Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
FERN
H e’s dubious.
“Great move,” I say as we’re about to board the private jet.
He gives me an innocent smile. “What?”
Oh, he’s playing the innocent bystander pretty well.
As if I don’t know what he did. This is something Gatsby or Caspian would do to avoid the family.
Heath uses his medical credentials. He’s always at the hospital.
I know that’s a lie. During his downtime he’s usually with his best friend.
Aslan just growls, and people back off. No one bothers Lysander.
Huxley is with one of his friends, and Cory can’t make up excuses. She doesn’t know how to, but that doesn’t mean she’ll stick around if she’s uncomfortable.
I look at him, a little disappointed. “You brought me as an excuse.”
“Excuse?”
“So you could leave almost immediately. I’ve seen that before. It’s great but they’re your family and they need you.”
He scratches his temple. “I see what you’re saying and next time, I’ll use it when they call me. I’m afraid I’m not that smart. We left because there were too many of us in the room and at their house. They don’t need me.”
That’s where he’s wrong. Families need each other. This is an important moment, why avoid it? “You’re uncomfortable with families.”
“Only mine. They can be a handful. You were there when they were blasting you with crazy questions, right? I love them dearly, but I can only take them in small doses.”
And I want to know why this is happening. “When did you start avoiding them?”
He grins. “You sound like a therapist.”
I cross my arms and tap my foot. He’s not diverting this conversation. “When?”
The flight attendant peeks through the plane door and says, “You can board, sir. We’re ready.”
Elliot doesn’t wait, he takes my hand, and we head toward the jet.
Once we’re seated and the jet is about to take off, he says, “My relationship with my mom was fractured the moment she found out that I was a stripper.
She used to treat my friends like sons and suddenly none of them were welcome in her house.
“I was working hard to mend our relationship before she died. I feel like she pushed me out of the family, and it’s hard to make my way back when it was my fault?—”
Suddenly, I’m upset with his mother. After everything he sacrificed, she pushed him away?
I don’t have words for him. Yet, I understand the feeling. My siblings swear I’m Mom’s favorite, and sometimes I feel like she hates me. We have a weird relationship where I’m the parent more often than she is. It upsets her but she can’t be the mother we need anymore.
She likes to hover and tell them what to do, but my brothers and Cory need more than just Dawn asking for the perfect family.I adore her, but when she resents me, I feel like I don’t belong with her or the family… but I would never push away my siblings.
I adore them.
Even if I got into a big fight with Mom, I’d be next to Maia and Gatsby when the tiny Spearman arrives.
“It wasn’t your fault,” I remind him, and I will keep saying that as many times as he needs to hear it.
“I shouldn’t have put work before them.”
And he’s probably right. But that’s what every person in the world does when they feel like it’s the only solution to their problems. If they don’t bust their ass, they can’t bring food to the table.
They have to find a way to provide. He got so wrapped up in that responsibility that he didn’t know how to stop.
“Still not your fault. What if you had been in that car and you had died too?”
He stares at me for a moment and takes my hand. “Let’s not think about the past, okay?”
And I agree with him because thinking about this world without him makes me feel uneasy. So uneasy that I have to run to the bathroom—again.
That flight was the worst I’ve had in a long time. I’ve never been sick on a plane. Today I broke some kind of record.
“Where do you want to eat?”
I groan. “I’m not particularly hungry.”
“We can get to Santa Cruz and grill some steaks,” he suggests.
“Or you can take me home?—”
He scoffs. “After the day you’ve had? Nope. I need to look after you.”
“I’ll be fine, I swear.” Except, right as I’m about to go down the stairs, I do it again. This is going to be a long weekend.