Chapter 29
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
DRAKE
I give Cadence’s hand another surreptitious pat before heading along the adjacent corridor to my locker, surprised by how much we’ve altered in just a few weeks.
Except it’s not really changed so much as changed back. This is closer to how we were as kids, enjoying each other’s company before the pressure to separate by gender increased and we drifted apart.
Before she gave Mum the drugs to kill herself .
The sharp slap of that thought resets my mood and I’m instantly irritable, snapping at the boy next to me as I enter the common room for my free period.
The low drag of grief threatens to overwhelm me.
Every time I push it away, it bubbles up elsewhere.
Halfway through my free period and I’m over everything. My face throbs. My torso aches, covered with dark bruises from body blows I didn’t even feel last night.
With just one day left before I’m yanked from school, abiding by their rules is a pointless activity and I head to the car. A few hours’ drive might allow me a re-set before facing the journey home with Cadence.
It's not until I pass the seedy mall that I realise I’ve driven near my old home. The rear cycle lane into Alabaster is beside the train tracks and I stare along it, thinking how many times I’ve ridden that same path to school.
The semi-autonomous drive leads me further, into the row of shops by the roundabout, the pharmacy door painted a soothing pastel blue on the ground floor, a narrow strip of steep stairs leading to the shop.
I stick to the centre of the threadbare steps. The scent of menthol rub, and floral bath bombs make me smile, the jangling odours an immediate rope tethering me to my youth.
The top landing leads to a doctor’s office on the right, the chemist to the left. There are only two other customers in there, browsing in the bored way that suggests they’re killing time waiting for prescriptions rather than on the hunt for something to buy.
“There’s a bell,” the elderly woman standing in front of cold and flu remedies says, pointing to the counter.
“That’s cool. I’m here for advice so I’ll just let him finish. No use making you late.”
She gives me a sunken smile.
In five minutes, I’m the only one left in the shop and the pudgy man behind the counter adjusts his glasses, the smears on either side suggesting it’s a habit.
“You find what you were looking for?” He leans on the counter, whispering, “There’s only us here, now, if you wanted to show me something… you know… private.”
“No, its…”
His face is kind, the laugh lines cutting deep beside his mouth and eyes. Not the mask of a villain.
“My mother used to come here; I think.”
“We are the cheapest.” His chest puffs out with pride. “What’s her name?”
I step to the opposite side of the counter, resting my hands on the fake wood design. “According to her prescription, Madelaine Summers.”
His face goes still, the pleasant smile still in place, a wariness in his eyes. “Is that right?”
He glances into the corners where I clocked the cameras on my way inside. It could be out of thanks they’re recording or fearful they are, his frozen face doesn’t tell me which.
“Do you remember that name?”
“Madelaine’s been a good customer for years, but you’re not her son.”
“Then whose son am I?”
His eyes move to the counter, and I snap my fingers for attention.
“If you press a button, I’ll have to ask my questions to whoever responds. Is that what you want?”
“What I want is to keep serving my community the same way I’ve always done.”
“Good. Then you can answer my questions and I’ll be on my way in no time.”
“What questions?”
“First off, do you always trade unclaimed prescriptions for blow jobs or is that a deal you reserve for your teenage customers?”
His body relaxes, head shaking. The sting of disappointment isn’t bad because I already knew Cadence was talking shit and this man’s about to prove it.
“There aren’t any teenagers doing anything in here, mate. You’ve got the wrong end of the stick.” He arches an eyebrow, one hand patting his rotund stomach. “I like my women with a bit more mileage on them.”
The statement is accompanied by a head tilt, his eyes lingering on my features. I can hear the cogs in his head whirring, trying to find a match.
“You’re Maggie Arlington’s boy.”
And I’m suddenly dropped in the gigantic minefield I’ve been tiptoeing around, the truth glaring.
Cadence might be the key to this mess, but she’s not the orchestrater.
My mother had some mileage on her. This man knew her well enough to pick out my ancestry just from our facial similarities, coming up on a year since her death.
And how did he get that familiarity?
I can’t stand to meet his gaze any longer.
My eyes drop, picking out the loosening threads of the old industrial grade carpet, the plastic runners laid along the main paths still not enough to stop the wear and tear of thousands of pairs of feet. There’s a shabbiness to the stock on the crowded shelves, some boxes faded even though barely any sunlight comes through the tiny window on the back, its glass crisscrossed with steel mesh to protect against eager junkies.
My head tries to fill with an image of my mother kneeling on this tatty floor, paying for the pills she swore in her weekly meetings she hadn’t taken for five, ten, fifteen years.
A hard knot tightens behind my breastbone as I calculate the blame. For me. For not noticing. For happily going about my life without ever seeing that she got hooked again.
Because she must have been hooked. Nobody would drop to their knees for this fat fucker without desperation cranking up their nerve endings.
I wonder if the elderly woman without her dentures ever gave this man the same payment. If that’s why she doesn’t fit them before walking along to this store to pick up her prescriptions.
A rush of nausea rises, fat beads of sweat popping out on my forehead.
“Take a seat,” the chemist says, already at my side, moving lightly as he guides me to the aluminium chair behind me, the vinyl of its cushion so old it’s cracked. “Are you asthmatic?”
“No. It’s…” I wave my hand, the words eluding me, face crinkling in pain as the bolt digs into my skull. “Headaches.”
“That have preventatives to keep them under control. Do you know your triggers?”
A soft laugh snorts out of me. I came here to be an avenging angel and my target crouches next to the chair, patting my hand as he stares into my face with mounting concern.
“My mum died.”
Alarm pinches his face, then he relaxes, eyes softening. “Shit, that’s hard. And her so young, too. Was it a car accident?”
“Pills.”
My eyes seek his, wanting him to take this pain away. The same way I’d felt as I tore the house apart in the hours after, trying to find a note. Anything to ease the burden that my mother—the person I loved and trusted and needed more than anyone else—didn’t want to live.
Not for herself.
Not for me.
“Oh, son.” He heaves a sigh. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry?” My fingers curl as the rage spreads like a wildfire. “She overdosed on the pills you gave her and all you have to say is you’re sorry?”
He frowns, then shakes his head. “The only thing she got from me was birth control and a nasal spray for hay fever.”
“But the unclaimed prescriptions?”
The man chuckles, rubbing the back of his neck as he looks ashamed. “Were only ever an arrangement between me and another lovely lady.”
I make the connection immediately. “Raelene Rivers.”
Cadence is covering for her mother. The same urge as when she parents her, their roles out of balance for as long as I can remember.
The grief inside me swells, twisting and turning until it feels like a live creature, stomping around inside me, destroying everything in its attempt to be acknowledged.
I spring off the chair, needing fresh air, needing to get out of this tiny, cluttered shop. “I have to go.”
“Are you okay to drive? Do you have an aura?”
“I’m fine.”
“I can call someone for you. A service will send two drivers, one to take your car with you in it, the other to take both home. My treat.”
I shake my head and barely wince at the resulting pain. “Thanks, but no.”
My head spins but it has more to do with the secrets Cadence was keeping than anything else. Even though I understand her protective impulses, knew she was lying, the reality weighs heavy. I hold the railing in a death grip until I reach the bottom stair.
Outside feels like a newer, cleaner world as I walk to my car.
I’ve driven halfway back to school when a deep stab of grief makes me feel like my heart is seizing. The emotions I’ve pushed aside for so long, hit me all at once. I pull to the side of the road, eyes closed, breathing slowly until the shockwave of grief passes.
Once the worst is past, I merge back into the traffic, heading to Ashcroft Crest for the second to last time.