Chapter 6
Phoenix
“Wait, what the hell is going on here?” I cry out in complete shock, my anger already beginning to build inside of me because this is nuts! They know each other?! How is this even possible?
Neither one of them looks at me, they’re too busy holding onto one another like their lives depend on it, which only exacerbates my fury. I can’t figure out what they are to one another - old partners, friends, or lovers? Surely, Jessie, the recluse, wouldn’t be the type of girl to cheat on her boyfriend with a stranger in the middle of a stormy night, would she?
“Jake!” I growl, folding my arms before I do something more destructive with them. “You better answer me, asshole, because I’m about two seconds away from losing my shit altogether!”
Only after I threaten my cousin does he eventually let go of her and return his gaze to me, looking a little defiant and ready to give as good as me if he has to. In the space of minutes, we’ve become a couple of dogs pissing around the strange girl in front of us, the one who was abducted at the age of eleven for nearly six or seven years. Take a chill pill, Phoenix, be the adult here.
While me and Jake are having a face-off, Jessie is trying to curl up as small as possible, bracing herself for the two thugs in front of her to go to town on one another. At the sight of her soft, frightened eyes, I step back and put my hands out in front of me, which shocks Jake because I’m certainly not one to usually back down. Something about this damaged girl has me softening. In fact, I feel like a complete tool for losing my shit in front of her in the first place, because the last thing she needs is conflict in her life.
“Jake,” I say a little more gently, though it pains me, “will you please explain how you know Jessie so I can try to keep my anger in check.”
I then nod my head her way, to which he looks and slumps a little with a guilty expression, seemingly releasing some of the same adrenaline coursing through his body.
“Jessie and I kind of grew up together,” he mutters at the same time as she releases a small whimper, “she’s my sister…of sorts.”
I feel my face screwing up tightly while I pinch the bridge of my nose, unable to comprehend what the hell he’s talking about. His mother, Ruth, died before he could talk; nobody knew who his father was. The only parent he had in his life was his creepy stepfather, a hippy kind of a dude from what I remember, a man named Robert Jackson. As far as everybody knew, he and Jake went to live across the country to be near his sister and her husband so they could help him raise Jake and her kids together
“Wait, her parents live together in New England, I saw their picture up in her house,” I finally say. “Is her dad your secret father? Did he have an affair with your mother?”
I notice Jessie start to shake her head sadly, and given the look on Jake’s face, that’s not the secret answer to this conundrum.
“R-Robert,” Jake starts, now turning pale, and looking just as scared as a now trembling Jessie, “Robert is the guy who took Jessie…when she was eleven.”
“Shit!”
“Yeah!”
“Wait, back the fuck up,” I gasp rather ungraciously, “you mean to tell me your trippy stepfather is responsible for abducting a child when she was innocently walking home from school?”
“Yes,” he snaps as I run my hands uncomfortably down my face, not quite able to make sense of all this. I then look over to the quivering girl on the bed for some sort of confirmation, but she only hides her face beneath her long hair, crying and distraught over the mention of the asshole’s name.
“And you were there?” I ask, again, trying hard not to sound like I’m accusing him of anything.
“Not when he took her, no, I was too busy being locked up inside of his basement, waiting for him to deliver me a ‘sister’. We were both trapped in that basement, Phoenix, both prisoners of this weird pervert,” he cries, now with tears streaming down his face. I suddenly grow cold, wondering what the hell happened during those six years. “But I never let him touch her, Phoenix, I never let him do anything to her, I promise!”
“Ok, Jake,” I reassure him before crossing the gap between us and wrapping my arms around his shoulders so he can break down inside of them. “I believe you, man, of course you wouldn’t. It’s ok, Jake, you did a good job, trust me.”
“I was only fifteen, she was eleven,” he sobs. “He had tried to take others, but I had always been there to stop him, to try and talk him out of it. But the day he took Jessie and her friend, he kept me locked at home, down in that stinking basement; what could I do Phoenix?!”
“It’s ok, Jake, there’s nothing you could have done,” I whisper into his ear while I eye Jessie now falling apart on top of Lou’s bed. “I’m proud of you for looking after her, Jake. Look, she’s still alive and she didn’t have to endure what he could have done to her, and that’s all thanks to you.”
He looks back at her and immediately breaks free from my grasp so he can go and hold her again. I sigh heavily, feeling sick while strangely wanting to be part of the relationship they have, but instead, I walk over to the door to leave.
