Chapter 25
TWENTY-FIVE
AURORA
Finding a kickboxing gym that’s open all hours within fifty miles of the Heights wasn’t easy. Actually, it was impossible. The one I found was in the closest thing the Smokies has to a big city, it was closer to a hundred miles away, and I drove straight to it.
Stopped at the first mall I found, went into Lululemon and bought a few days’ worth of clothes, changed into some in the dressing room. Walked around barefoot, mascara on my cheeks until I found a store that sold acceptable footwear and grabbed some white sneakers and socks.
Unlike New York, where people won’t stop to ask if you’re okay even if you’re bleeding out—they’ll just move you out of their way if you’re blocking traffic and keep on going—I forgot how damned hospitable people are in the South. Even my bitchiest face didn’t keep at least three different women and one kind older man from checking in on me. When I snarled at them, though, that did the trick. My mouth might’ve been foaming, which probably helped my case.
After a quick stop at the drugstore for essentials, I check into the nearest hotel that doesn’t scream cockroaches (I couldn’t find one that screamed mimosas and massages or I would’ve gone there), drop off my new bags and my old clothes, then scrub my face until all evidence of the tears are gone. Just a red, raw face, and one absolutely ruined woman remain. The remnants of the woman I used to be. Both Rory and Aurora have been shattered in one day.
I’ve forgotten what it’s like to be a prisoner in your own mind.
Not even two months here and I’d gotten used to the peace that has crept up and blessed me. It was so gradual, I hardly noticed the shift until it all came slamming back into me, first with Lexi, then the dressing down my mother gave me, realigning the last decade and a half of my life, and then again with Wyatt’s words tonight.
Like when you never knew you’d had a headache for all those years, until it’s gone?
I think this was the opposite. The effect Wyatt had on me was so gentle, so subtly pervasive, I didn’t even realize that my cruelest thoughts have hardly barraged me at all until they erupted at full force again.
Tonight, they’re so vivid, so sharply penetrating, they ram past my usual barriers. No amount of stimulation, of attempting to distract myself with my surroundings seems to be helping. In fact, they rage louder with the new, firsthand knowledge of how badly I hurt everyone I used to care about.
It’s all I can do to make it to the kickboxing gym, fill out a membership form, and buy the gear I didn’t bother bringing with me from New York. I couldn’t tell you how long passes once I find an open corner and get a bag to myself. I’d say it was minutes, but when I get a glimpse at myself in the mirror after a concerned employee suggests I go home and sleep, I’m pretty sure it’s been hours.
My hair is drenched, matted to my skull, and the ponytail to my upper back. My face isn’t red, it’s drained of all color. I look like I’ve been in a sauna instead of a gym. I look like I belong in The Walking Dead . And I don’t realize how tired my muscles are until I try to move my limbs to get back to the hotel and they don’t cooperate.
The Cutlass picks this time, tonight, to decide it’s done with my shit, too, just like everyone else in my life. I leave it in the parking lot and get an Uber to take me to the hotel, where I don’t bother showering, and cry out whatever moisture remains in my body until it finally shuts down on me too.
Almost two days of sleep. Another kickboxing workout. Force myself to eat something, because Wyatt isn’t here to do it. Then another twelve hours of sleep, another couple workouts. Ignore my phone through all of it, not even bothering to charge it, or look at it, beyond the initial email I sent off to the firm that I wouldn’t be available for some time.
Eventually, my mind quiets. I think it’s day three of being here. Or maybe week three?
I’d be worried about my mom, about something happening to her, if I didn’t know she has Duke, she has Lexi, and she probably has the entire town behind her now.
And if I didn’t know that I’m the biggest asshole in her life, in Lexi’s, and in Wyatt’s. In fact, there’s no one I’ve ever loved whose life I haven’t fucked up. Whose future I haven’t darkened. Which is why I stayed away.
I may have left out of self-preservation, but I stayed away out of the one small part of my heart that’s good. The part of me that knows I’m bad news, and none of them deserve my selfishness inflicted on them any more than they’ve already been subjected to.
And when I got overly optimistic? Forget what my past behavior has done to them? That’s when my hopes finally made an appearance. Until all three of them made it incredibly clear to me the type of effects I’ve had on their lives, and I remembered where I belong. Away from them.
And if the landline in my hotel room hadn’t rung, I might never have gone back to the Heights.
“’Lo?” I tried to say hello , but I think my vocal cords got buried under some cobwebs after all this disuse.
“Aurora, hon? Oh, thank fuck.” Trevor’s voice goes from panicked to relieved when he recognizes mine.
“Trevor?”
“When you get back, we’re going to have words about you dropping off the face of the earth. Where is your phone? Is it okay? Are you okay?”
“I dunno.” I’m not sure which of his questions I answered, I think all of them. “What’s going on, why are you calling me?”
“What, I don’t get a ‘wow, how’d you find me’ moment to showcase my glorious PI skills? You could at least give me that much.” Been a while since I’ve heard that Eastern seashore accent.
