CHAPTER SIXTEEN
UNCULTURED
“Hey, how was Levi?” Meg asked the moment I walked through the door.
“Sleazy as fuck,” I answered absent-mindedly, dropping my messenger bag on the floor.
One day, I was going to get around to hanging some coat hooks.
But today wasn’t that day.
I had too much on my mind, too much to do. Too much taking up space in my head to care about silly, insignificant things like coat hooks.
Meg looked up from the couch, her feet up on the cardboard box we'd been using as a coffee table after our old one got broken in the move.
Couldn't care about that right now either.
“Did he have anything to say about Tommy? Or that kid?” she asked as I bent over to kiss the top of her head.
“A little bit,” I said, dropping beside her with my phone in hand. “Not much. He was, uh … kind of a closed book actually. But he gave me something.”
“Yeah?”
I nodded, already punching the name into an internet search. “A name. Tommy Nolan.”
“Tommy Nolan,” she repeated, scooting closer to peer over my shoulder. “You think it could really be the same guy?”
“I mean, he said they knew a few guys named Tommy, but this was the only one in Massachusetts.”
Meg gasped and looked up, staring at the side of my face. “Seth took you all the way to Massachusetts without your mother knowing?”
“Not sure if you’ve figured it out yet or not, but Seth didn't give much of a shit about my mom or getting her consent,” I said, despite what Levi had said. That Seth had liked my mom at one point.
Maybe there was some truth to it—I could get behind that, sure—but when Mom had been fifteen, he would've been, what? Nineteen, twenty? What twenty-year-old man couldn’t control himself around a fifteen-year-old girl?
Not a good one—that was for fucking sure.
Not the kind you wanted around your kid.
For a split second, a silly, ridiculous thought crossed my mind, and I smirked, glancing at Meg.
“What?” she asked, a smile forming on her lips. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Just thinking that there's the same age difference between you and me as there probably was between Seth and Mom.”
Her mouth immediately fell open, her playful demeanor vanishing with the onset of her disgust. “Oh my God, Noah, you cannot be serious. You are not comparing me to that fucking psychopath, right?!”
I laughed, shaking my head and looking back at my phone. “Of course not. You would've had to take advantage of me when I was fifteen to be anything like him. You at least waited until I was legal—”
“Excuse me, I didn't even want you until you were twenty-one!”
I rolled my eyes. “Please. You thought about it before then. Come on. You can tell me. We've been together for years. We're cool at this point.”
“I cannot believe you're actually implying that—”
“I'm not saying you wanted to rob the freakin' cradle. I'm just saying, you know, you probably considered it when I was, like, eighteen. Nineteen maybe.”
She huffed and shook her head, scooting away from me until she sat at the other end of the couch.
“You're being disgusting right now,” she muttered, clearly more annoyed than I'd intended for her to be.
I raised my brows. “Are you seriously mad? I'm just messing around—”
“Well, it isn't funny! You're comparing me to the psychotic piece of trash who repeatedly assaulted your mother!”
Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes were tearing up, and I had very clearly fucked up in a moment of stupidity I never should've said aloud.
I lowered my phone to my lap and shifted in my seat, facing her. “Meg—”
“No,” she said, shaking her head and lifting her hand. “Just stop. I'm not—”
“Meghan, please.”
With a harsh exhale, she turned her heated gaze on me. “What?”
I dipped my chin, looking deep into her eyes.
“I'm sorry. It was a stupid thing to say.
I wasn't saying you were like him. You aren't. God, of course you're not.
I was just … doing the math in my head, and it hit me out of nowhere that this guy my mom had liked at one point was the same number of years older than her as you are to me.
That's all. Like I said, it was stupid, and I'm sorry.”
She hesitated for a moment, then blew out another breath as she nodded.
“I'm sorry too. I shouldn't …” She groaned and gave her head a shake, sending her curls dancing in the dim light from the hand-me-down floor lamp her parents had given her years ago.
“I've just been worried all day about this whole thing.
Sitting here, getting my mind all worked up, like Levi was going to …
I don't know … bring up too many sensitive topics or something and make you upset, and I kept thinking I should've gone with you.”
“Babe, I'm fine,” I assured her, shifting in my seat and lifting my arm, welcoming her in. “Come on. Let's start over and find Tommy Nolan.”
