Chapter 31
Hollis
My truck rolls to a stop half a block away from the small house.
It should feel like home. It doesn’t.
It never did.
Many people say home is in your heart, where you feel most protected, most able to be yourself.
I haven’t felt that since before Dad started drinking.
Being told this is your new home, doesn’t make it so.
A dog barks in the distance as I climb out of my truck, but it’s not close enough to draw attention to me.
I don’t bother knocking on the door after approaching the house. I can’t turn the handle and just walk in as one would expect of their childhood home.
I’m not welcome here. I haven’t been for many years.
My mother, my protector, cast me out the day I took matters into my own hands against her second husband.
She had a problem with my father’s drinking but never once voiced an ill opinion of my stepfather when he struck her.
It never made sense to me as a child, and even now as an adult, I still don’t understand.
She never left him. He left her, and she hates me for it.
I don’t turn back to look when the front door opens, my seated figure casting shadows on the front lawn.
“She will shit a brick if she catches you out here, junior.”
“Stop cussing,” I admonish, still smiling as my little brother takes a seat beside me.
At thirteen, he has gotten too old to welcome me with a hug. I miss those days. True affection isn’t something I ever get.
Mimicking my position, he places his elbows on his knees and stares out into the darkness.
“Been a while since you’ve stopped by.”
I feel like an asshole, but it’s hard to make the effort when I know I’m going to leave with a bigger hole in my heart than I arrived with.
“Sorry, bud.”
I refuse to tell him this may be the last time he sees me.
I don’t want to cloud his young mind with the danger I’m facing in Chicago.
It was a rule that neither Ellie nor Patrick’s name were mentioned at my mother’s house.
She said it was too painful. She lost too much with the teenage girl’s death, including her husband and the financial stability she had.
Life after Ellie was too much of a struggle, so she felt ignoring it would make it all better.
“I understand you’re busy. I watched the race last weekend, but I didn’t see you once on TV.”
At some point in my visits, Connor got the idea in his head that I work the pits for a NASCAR racing team. I never corrected him.
“I was off last week,” I lie easily. “Took some vacation time.”
He nods, his eyes still locked on anything other than me.
“Did you go to the beach? I’d rather go to the beach than come here, too.”
I know it’s a tiny dig at my continued absence.
The kid is in one of his moods where he can’t seem to understand that he isn’t the center of the universe.
He’s probably been too sheltered by my mom, and I don’t see it as a terrible thing.
There’s so much evil in the world. He’ll find out about that shit all too soon.
The longer it can be postponed, the better, as far as I’m concerned.
“I stayed home. How’s Mom?”
“The same.” He sighs. “She got a raise at work, but it doesn’t cover the increase rent.”
“I can give you money.”
He shakes his head. “Last time she caught me with money, she accused me of selling drugs. I was grounded for a month.”
“She won’t let me pay for anything. Everything I’ve sent gets returned,” I mutter, wanting to help my mother. She’s too smart to believe she won a month of free electricity or she landed some windfall from a newly deceased distant relative. I’ve fucking tried everything to help her out.
“She hasn’t said anything about your tuition?”
He shakes his head. “No, the lady she has the contact with at school is a great liar.”
Only because I paid her extra. My brother’s private school tuition and uniform allowance are the only things my mother hasn’t refused. Some days, I wonder if she knows about it but refuses to acknowledge it’s me because she cares enough for Connor that she won’t take the opportunity away from him.
She already has one son she sees as a criminal. It would kill her to have two. With the neighborhood they live in, private school and a different group of friends may be the only thing saving him from that.
“Making good grades?”
“Passing everything,” he answers, dodging the real question.
“Better than me.” I always found school hard, not the work but the focus and perseverance.
It’s hard to concentrate on math when you didn’t get much sleep the night before because your stepdad was yelling because Mom didn’t hand dry the dishes and put them away after washing them.
“She doesn’t know I know but Dad is in jail. His newest wife didn’t like getting hit.”
“Fuck,” I grunt.
The bastard is right where he deserves to be, but the man always paid his child support on time. I know they depended on that money.
“I can get a job,” Connor says hopefully.
“No one is going to hire a thirteen-year-old.”
“Old man Myers said I could help out around the shop.”
I glance at him, trying to see how he actually feels about the guy. “The lawn mower repair shop?”
He nods. “Won’t pay much, but any little amount will help.”
“I wish she wasn’t so stubborn,” I growl, trying to resist going inside and telling her to just take the fucking money I offer.
Last time I confronted her was years ago. She said she would once I was able to prove that I earned the money legitimately. She was too smart to accept check stubs created online.
“Me too,” he quickly agrees. “I might have an Xbox if she did.”
We both chuckle, neither of us feeling any humor in the conversation.
“I better get inside before she comes looking for me,” he says, standing from the steps.
I stand too, pulling him into my chest for a hug, knowing it could very well be the last time I see him.
My throat burns with all the things I want to say to him.
I cup his face in my hands, and I watch as his eyes well with tears, as if he knows exactly what this means.
“Connor.”
“Love you, too, weirdo,” he says, taking a step back and pushing at my chest.
He sniffles once as he turns to leave.
I step off the porch into the shadows, wondering if I’ll be an even greater disappointment to my mom. My dad ruined his life, drank himself to death because of the fucking Severino family, and it’s very possible I’ll be joining him soon.
“What could you possibly be doing outside in the dark?” It’s my mother’s voice. I don’t hear it very often.
Even disembodied, she sounds tired and frustrated.
“Nothing.”
“I heard you talking.”
“To that dog that keeps wandering over from the neighbor’s yard. I was just—”
The door closes behind him, cutting off his words.
I wait a few seconds longer, wondering if he’ll confess to what he was actually doing.
I always wait, praying she’ll step out onto the porch and look for me in the darkness.
She never does, and tonight is no different from the others.
As I walk away, I question everything I’m doing, knowing full well I can claim I’m doing this for Ellie, but I know better.
Madelene needs this. She needs the monsters eradicated from her life. She deserves a choice.
At least Connor has our mother. He’ll have someone that loves him to protect him long after I’m gone.
Mads has no one but me.