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  “I’m not trying to hold you back. I’m just trying to keep you from ending up like your mother. I just want to keep you safe. The last thing I want is to bury another person I love. And to be honest with you, it’s hard to look at you and see the person you’ve become. The last time I saw you, you were a happy, three-year-old little girl that thought the world of me. I’ve held on to that image for fourteen years, and that’s not the person that came home to us. I knew you wouldn’t be the same, but the reality is harsher than I had anticipated.”

  I looked over at the silent Link, letting him know I had enough. He took the hint and stood up, pushing the chair back with his legs. “Thanks, Jack. This has been helpful. We appreciate your time.”

  Jack tightened his grip on my hand before releasing it. “Anytime.”

  We left and drove away from the station in complete silence. I had no words. And neither did Lincoln. He took me to a deli and we sat at one of the tables in front of the building, just under the shade. I was dazed and staring off into nothingness while trying to decipher what Jack had told me. It was so strange. How he could be such an asshole one minute and then a sincere man the next.

  “You look like you’re high,” Link said from across the table, breaking me from my daze.

  I laughed. “Why do I look high?”

  “Your eyes are bloodshot and you were just staring into outer space.”

  “Ugh,” I groaned. “My eyes are bloodshot because I barely got any sleep last night.”

  “You were sleeping pretty well on me,” he teased.

  “Yeah, well, I guess I’m not very good at sleeping by myself anymore.”

  That got me thinking about Billy again, and if he had a hard time sleeping with the cold space next to him. It was going to be such a long and hard time without talking to him, but I knew it was what I needed to do. I just hoped he didn’t adapt to my absence and not want me to come back to him.

  Two women walked past our table and I heard one of them mutter, “just like her mother.”

  I jumped up and stopped them. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” one of them said.

  “You said I’m just like my mother. What does that mean?”

  The blonde, who looked to be around her mid-thirties, rolled her eyes. “That you’re just like your mother. Sitting around, clearly under some kind of influence, with a boy that’s no good. The past has a way of repeating itself.”

  My blood began to boil and Link noticed. He was by my side in a matter of seconds.

  “I’m not under the influence of anything. And Link is not ‘no good.’ You don’t fucking know about anything you’re talking about, you stupid bitch.”

  “And it’s like looking at Corinne all over again,” she said to the other woman she was with.

  Before I could say anything else, Link interjected, “You knew Corinne?”

  “We went to school together,” she answered.

  They started to walk away, done with our exchange, but Lincoln stopped them.

  “Can you tell us about her? She doesn’t know anything about her parents.”

  “She should be thankful. And maybe she should keep it that way.”

  “Please. You have to tell us something,” he pleaded.

  The blonde stopped and took in a deep breath. “She was troubled. I don’t know what else to tell you, other than she had a lot of issues. Her brother couldn’t help her, her friends couldn’t help her, no one could. That idiot she married dragged her down and took the last little bit of intelligence she had left. I really don’t know what else to tell you. But from the looks of it, your friend there is following in her footsteps.”

  “She’s had a rough life,” I heard him whisper. “Don’t judge her.”

  With that, the women walked away, talking amongst themselves.

  I looked at Link, thoughts swarming my head. “What does that even mean, Link? My parents were fuck-ups? I don’t even know how to take that.” I was lost. I felt so confused and I didn’t even know where to start.

  “I guess this just means we have to keep looking.”

  It had been a week since the revelation about my mother and her problems. I still hadn’t learned anything else. It was as if people didn’t want to talk about them. Again, I wondered why. I had just finished my first test for my GED, and then had to go to Joanne’s office immediately after. Things had been rather boring in her office. She wanted me to talk about my feelings. I didn’t really know how that would help anything.

  “You really want to know how I feel?” I asked with impatience.

  “Yes, Kendall. I really what to know what you’re feeling.”

  “I have been on my own since I was fifteen. And now I have all of these people watching over me. I fell asleep at a friend’s house and came home to Jeri and Jack waiting up for me. I’m not used to that. I was perfectly capable of taking care of myself for years before they dragged me back here. They don’t need to keep treating me like I’m still three.” I knew I was deflecting. That wasn’t what was bothering me. But I couldn’t tell her what I was really upset about.

  “Let’s talk about that. Tell me about you going from John to Billy.”

  She already knew the story. It was discovered at the station the night I was brought in, but I let her play it out. I would tell her what happened, and then she’d ask me how I felt about it. At least the hour would go by fast.

  “John hadn’t come home for three days, and I was a little worried. He had never left me alone for that long before without having Billy come and stay with me. The first day, I just thought he left before I woke up, and then came home after I went to bed. But by the end of the second day, I noticed nothing had been touched in the house. He usually had a pot of coffee every morning, and the pot that was there was still cleaned and put away from when I had done the dishes the morning before.

  “I figured he went away for the weekend and didn’t want to tell me. By the end of the third day, I was beginning to worry.” Talking about it made me think back to what it was like those few days. How scared and confused I was. How I tried to stay rational and calm but slowly felt the grip on reality loosen.

