The Problem with Falling (Problems #3)

Prologue

PROLOGUE

Willow

Ten Years Old

Honey Creek, Illinois

May

C hicken patty Thursdays were my favorite days at school because the lunch lady always gave us cheesy Bosco Sticks, too. She’d give me an extra one because I once told her I liked her hairnet and thought she had pretty green eyes. My eyes were brown, so I always thought they were boring. Not a lot of people had green ones.

If I could ever be born again, I’d want green eyes.

“All right, class, we are going to head to the cafeteria for lunch, featuring some special guests,” Mrs. Robinson announced as she stood from her desk. We all lined up, and I was able to be the line leader. Whenever a person was a line leader, you got an extra star to put on your desk name tag, and I had so many stickers that I wasn’t sure I even had space for another star.

Dad said I was good at getting the stars because I was a star, but that was just because Dad thought my sisters and I were the brightest girls in the whole wide world.

As we walked to the cafeteria, my best friend Anna prattled on and on about how she thought dolphins were the best animals ever, and I listened to everything she said because that was what best friends did.

“Do you think when we get older, we can get a baby dolphin as a pet?” Anna asked me as she pulled her hair back into a ponytail, using the pink scrunchie I gave her last week for her birthday. It had a little dolphin charm on it, too. I called her Phins because of her love for dolphins, and she called me Otto because of my love for otters.

“We can, and we’ll buy a house by the water so we can have otters, too,” I said.

Anna and I had pretty much everything in common, and a few months ago, we’d decided that instead of getting married and having kids, we’d build two houses next to each other and raise animals after we spent most of our lives traveling the world. Ricky, the jerk in our class, said we’d grow up to be lonely cat ladies, but I didn’t think people could be alone if they had cats.

Besides, animals were nicer than people most of the time. People made me cry sometimes. Animals never did.

Except for Ms. Hollows’s dog, Mikey, who bit my ankle when I was running down the street. Then again, it wasn’t Mikey’s fault. He was just a little too excited. I’d been too excited before, too, to the point where I cried. Maybe humans cried when too excited, and animals bit.

We all had our things.

My oldest sister, Avery, never cried, though. She was tougher than me and our other sister, Yara. Once, I heard Dad tell Avery that it was okay to cry sometimes. She told him he was wrong.

Maybe I cried enough for us both. Avery always said I was a crybaby. But that was the thing about my heart—it felt a lot of everything all the time, no matter how I tried to stop it from feeling big and little things.

The moment my class stepped into the cafeteria, my feet froze. Everyone behind me in line dashed past me with big smiles as they rushed over to the surprises sitting in the space already.

My tummy hurt as my eyes stung with tears welling up.

I gripped the sleeve of my shirt and held it tight in the palm of my hand as I glanced around at the space. Even Phins had sprinted off toward her mama and hugged her tightly. She did look back at me with a sad face and waved me over to join them, but I didn’t want to.

Mrs. Lane frowned toward me before quickly averting her gaze. She must’ve still been upset with me from when I dared Anna to climb a tree, and she ended up falling out of it. She got three stitches from that. I felt pretty bad, and Mrs. Lane gave me a good talking-to, telling me I was too rowdy with her Anna.

Sometimes she scolded me like a mama, but she wasn’t my mama.

I didn’t have one of those.

Before I could turn to Mrs. Robinson to ask if I could go to the bathroom so I could cry alone, I noticed Dad standing to my left with a bouquet and a pink bow tie on.

Dad hated pink, but I figured he wore it for me because I gave it to him as a gift last Christmas.

That made me want to cry, too.

I dashed over to him and wrapped my arms around him. I didn’t want to cry, but I couldn’t help it. How could I be both happy and sad at the same time? How could my tears mean more than one thing at the very same moment? How could I be so happy to have a dad and so sad not to have a mama?

I hated Mother’s Day.

“It’s okay, Willow. You’re okay,” Dad swore as he wrapped me tightly in his arms while I cried into his shirt, holding him as if I were holding heaven. I couldn’t stop sobbing, but he let me cry. He always held me and let me cry. He pulled me back and kneeled down in front of me. He wiped my tears and combed my messy light-brown curls behind my ears. “You want to play hooky and skip the rest of the day?” he asked.

I cried some more and nodded.

“Okay,” he agreed, lifting me into his arms. I rested my head against his neck and closed my eyes as he walked over to Mrs. Robinson and told her he’d be taking me out of school for a mental health day.

He kissed my cheek and walked us out of the school building. “You know how big my love is for you, Little Bird?” he whispered as he opened the back door of his truck for me and placed me inside.

“Bigger than the sky,” I said.

“And deeper than the sea,” he replied, kissing my forehead.

He closed my door and climbed into the driver’s seat.

Before he drove off, I called out to him. “Dad?”

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“I like your bow tie.”

He smiled through the rearview mirror at me and nodded once. “Thanks, baby girl. I like it, too. And I know today was hard for you, and I know you’re feeling a lot of feelings, but do you know what you’re gonna be?”

“What?”

“Okay, Willow Rose. You’re going to be okay.”