“Do you guys want anything?” I ask before I walk away.
“No, we’re good, Phoenix,” Jake says as he finally releases his tight grip so he can hold her hand; she refuses to even acknowledge me. “We’ll come out later; thanks, man.”
I simply nod, linger for a moment or two, and then leave.
_____
Jessie
I don’t know how much time passes by, being locked inside of Jake’s arms, but it feels like a lifetime. He feels just as warm as his cousin, while I remain cold, even in this much hotter climate. Jake’s tears dry up, just like when we were trapped inside of that basement. In fact, he very rarely let me see his pain when we were growing up with one another under forced circumstances. I always felt bad for him, having to be so strong because I was weaker. I’d often feel guilty for falling apart in front of him, but then, there was nowhere to privately let it all out, apart from behind a makeshift curtain that provided the only barrier between our room and a small bathroom. A girl going through puberty as well as being abducted meant it took me a while to get a hold of my emotions.
Jake’s fingers trail up and down my back as I burrow my face against his chest, until eventually, his breath steadies and I realize he’s fallen asleep. The poor boy looks exhausted, perhaps from his meltdown or just life, I can’t tell. As I study him with concern, I notice he’s looking pale, almost sickly, not how I remember him. He always looked so tanned, and on the rare occasion we laughed, he would have a small twinkle in his eye. Jake is the only part of that life I miss; everything else is a nightmare I try desperately hard to forget.
When I feel it’s safe to move without waking him, I tiptoe toward the door and wander out into the living area to try and find something to eat. I don’t eat a lot; I rarely have an appetite. However, I need at least something to keep functioning, so I have no choice but to engage with the outside world. Thankfully, the room is empty, though I can hear banging and crashing with the odd chuckle coming in from the bar area, so I try to keep as quiet as I can. First, I head to the cupboards where I manage to find some cereal, only to become stumped when the fridge offers nothing but a half-eaten packet of ham, a carton of orange juice, and what looks like an energy drink.
My grandmother used to eat her cornflakes with orange juice, which I always thought was weird…and gross. When I asked her why she didn’t have milk, she said it was because she was trying to keep the pounds off. She was seventy-six when she told me this, and being only eight, I accepted it without question. But now I have to question when the worrying stops; when do you finally give into just accepting who you are and being happy with it? Will this all-consuming anxiety that spreads through my chest like a plague ever end? I suppose my fears are somewhat more complex than having milk on my cereal. Perhaps if life had been normal, I too would worry about my weight to the point of analyzing each and every mouthful. Would I be any happier?
I pour the cereal into a bowl, grab a glass of OJ, and head straight over to the couch, giving over to the fact that I’ll just have to eat my cornflakes dry. As the flakes begin to stick to the roof of my mouth in a sticky, dry kind of texture, the door bursts open from the bar and the hulking figure of Warren walks in, muttering things to himself while hauling a huge crate over his shoulder. The sight of his strength, the ease with which he lifts such heavy loads, stirs strange feelings inside of me; the same I had felt on the first night I had seen his naked torso covered in a myriad of tattoos, and…that phoenix.
I remain huddled in a frozen lump of nerves on top of the couch, my spoon still floating around in the air, just waiting for the moment when he finally notices me.
“You want some milk with those?” he asks, surprising me because he hasn’t yet looked at me. When he finally brings his eyes my way, he must notice my surprise because he smirks smugly to himself. His arrogance only makes those feelings return full force, to the point whereby I drop my spoon with a loud clatter inside of the bowl. “Jess, not only did I have a career in being a paid assassin, but my sister was also just as quiet and unassuming as you once upon a time; in fact, she was mute until she was six.”
“Oh,” I manage to reply before averting my eyes away from the sight of his skin, which is now slightly red from exertion, with a thin layer of perspiration covering his brow, and a vein that is still raised from lugging that crate around on his shoulder. Strength against weakness; warmth against coldness; the wolf against a mouse.
“Jake asleep?” he asks as he switches on the coffee machine, the sound snapping me out of my thoughts; the images of what we must have looked like on that stormy night.
“He is,” I reply, “completely wiped out.”
“Can I ask you something?” he says, then smirks when I simply shrug with a non-committal nod of my head. “Were you ever more than…er…friends?”