  “Why didn’t you try calling John, or Billy?”

  “We didn’t have a phone. John had a cell phone, but I was never allowed to use it. Even if I had it, I wouldn’t know how to call Billy. I didn’t know his number or how to get ahold of him. I just had to wait for John to come back.”

  “Tell me about that. What did you do to pass the time while he was gone?”

  “I was outside a lot. John had built me a room in the backyard to develop pictures in. He had given me a camera when I was twelve and taught me how to develop the film myself. He said it was a hobby he used to have when he was younger. So I spent a lot of time back there doing that. I also kept up on the house, which wasn’t much since John wasn’t there to pick up after.”

  “Did you have enough food?”

  I nodded, but decided to elaborate when a memory hit me. “I remember running out of milk. I was going to make macaroni and cheese but couldn’t because I didn’t have any milk to make it. That was the last time I cooked in that house. I ended up making it with water instead because I already had the noodles cooked and the powdered cheese mixed in.”

  “But you did have stuff to eat? And you couldn’t go to the store?”

  “No. I wasn’t allowed to. Even if I had tried, I didn’t know where it was or how to get there. Not to mention, I didn’t have any money to pay for anything.”

  “So what happened next?” she asked, looking at me and not her notepad.

  “I woke up on the fourth morning. There was this foul smell in the house I had been noticing for days but I didn’t know where it was coming from. At first, I thought I had left clothes in the washing machine, but I didn’t. It was getting worse by the day, and when I woke up on the fourth day, it was so bad it made me sick.

  “I thought maybe
it was the trash, so I took it out. And when I got to the driveway, I saw John’s truck. That meant he was home. I remember feeling relief when I saw it. That I wasn’t alone anymore. So I quickly took the trash to the side of the house and ran back inside. The coffee pot was still untouched so I figured he had been sleeping. He must’ve had a big project and that’s why he was gone. I cleaned the house from top to bottom, trying to get rid of that odor and staying quiet so I didn’t disturb John.

  “It was after two in the afternoon and he still hadn’t come out of the room yet. I decided to go check on him. Once I opened the door, the smell was worse. I gagged and covered my face with my shirt. For some reason, I thought maybe a pipe must’ve burst in his bathroom and that’s where the smell was coming from. It was awful.

  “He wasn’t in bed, and the bathroom door was open. I got closer to it and that’s when I saw him. He was lying in the middle of the bathroom floor. I almost didn’t recognize him if it weren’t for the pajamas he was wearing. They were the same ones he had worn the last time I saw him. He looked fat and his skin was gross. I had to run away before I got sick all over him.

  “The only place I could go to was my developing room out back. I threw up just after getting out the back door, but I kept going until I was safely behind the doors of my darkroom. I was terrified. I thought someone had been in the house and they’d be back for me. I didn’t want to be alone, but I couldn’t go back in the house. And I didn’t know where else to go. I didn’t know anyone else. There weren’t houses right next door like there are here.”

  “What did you do?” I almost forgot she was still there. I was lost in my head.

  “I locked myself in there and didn’t come out.”

  “For how long?”

  “I don’t know. Could’ve been hours, could’ve been days.”

  “How did you finally get out?”

  “Billy came.”

  “Why was he there?”

  “He told me later it was because he had tried to get ahold of John for days, but he never returned his calls and it worried him. So he came over to check on things. He said he smelt the odor and knew immediately something had gone horribly wrong. He found John and then went looking for me. He said he was panicked when he couldn’t find me. Then he found the door out back locked.

  “I remember hearing him bang on it really loudly, like he was trying to kick it down. He was yelling my name, but I didn’t recognize his voice. I was even more terrified. Finally. It stopped. All the banging and yelling stopped. That’s when I heard him, and knew it was him. He was whispering, ‘why, oh my God, why.’ I unlocked the door and found him kneeling on the grass in front of me. He jumped up and held me. I thought he was crying at first until I realized the cries and gasps of air were coming from me.”

  “How long did it take for him to find you?”

  “I don’t know. Everything was so confusing. I was in shock I think, and had no sense of time. I just know he grabbed a bag full of things while I waited in the room. He came and got me and rode with me on the back of his bike until we were far away.”

  “Where did he take you,” she asked.

  It was weird talking about that time. I had never really spoken of that to anyone. The police were informed of John and what happened, but I never really explained what it was like for me. I felt so emotional talking about it, like I was living those days all over again. It finally made sense why people talk about their problems. They don’t know how much feelings get bottled up inside when they keep it all in. As scary as it was to talk about it, it also felt a little liberating.

  “Back to his house. I had never been there before and didn’t exactly know where it was. I just knew I wasn’t in John’s house anymore. I also knew John was no longer there either. His body was, but he had been gone for days.”

  “When did you find out what happened to John?”

  “Billy dropped me off at his house. I didn’t want him to leave me, and he stayed for as long as he could, but he explained he had to take care of his dad. I understood that. I didn’t want him to be there alone any more than he already had been.

