“Landon,” my step-sister said, her own voice strangely bereft of hatred and fury. If I were in her place, I think I might've wanted to throw lightning bolts. “I'm gonna give you the address to my sister's place, okay? It's near Kerbey Lane. I want you to pick me up.”
“Why?” I blubbered. In the olden days, dudes had carried around hankies to prevent just this kind of gross-face situation. Scanning the area for any unexpected street traffic, I ducked my head below my collar, tried to sop up some of the nonsense.
“You're going to buy me a thousand drinks, is why,” she said.
The anger changed form—and became fear.
Chapter Nineteen
Landon
The older sister was in a far less charitable mood. She had a big, rambling two story full of cool artsy shit—I stepped into her foyer and almost hit my head on a hanging lamp. Though half of me was still expecting nods of recognition from every Austin resident I happened to encounter, as soon as I got to Doll's neck of the woods I realized I was no longer in game-watching country. From the looks of it, Carson didn't even have cable. And one look at her rigid face in the doorway told me that now was not the time to dole out autographs.
“How's Anya?” I asked.
Carson cut me with a stare, but forced herself to reply like a human. “She's resting comfortably. Couldn't get any painkillers because of the preexisting condition, but I've made her some Kava tea and that seemed to do the trick.”
“So she's not in pain anymore?”
“Not any physical pain, no.”
Walked into that one, Landon.
We paced around the entranceway for what felt like another ten minutes, her sizing me up like I was a potentially dangerous stray. Which was her prerogative. She had every right to be suspicious. I was a shit-stain. I'd hidden an important truth from a trio of innocent women. I'd hidden an important truth, I realized, from myself.
“Landon,” Carson said slowly, stopping her pacing. “We're thinking about pressing charges. She doesn't want to, but I do.”
I assumed the she indicated the sleeping Anya. And possibly Ash, who sure was taking forever and a half to get ready. I stopped pacing, too, and took a look at Carson. She seemed the faintest bit...sorry.
I'd been trying to keep myself far, far away from Memory Lane, but it was impossible to stay fully impartial. I didn't know exactly how many nights had resolved with ten-year-old me hiding my mother from my father, but it felt like a dozen at least. He'd always apologized in the mornings. Sometimes, he'd cried. I would watch them make up and feel the deepest confusion. On one hand, I had hated the man who could give my mother bruises, who could come at me with an alien fury in his eyes, like I was the enemy and he was still at war. On the other, there was nothing I could do—he was still my Pop. Plus, it'd been so long ago. All of that had stopped when I was in middle school, even if the fear lingered.
I knew the Pastor wouldn't do well in prison. But perhaps he belonged in some kind of...other place. Some place where they could help an old soldier get back to himself. Some place where he couldn't hurt anyone. I didn't have to think about it too hard, and I didn't have to confuse it with love. I simply nodded.
“If that's what you need to do, I'll support you,” I said. This seemed to mollify the pacing she-tiger. Her eyes softened.
“Look, this is a really shitty situation. We're going to think long and hard, before...”
“I understand.”
“And if you're willing to cooperate, then...”
“I understand.”
“He understands,” piped up a voice I recognized. I couldn't help but smile, though I knew it was inappropriate. Ash hovered at the top of the rickety staircase, looking exhausted, but somehow lovely as ever. She wore ratty jeans and a snug band t-shirt (The Pixies), and her shorter hair fell across her face in lanky waves. It looked good without the highlights, I thought. Not that I super cared either way.
“We won't be out late,” Ash told her sister, and I was reminded for a moment of what television described as typical-family-behavior. It felt like I was about to take my stepsister out for an all-American date, to the drive-in or something. The QB gets the girl...
Ash jerked me out of my reverie by tugging on my wrist. The door slammed behind us, and suddenly it was just me and her sharing the moist Texas air with a trillion chirping cicadas and the kind of humidity that could make a hummingbird slow.
“So where are we going?” I started—but Ash was already tearing towards shotgun, a feverish look in her eyes. I loped over to the driver side of the Saab, trying to keep the highly inappropriate memory of the last time we'd been in this car together at bay.
“You're a senior and a minor celebrity. Don't tell me you don't know a bar that'll serve me.” Ash turned her attention to the radio dials, just as I eased off the brake. “And don't forget—I'm one part legal now.” Some particularly angry Green Day tune seemed to sate her. I watched her mouth along to the lyrics as we pulled back toward school, where—as it happened—I had managed to think of a place or two that would serve us.
“You're a little young for these guys, aren't you?” I asked, eyebrow cocked at the radio. Ash fixed me with a sullen stare. And I couldn't help it. I knew the situation was serious, the stakes incredibly high—but something about that chick made me crack a smile. We drove on in a rock n' roll silence.
But soon, Green Day gave way to commercials. Ash sighed. She knocked her pretty head gently against the headrests. “What I don't understand is, how could anybody do that to someone they love?” she asked suddenly, her voice thick with emotion. Her tone reminded me that she was a teenager, and that there were still some things of which she remained innocent. The things people would do to one another, under guise of love. I didn't have the heart to offer my own cynical explanation, so I just shrugged.
“I don't understand it, either.”
“Like—you love someone, you should want them to be safe and happy at every second, right? When you're not with them, even. You should be taking seconds out of every minute to wish them the best. Even when they make you mad or make you crazy, the right kind of love should be enough.” Her eyes were boiling again. Tears were hovering on the tips of her long lashes.
“It should be,” I said, fighting to keep my attention on the clogged roads. We were hitting some post-game traffic.
“She's a good person.”
I could feel her eyes on me. Was this some test? Was she waiting for me to rush to the Pastor's defense? I waited to feel the love she spoke of for my father, the unconditional concern. But I didn't even know where my old man was. I'd called him once from the car on the way over, and hadn't even left a voicemail. My fury with him remained blinding.
“Some people learned to show their love in kind of... crooked ways,” I finally ventured. No sooner were the words out than I started to feel anxious. Was it possible that I was this kind of person? Had the Pastor passed his wickedness onto me? I hadn't loved Zora the right way. It wasn’t a stretch that I would always have this problem with women, that I would always seek out the people who I could never love the right way, the people who could never truly love me back.
“Turn here,” Ash said, in sotto. We were coming up on the nightlife-y part of town, but she pointed toward a cul-de-sac loop that veered back toward residential Austin. I was confused, but didn't question. All I wanted was for her to feel safe.