s calling me her daughter. I know little Spanish, but I do know that term of endearment. With no idea on how to navigate the horrific way she left his world, I decide to answer the questions she asks as honestly as I can. It’s not until sometime later that I realize I’m having a panic attack right in front of her. She consoles me until we’re both sobbing on the back porch. Alicia leaves a little more enlightened than when she came, but I can still see her hesitation to go as she waves at me from the side of her truck.
“You look like hell.” My eyes move across the room to where Sammy’s standing with her arms crossed on her chest. She looks pissed.
Responding would require too much of an effort, so I merely nod and groan.
“Why are you doing this to yourself?” I try to ignore the tremor in her voice because I simply can’t handle any more guilt right now.
Shrug.
Her face turns beet red as she slinks down the wall, sitting on the other side of the commode. The woman I respect more than any other releases a sigh of defeat.
“What the hell did you survive all that shit for, if you were just going to come home and fucking kill yourself?” She pulls her knees to her chest, hugging them close. “At least if you’d died out there, it would’ve been with some dignity.”
Her words should strike a chord, and I’m sure they will fester later. But right now, all I want is for her to go away and stop looking at me with such disappointment. I want to wallow, and for the first time since I left Germany, I want to grieve my best friend.
“Can you go?”
Sammy’s mouth gapes open. “No, I will not go. You need me.”
I shake my head. “I’m sick,” I mutter, dry heaving into the bowl.
“You’re not sick. You’re fucking drunk. My God, I didn’t realize it’d gotten this bad.”
“I’m fine.”
Her eyes narrow. “You are so far from fine.”
“Jessica’s mom visited me today.”
Sammy’s eyes bulge slightly, and I can see the understanding pass through her.
“I know that was hard, Katy, I do, but yesterday was fucking awful. And despite what you’re going through and how you’re trying to handle it on your own, you’re fucking up more than you’re actually handling anything. So, this, dear sister, is your impromptu intervention.”
I’m too dizzy for this conversation. Squinting, I try to focus on her face, to make it stop moving so I can read her expression and decipher just how angry she is with me, but it’s of no use. Between retching and the brain fog I’m in, I just can’t participate in this right now. Lifting my hand to shoo her away is a monumental task, one that only further incites her rage.
“You need to talk to someone.”
“You mean you,” I mutter. “And you don’t want to know what happened.”
“I have an idea,” she whispers, “but if you don’t want to tell me, Gavin deserves to know.”
“Fine, thanks for the advice, because there’s no shortage of that in my life. I’ll make girls’ day up to you.”
“I’m not finished with you just yet,” she snaps, jumping to her feet.