Something about his question irks me, which is probably unfair because he wouldn’t have any idea how it felt growing up with someone under those circumstances. To me, his question is tantamount to asking him if he ever had sexual feelings toward his sister. But to him, Jake and I are just a completely unrelated boy and girl, living in close proximity while trying to survive a terrifying ordeal. So, although I want to snap back at him to mind his own Goddamn business and not be such a sick bastard, I simply shake my head.
“I’m sorry,” he says, sounding genuine as he turns around to grab a couple of cups from the cupboard. “Coffee?”
“Please,” I reply, “thank you, Warren…Phoenix?”
He laughs softly to himself, shaking his head before passing over the cup of hot coffee to my awaiting hands. I hold it close to my chest because I’m still that cold.
“Everyone calls me Phoenix around here,” he says, “but Warren is the name on my birth certificate, so…”
“Why ‘Phoenix’?” I ask, because with the tattoo and everything else I’ve come to learn about him, it surely has to mean something.
“Because everyone has their battle scars, Jess,” he replies cryptically, “why ‘Jessie’?”
“W-what do you mean?” I ask nervously, wanting to avoid the question altogether.
“Well, given that you were once called Niamh, I guess I’m curious as to why you would change it,” he says, shrugging like it’s no big deal. “It wasn’t hard to find out and if you think it will keep you safe from your demons, trust me, it won’t.”
“Jessie was my grandmother’s name,” I reply a little sheepishly, feeling embarrassed all of a sudden, “I changed it when I returned…h-home.”
“Well, Jessie, if Jake’s asshole stepfather is still alive, I’m guessing he’s already found out about your name change, especially as it’s likely to be him who hired me through a third party. We’re going to have to be more cautious than that. I don’t want you going anywhere without me, not even outside. We can call your parents but that’s it,” he says authoritatively. “Do you understand me?”
“I wouldn’t know who else to call anyway,” I mutter against my mug, “and going outside is something I don’t tend to do unless I really have to.”
“I’m going out on the bike in an hour or so, do you wanna come?” he asks, finishing off his drink and then chucking his mug noisily into the sink. I instantly jump at the sound, even though I knew it was coming.
“No thank you,” I reply.
“Ok then, Jessie,” he sighs and begins walking toward the door, but for some unknown reason, I feel the need to stop him.
“I didn’t change my name because of him,” I say quietly, with half of me hoping he won’t hear.
“No?” he responds once he’s turned to face me again, crossing his arms and tensing up all his muscles.
“It was to try and become someone else, someone new, someone stronger,” I explain while looking at the frayed edges of his rug. “My grandmother was one of the strongest women I had ever known. I thought I could become her, but I guess it didn’t work too well.”
“Strength comes in different forms, Jessie,” he says, making me look up at him. “Sometimes the biggest, broadest men are quivering little boys inside. Whereas that woman who has been beaten down so hard? The one who is so anxious about everything but manages to put on a brave face every day? She’s the strongest person you know. If your grandmother’s name gives you strength, then keep it.”
“Does ‘Phoenix’ give you strength?”
At first, he says nothing, just looks at me like I’ve said something completely alien to him. But then he glances at the wall behind me, for just a moment, right before bringing his eyes back to meet mine.
“Phoenix gives other people strength,” he finally replies, “doesn’t mean that’s who I really am though.”
“May I call you Warren then?” I all but whisper, though his looking back at the wall behind me, averting his gaze from mine, followed by a tight smile, tells me he heard well enough.
“If that brings you strength, Jessie,” he says, sounding sad for some reason, “then sure.”
Without another word or look my way, he turns and walks back through the door as though he’s trying to get out of here as fast as possible. I get the impression he is escaping before I can make him feel any more uncomfortable. I sigh because I’ve been making people feel that way ever since I returned home, back when I was seventeen. My parents especially. Though they try to hide it, it’s more than obvious, particularly to someone who has had to learn to read human behavior, to know when to keep quiet, when to answer, and when to hide.
When I’m able to shake this feeling of inadequacy aside, I find myself turning to look at the same wall he had been staring at, to see what had managed to give him just a little bit of strength to answer me just now. It’s a picture of who I assume are his parents, both of whom look young and very much in love. His father is staring at his mother, whereas she is staring right at me, with her arms flung around his neck. I get the impression they’re no longer around, and that the paid assassin, bad-ass biker with warrior tattoos and a nickname that is supposed to make him strong, is completely lost without them.