14. Jackson
FOURTEEN
Jackson
It was a risk bringing her here, and honestly, if it weren’t for the fact the racetrack is closed today or that my only friend in California is one of the directors of operations, we wouldn’t have come.
But I called in a favor, and my friend Timmy set everything up. I’m not even sure she’ll be into it, but I wanted to offer her something different—an experience that isn’t just for the sake of how good it will look on the internet. Wanted to give her something sincere, because there’s this sinking feeling in my gut that she doesn’t have much authenticity in her life.
And everybody deserves something real.
“Wait, wait, wait! What do you mean we’re driving?” she screeches, scrambling after me as I walk into the building. “I don’t even drive myself on normal days. You expect me to drive a race car ?”
I bite back the laugh bubbling in my chest. “Why?” I spin toward her, walking backward. “You don’t think you can handle it?”
My voice echoes off the concrete floor, reverberating through the empty hall we’re in.
“I don’t… I mean, I can’t…” she gasps out.
The smile slides off my face as I take in the sudden stiffness of her shoulders. My eyes trail her posture, my stomach dropping when I notice how her fists clench and unclench at her sides.
I move toward her, gripping her hands first and then running my palms up her arms until they’re cupping the back of her neck.
Her eyes are closed and she’s mouthing numbers.
Shit.
“Look at me.”
Her eyes snap open, and my heart wavers when I see the panic swirling in their depths.
“You’re not driving,” I tell her. “Okay?”
She nods, her chest heaving with her short, stuttered breaths, and my fingers tighten around her neck, anchoring her in place, wishing there was more I could do. She reaches her hands up, gripping the front of my shirt in her fists.
“I’m sorry.” My thumbs slide across her skin, and when goose bumps sprout under my hands, my stomach flips. “I didn’t mean to keep it from you. I just wanted it to be a surprise.”
She blinks, breathing out in slow, measured increments. “It’s okay,” she whispers.
“It’s not.” I shake my head. “Do you trust me?”
I’m not sure why the question makes my chest pull or why it suddenly feels like I’m dangling myself at the edge of a cliff, teetering back and forth as I wait for her answer.
“Yes,” she grasps my shirt tighter.
The satisfaction of her response sends a flood of tingles through me, and for some reason her trust gives me the confidence to continue trying to bring her back. To keep her from spiraling.
“Listen to me,” I continue.
She leans in, making my words stall from the warmth of her breath on my lips. I swallow down the urge to close the gap—see if the temptation wanes once I’ve tasted her sweetness. The strength it takes to remain focused makes my jaw clench tight. “I promise I won’t let anything happen to you.”
“Okay,” she murmurs.
“Do you need a minute? Do you have your meds?”
She shakes her head, her fingers tightening around the fabric of my shirt, pulling me farther into her. I move her to the wall, wrapping my arms around her waist as I slide us to the floor.
And that’s where we stay.
We sit in the empty hallway, her body trembling beneath my arms, her hands grasping at my chest, and I let her do what she needs to bring herself back.
To calm her thoughts.
After a few minutes, her fists relax, and she smooths the wrinkles in my shirt as she gazes up at me. “I’m sorry.”
My hand cups her face. “Don’t be sorry. Don’t ever be sorry for being real with me. I’m sorry that I brought you here.” I tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “We don’t have to do this. I just thought it would be fun.”
She shakes her head. “No, I want to. I just—sometimes they happen for no reason…if I let my thoughts run away from me. I normally have it under control, but I’m also usually…”
“In a routine?” I guess.
She nods. “Yeah, exactly.”
“I get it.”
“Do you?” Her brows rise, disbelief painting her features.
I stare at her, debating on how much I want to tell. I’m no stranger to being open with people, but my father is something I’ve always held close to my chest. I don’t talk about him, not to anyone.
Besides, no one’s ever really cared to know. Even my friends back home were too busy with their lives to spend much time asking about mine.
“My dad was a Marine. He spent a lot of time overseas, and at first, he would come home with these amazing stories.” I pause, smiling. “I missed him so bad my stomach hurt, but I remember feeling giddy at the thought of all the stories he’d have when he got back. Adventures he went on, the cultures, the people he met…” My throat tightens. “All the ways he would remind me that he was my hero.”
“He sounds like an incredible man,” Blakely says.
“He was.” I nod. “But after his third deployment, the stories never came.”
My hand reaches up, fingers tangling around the metal chain that rests around my neck. “He only brought home nightmares that time. Ones he tried to hide but couldn’t. He’d lash out at me. At my mom, and she…” I blow out a breath. “It broke her heart every time she had to say goodbye, but I think it killed her soul when he came back and she wasn’t what he needed. When she didn’t know how to help.”
I gaze down at Blakely, tears glossing over the amber color of her eyes. One falls down her cheek and my thumb reaches over to wipe it away.
“Mom convinced him to go to therapy, but it was me who ended up bringing him back whenever he’d get lost. When the panic would overwhelm him, and he’d be stuck, his brain like quicksand, pulling him into the memories of where he’d been.”
“That’s so sad.” Blakely lays her head on my chest. “What’s he do now that you’re not home? Is he…is he better?”
My hand comes up and smooths over her hair, the motion calming the wave of sadness that’s crashing through my insides, threatening to pull me under. “He passed away on my sixteenth birthday.” My eyes close, the words exploding through my throat and singeing the back of my nose.
I brace myself for the empty apology—the one that always follows when someone finds out about his death. But it never comes, and I’ve never been so grateful for someone’s silence.
The torn muscle in my chest rattles against my ribs, reminding me that some pieces of a heart don’t ever heal. They just exist, broken and bleeding, reminding you to appreciate what you have when you have it, because you never know when it will disappear.
We don’t make it to the racetrack. I never show her how to drive.
But sitting here, in the middle of an empty hallway, as I spill a story I’ve never told a soul about the greatest man I’ve ever known, the frayed stitching that holds my broken heart together starts to mend.
And it’s the realest thing I’ve ever done.