I took a breath and kept wiping my tears as I echoed his words. “ Okay . I’m gonna be okay.”

Theo

Twelve Years Old

Westin Lake, Wisconsin

August

“But, I d-d-don’t want to stay with P-P-PaPa and Grandma,” I told Mom as she dragged me by my arm over to my grandparents’ house with my suitcase. I’d tripped over my feet a few times, feeling unstable from the quick pace that we traveled. Whenever I’d trip, Mom ordered me to stop being a child and walk like a normal person, yet she yanked me so hard that it was almost impossible to walk normally. Plus, it was dark outside.

I hated the dark. It was my biggest fear.

It felt like the trees and their shadows were haunting me as we moved through them. Plus, the sounds of the forest at night made everything scarier.

I gripped the handle of my suitcase tighter.

The only time I’d ever used my suitcase was when PaPa would take me on fishing trips to different lakes in Wisconsin. We’d travel somewhere new every summer to fish on as many lakes as possible. I’d always pack my favorite books, and PaPa would pack his favorite cigars.

We weren’t going on a fishing trip that evening, though.

Mom was mad at me. I could tell by how she dragged me through the forested area to get to PaPa and Grandma’s house. Sometimes, it felt like no matter what I did, she’d end up mad at me. All I wanted to do was make her happy, though. Why couldn’t I make her happy?

“I don’t care, Theo,” she said with tears in her eyes. It felt like she was always crying, and I hated that she always cried. All I wanted was for her to be okay. All I wanted was for us to be okay. Yet, it seemed whenever I’d try to do the right thing, I’d end up making her sad. I tried my best not to upset her. I’d do my chores and get good grades. I’d pick her wildflowers from the woods and leave them on her nightstand. I listened to her favorite songs. Sometimes, I’d see what books she was reading, and I’d read them, too, so we’d have something in common. I’d tell her I love her.

She’d never say she loved me, too.

She’d just say I looked too much like my dad. I never knew him, but I resented the fact that I looked anything like the man who’d hurt Mom. I wished I looked more like her than him—maybe she would’ve loved me more.

When we made it to my grandparents’ house, Grandma came outside, flipping on the front porch light.

“What’s going on, Christina?” she asked Mom, concern in her eyes. The way I had physical traits of my father that I’d never known, was the same way Mom looked like Grandma. The only thing I could see that we had in common were our eyes. The blue eyes ran deep within our bloodline.

“I’m leaving,” Mom said, standing straight, with her chest puffed out.

PaPa came from the backyard with a stack of wood in his arms. “What’s going on?” he questioned, echoing Grandma’s words.

“I can’t do this anymore. I don’t want him,” Mom said, tears falling down her cheeks. “I hate him,” she swore.

The him was me .

She hated me .

“Stop that right now,” PaPa ordered, his nose scrunched up as he walked over to me and took my hand in his. “Don’t speak like that in front of Theo.”

“He should know! I hate him, I hate him, I hate him,” she sobbed. She turned toward me and narrowed her eyes. “You ruined my life. Everything good I’ve ever had was ruined the day you were born,” she accused.

My chest burned and I felt seconds away from vomiting.

I cried and my whole body started to shake as my stomach sat in knots. I needed to use the bathroom. I needed to throw up. I needed Mom to love me.

Why doesn’t she love me?

How could I have been a better son?

PaPa shook his head as he pulled me behind him. He stood straight and puffed his chest out toward my mother. “Don’t you ever speak to that boy like that again, or you’ll never speak to him again.”

“Good,” Mom said. “I never want to speak to him. I wish I’d never had him.”

She spat toward my feet with nothing but darkness in her eyes.

“I won’t keep him around this. Deal with Christina. I’ll look after Theo,” PaPa said to Grandma before he pulled me around to the back of the house.

PaPa stayed close to my side as we stood on the dock behind his house, looking out toward the lake for a long time. The sky was fast asleep. PaPa and Grandma’s house was quiet. It wasn’t quiet an hour or so ago when my mother decided she didn’t want to be my mother anymore.

She was running off with some guy who had a motorcycle because I was the kid she never really wanted. Grandma yelled at Mom and begged her to stay. They said how much I needed her, and they were right. I loved my grandparents, but I needed my mom, too.

It seemed she didn’t need me back.

Grandma always said it wasn’t Mom who said hurtful things to me, but it was the kind of drugs she used that made her not be herself. She and PaPa tried to make me feel better about Mom not being nice to me. Sure, she loved me, but she didn’t like me very much. I often felt she only loved me because society said she had to.

After Mom yelled back that she should’ve had an abortion, I felt my heart break. I didn’t know anyone could actually feel a heart break, but I felt it in my chest—the tightness that appeared.

I heard a motorcycle pull off, and I was certain Mom was on the back of it.

I kept biting the inside of my cheek to the point I could taste my own blood. I didn’t care. I didn’t care about much of anything anymore. Every few minutes, PaPa would squeeze my hand, almost as if he were reminding me to breathe. I didn’t know I could forget to breathe until God gave me a mom who didn’t want me.