She sniffed and nodded, rubbing her sleeve beneath her nose. She crawled across the couch, curled up against my side, and laid her head on my chest.
“You're sure you're okay?” she asked in a small, timid voice.
“I'm okay,” I insisted.
But was I? I’d had to ask myself that question several times on the long drive back home from Wayward.
Levi had divulged a little more information about my mother's interactions with Seth than I'd gone looking for.
He'd shared more about their relationship, if we could call it that, than I'd ever cared to know.
I had to live with that now, and was I all right with it?
I wasn't sure, but I guessed I'd have to be, right?
I couldn't just … forget. If I had that power, I would've forgotten a lot over the years.
Hell, maybe I would've forgotten everything and just … started over.
A clean slate.
I pursed my lips and thought about that question again.
Am I okay?
God, I'd spent years lying for the sake of other people.
Not wanting anyone to worry about me when I preferred they worry about themselves while I acted out and got myself into trouble just to force someone to pay attention to me.
Hell, look what I'd just done. Insinuated that my fiancée—the woman I loved more than anything—had intentions at all akin to those of my drug-dealer, murderer, rapist biological father who'd preyed upon an underage girl.
I hadn't intentionally upset her, but what the fuck had I been thinking, even saying it?
“He said some stuff,” I finally said after a moment of thoughtful silence. “He told me about how Mom had met Dad. How he saved her from Seth before …” I swallowed. “Well, before he took what he wanted anyway and got her pregnant.”
Meg lifted her head, looking up at me. “You didn't know any of that before?”
Rolling my lips between my teeth, I shook my head.
“I knew Mom and Dad had met when they were younger. I mean, they'd grown up in the same town, and … I just never thought to ask how they’d met. I figured it was—I dunno—something boring, like they went to school together or they bumped into each other at the grocery store. And I didn’t know that Dad had pissed Seth off so much that he was hell-bent on revenge. Dad was why Seth raped—”
“Do not even go there,” Meg said, laying her fingertips over my lips.
“Some people are born heroes, and others are destined to be monsters. You and your mother are so unbelievably fortunate to have found a hero who knew exactly how to fight off that monster, and I will not let you blame him for what happened to either of you.”
She lowered her hand, and I sucked in a deep breath before nodding.
“No, you're right. I … I guess what I'm saying is, I don't know that I'm okay. Not right now. But I will be. Today was just … a lot.”
One side of her mouth curled into a soft, understanding smile. “I get that. It's all right.”
I cleared my throat and lifted my phone. “Anyway, where were we?”
She snuggled against me once again, settling her warmth against my weary soul. “Tommy Nolan,” she said. “But, baby, if you wanna take a break for a minute—”
“We will,” I promised. “But first … Tommy Nolan.”
***
But as luck would have it, finding Tommy Nolan wasn't as easy as I'd hoped it'd be.
The internet search I did pulled up dozens and dozens of results, even with the search narrowed down to only those limited to the state of Massachusetts.
Tom or Thomas wasn’t much help either.
After an hour of digging, Meg suggested we set the search aside and head over to my parents' house for dinner for a change of scenery and something else to do.
I reluctantly went along at first, not wanting to focus on anything else, but I was immediately grateful for the suggestion the moment we stepped outside and started walking.
The fresh air helped to clear my mind, the early summer sunshine on my skin thawed the bitterness in my heart, and the second we walked through my parents' open door, I could've cried at the warmth that spread through my chest at the sight of the three people I loved almost as much as I loved Meghan Kinney.
“Hey, guys!” Dad said, wrapping his arm around my neck and dragging me farther into the house. He dropped his voice to a low mumble as he said, “Mom's cooking dinner tonight, bud. We might wanna order a—”
“What are you saying over there?!” Mom exclaimed from the kitchen. “Soldier, I swear to God, if you make another comment about my cooking—”
Dad feigned a gasp, pressing a hand to his chest. “I would never.”
Then he cupped a hand around his mouth and whispered to Meg and me, “But seriously, guys, I wouldn't blame you if you wanna run out of here. I'll cover for you. Save yourselves.”
Meg laughed and rolled her eyes, shaking her head as she walked toward the kitchen. “Oh my God, will you leave her alone?”
“Leave her alone?” Dad hissed. “I'm trying to save you guys, and you're scolding me?” He turned to me and asked, “Are you sure you want to legally bind yourself to this insanity? ‘Cause, dude, it's not too late.”