  “I had to promise to keep the doors locked and not go outside. I was used to it, but it felt different coming from Billy. It made me scared of what would happen if I didn’t follow the rules. I wasn’t scared of him. I still thought someone might have been after me.

  “I was alone for hours, with only my imagination. Theories flew in and out of my head. I thought maybe one of my parents had come looking for me. I didn’t know anything about them, other than John loved my mother. I thought maybe I didn’t have a dad because he was a monster and now he was after me. Then my imagination took a turn and I thought maybe it was a guy John had worked for. I didn’t exactly know what he did for a living, so it made my thoughts even crazier. I imagined him working for scary men, doing illegal things, and something went wrong. I was like that for hours—scared to death before Billy finally came back.”

  “What did he leave to do?”

  “He went back to the house and called the police.”

  “What did he tell you as to why you couldn’t be with him?”

  “He never told me why. I never asked. I didn’t want to be in that house with his body.”

  “So then what happened?”

  I sat for a moment and thought back to it. I blocked a lot of it out for so long since I didn’t like to think back to that time. It was a horrible time filled with sadness and confusion and I didn’t want to remember what that felt like. I became a stronger person after that. I wasn’t sure if it was because of what happened or because of the freedom I found with Billy. Whatever it was, I was determined to never be that person again.

  “Billy came back with more of my things. I never did have much, and the only things I cared about were my camera and pictures. He brought those with him. I found out later, much later, that he had to clear everything of mine out of the house before he called the cops. He never told me why though.” Thinking about that, and what I had learned since then, it brought up even more questions I didn’t have answers to. It felt like I was never going to know the whole truth and I’d be lost forever.

  “He called the police,” I continued. “It was days later, maybe even a week, before we found out John had died from a heart attack. Even though I knew someone wasn’t after him, it didn’t stop me from being afraid. Billy spent a lot of time comforting me when I’d allow him to. I think that’s when I started falling in love with him. In those moments in the dark, when I would cry to myself and then feel him wrap his arms around me, like he just knew. Like he could feel my sadness through the walls of the small house and he knew he had to save me.”

  “Is that when your relationship started?”

  “No. It was more than a year later before we started anything.”

  “What was it like for you for that year?”

  “Safe. I had more freedom than ever before and enjoyed being able to go out. Sometimes Billy’s friends would come over and we’d all hang out. It was the first time I was really around other people. It frightened me at first, but then I learned to enjoy the company. I took less and less pictures since I had more things to do.

  “I still did the household chores, like I had done for John. It was the only thing I felt I could do. I didn’t have a job to help Billy out around the house, and he was gone all day working. When I first got there, he had piles of clothes to be washed and it looked like he only cleaned his dishes when he ran out of clean plates.”

  She began writing on her notepad again. I hated it when she did that. But she didn’t do it for long before turning back to me. “How would you describe your relationship with Billy during that time?”

  “Friends I guess.”

  “You have a friend now, is that the kind of relationship you would call what you had with Billy for that year?”

  “Yes. We didn’t talk a whole lot like Link and I do. We mainly coexisted unless he had people over. His friends were nice to
me and I didn’t mind being around them. That was really the only times I actually hung out with Billy. Everyone thought I was his sister for a while.”

  “But you didn’t feel like his sister.” It was a statement, not a question.

  “No. I’ve never felt like he was my brother. Even when I was younger.”

  She nodded, knowing we had already discussed that. I guess she was just checking to make sure I kept with the same story. Which I was. I wasn’t lying about anything. The more I talked to Joanne, the more open I felt about discussing things with her. I didn’t even realize that’s how I felt until I started talking about how I had come to live with Billy.

  “That’s all for today, Kendall. You did really well. I’m really proud of you.”

  She dismissed me and walked me out. Jeri was in the sitting room, waiting for me.

  That night, I lay in bed, thinking of all the feelings that were brought up from my session earlier. It had been so long since I really thought about that period of my life. I didn’t like to think about it. It was the first time I had ever lost someone, and I hated that feeling.

  As I drifted off to sleep, my mind wandered to a day just after I went to live with Billy.

  I was getting dinner ready, knowing Billy would be home any minute. He was very good about getting in just after five o’clock, right after his shift ended at the auto shop in town. I had been there for a few weeks so far, and he made sure to keep a good schedule. It was easier for me to adjust that way. I didn’t know if he was doing it for that reason, or if this was the routine he had always done, even before I got there. Either way, it was nice.

  The timer on the oven beeped to let me know the chicken was done. I pulled it out and began to put the food onto two separate plates. I heard the door open and close, and then the water running in the sink in the hallway bathroom. Everything was normal. Everything was good.

  Just before he made it out of the bathroom, I was getting ready to pour him a glass of milk. It was what he had every night with dinner. I preferred tea. My glass was waiting at the table and all I had left to get was his drink. That was when I noticed the milk was gone. Panic took hold of me from the inside out. Nothing made sense. Nothing was good anymore.