“It’s all right, Theo. We’re gonna be all right,” PaPa said, his voice deep and raspy from all the cigarettes and cigars he’d smoked. He hadn’t lit one in a few hours, but I could still smell the scent imprinted on his clothes. I used to hate it. Now, the smell reminded me of home.

“You boys need to come back inside,” Grandma called as she walked down a few of the steps on the back porch. She didn’t reach the bottom, but she waved us over. Grandma loved a lot of things in life, but makeup was her favorite pastime. That afternoon, she didn’t wear a drop of it.

“We’ll be just a minute,” PaPa shouted back toward her.

“Make it less than that,” she ordered before she headed back inside.

PaPa squeezed my hand once more.

Breathe.

I took a breath.

“I d-d-don’t want to go back in there,” I softly said, stumbling over my words. That was another thing my mom hated about me—the way I stuttered.

“Yeah. Me neither,” PaPa agreed as he brushed his hand against his white beard. Last year, some kids in our small town confused PaPa for Santa Claus and asked if they could sit on his lap. He let them, and they told him what they wanted for Christmas. He made sure each of those kids got the exact gift they requested, too. That was who PaPa was, though. In many ways, he was Santa Claus, and whenever I’d come to his and Grandma’s house, it felt like being at Santa’s workshop. There were always cookies, love, and any gift I could ever want.

PaPa slid his hands into the pockets of his slacks. He stared out at the water and said, “So let’s not go back in there.”

I looked up at him, confused. “But Grandma—”

“Grandma will be all right for a bit of time. She’ll know where we are.”

“Where are we going?”

He nodded toward his fishing boat. “I caught some bluegills and perch last week on the lake. Figured we could go out there, then I can make you a fish fry afterward.”

I smiled a little.

I didn’t know I still knew how to do that.

“What do you say, Theo? Wanna go fishing with me?”

I nodded, and we headed off to his boat. After collecting our fishing poles from his shed, I climbed into the boat, and PaPa followed me, holding a pole in his hand. He untied the boat from the dock, then took the steering wheel and away we went.

We didn’t talk as we chopped through the waves, with water splashing against my face. We didn’t talk when we stopped the boat to start fishing, either. I was fine not talking. I liked fishing at night with the quietness.

My eyes started getting teary, but I tried my best to play it off as if I got some lake water in them. I kept rubbing them as I sniffled, but PaPa didn’t call me out on my emotions. He just let me feel what I needed to feel.

We fished for hours until the sky fell completely asleep, and then we fished some more.

We caught fourteen bluegills and six perch. PaPa said he was proud of me, but he would’ve been proud of me whether I caught a fish or not. When we returned to the house, we cleaned the fish, and he cooked me a fish fry at two in the morning. Grandma woke up and ate the fish fry with us, and then she kissed my forehead, cleaned up the kitchen, and said good night.

PaPa sent me to bed, and I asked if I could keep the light on. Lately, I didn’t like sleeping in the dark. I didn’t feel safe in the darkness. He said yes and pulled up a chair beside my bed.

“I think I’ll stay here till you’re asleep,” he told me.

“It’s okay. I’m okay.”

“No,” he said, “you’re not. And that’s okay.” He held his hand out toward me, and I placed mine in his. “And it’s okay to cry. I cry, too.”

The tears came back. I didn’t feel like much of a man, crying again, but PaPa cried, too, and he was the manliest man I’d ever known. He fished, chopped wood, and cried sometimes, too.

That made me feel a little bit better even though my heart was still sad.

“Hey, PaPa?”

“Yes, Theo?”

“You can turn off the light tonight if you’re going to stay in here with me.”

“All right.”

He shut off the light, then came back and held my hand again. I was still sad. I wanted Mom to come back, but I had a strong feeling she wouldn’t. I never knew my father, and I was almost certain I’d never know my mother again, too. That made me extra sad, but I had my grandparents, Molly and Harry Langford, who were my very best friends. I didn’t have a lot of friends because of how I stuttered and tripped over words sometimes. I hated that I stuttered. The doctors said it was a speech impediment, but I didn’t care what it was called. I just cared that no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get out some words without tripping over them. What I hated most about it was that other kids made fun of me for it. Not only did I have speech issues, but I was also a little chubby and short. A lot of kids my age bullied me for how I looked and talked, so after a while, I stopped trying to make friends.

Instead, I liked to fish with PaPa. Sometimes I’d help Grandma make the sourdough bread they’d sell at the farmers’ market and their fish shack restaurant, Fisherman’s Loaf, each week. PaPa said I could take over Fisherman’s Loaf one day, and I was already looking forward to it. I knew I wouldn’t let him down.

“Hey, Theo?”

“Yes, PaPa?” I yawned.

“Your worth isn’t measured based on the people who walk away. Remember that. Your mama…my little girl…she’s struggled with demons for a long, long time. Her choice to leave had nothing to do with you, okay?”

But why wasn’t I good enough to make her stay?

Instead of saying that, I stayed quiet.

“Love you, boy,” PaPa said. “You’re gonna be all right.”

Yeah , I thought even though I didn’t believe it just yet. I didn’t know when I’d believe it, but I hoped it would be true someday.

I’m gonna be all right.