“Fine,” I say, a begrudging chuckle freeing itself from the shackles of my misery. I put on an affected tone to participate. After all, he’s what’s waiting for me back in New York, no need to burn that bridge too. “How ever did you find me, Trevor?”
“Shit, Aurora.” He whistles, either really impressed, or really un impressed. “All that enthusiasm, you’re lucky you don’t get the Keynote presentation on it. Tell ya what. For your overzealous interest in how I tracked you down, I’ll give you three options, and let you believe whichever one makes you feel safe at night. One, I got IT to ping the IP address you sent the last email from. Two, I tracked the GPS chip in your laptop to a location near the hotel you’re in and had to call eight others before I found you there. Or three, I’m psychic.”
Even my Eeyore-channeling ass can’t not give him a small laugh at that. “Fuck, Trevor, what do you want? Can’t a girl take personal time?”
He pauses for a moment before asking, “Is your mom okay?”
“I think so.”
“Are you okay?”
“Been better.”
“Will good news cheer you up?”
“Better be some great fucking news.”
“Would I have tracked you down just to say the muffin guy started bringing extra banana nut?”
“What the fuck is your news, Trevor? Jesus Christ, you’re acting like you’re billing me by the damn minute, here. And don’t even think about trying that shit on me.”
He chuckles, but quickly stops when he presumably picks up on my icy demeanor through the phone. “So. Our pet project. Turns out there’s a lot more they’ve fucked with in that town you claim not to love than just that bar, and the senior partners have a strategy in mind …”
I might be going back to the Heights one more time, but it’s to do what’s right. To bad bitch up and help Duke, and hopefully my mom, and to stick to my original promise I made to her.
All it took was my mother, my sister, and my ex all letting loose on me in one day with how they really feel to see that I was delusional to think I could build a life in this town after I left it the way I did. But me, my firm, and this new plan? We can help some folks out majorly .
However long I have left in the Heights, I’ll do what I can for my mom, do what I can to get this motion underway, and then I’ll get back to New York, where I’ll finish this out from there.
Where everyone I care about here will be safe from me and the tornado of destruction I apparently bring with me. And if I get to improve their quality of life, restitute the wrongs done to them by this one colossal fuckwad of a corporation—the bank that services most of the residents of Smoky Heights, this reverse Robin Hood thing they’ve got going on—hopefully that’s some lasting positivity I can leave in my wake this time. One final attempt to right the ways I’ve wronged so many people here.
For the first time since that night at the garage my head isn’t spinning. I’ve had the time and space to reflect, to see the ways I’ve hurt Wyatt, my mom, my sister, probably others I used to be close to, and I know what I’m walking back into this time. I’m not the martyr in their story, I’m the one with the scarlet letter. I earned every bit of shame and contempt these people hold for me, that I hold for myself. But I’m determined to do what’s in my power to help all of them.
I grab an apple crisp macchiato—giving cider vibes with the best coffee has to offer—before I hit the road in my newly acquired rental, wrapped up in a new zip-up and matching yoga pants to give me a little warmth in the rapidly dropping temperatures.
Looking out my hotel window this morning, the grass wasn’t dewy, it was frosty. And the open windows on this drive confirm that fall is well and truly here. We’re past the sixty-degree days and the fifty-degree nights. This unseasonable chill tells me the first snow might be here before Christmas this year, a rare treat in the Smokies. In fact, the only place prettier than New York in the winter just might be Smoky Heights, as the seasons change from crisp air to nippy nights in front of a fire.
It’s just about an hour-long drive once I’m off the interstate as I come back from my hideout, a gorgeous path on winding roads, the passing trees doing their best to hold onto their last leaves, in auburn, maroon, gold, and the final greens, as the wind tries to carry them away.
Crossing through the southern Welcome to Downtown Smoky Heights arch, I see downtown is what I think the locals might call bustling . A handful of people on either side of Main, in and out of the brick storefronts (at least the ones that are still open), including Ernie who’s sat himself in front of the hardware shop and looks like he’s decided to start telling stories on the side of the road now, because the folks in the bar have heard ’em enough, I guess. Mrs. Dixon is holding court at a table in the front window of the coffee shop, Foamy Heights, an audience of other old biddies hanging onto her every word. It might not be the Upper West Side, but it’s got charm, I’ll admit that much.
I park in the lot at the end of Main Street and when I get to Suds I don’t think to use the left-hand door, using the one on the right out of habit and smiling to myself when I feel the smooth underside of the carved wooden handle.
Something about the brisk air, the lingering taste of apples on my tongue, the rustling of the trees that line Main Street, and walking into this place makes me want a beer, so I head over to Dallas behind the empty bar and order two. Is it three o’clock on what my phone (and Trevor) told me is a Wednesday? Sure. But Duke and I have something to celebrate, finally.
Set the beers down and track the old man down in his office. When I lean against the doorjamb, he barely looks up before making a derisive sound.
“So you are alive.”
“Sure am.”
“Your mother wasn’t so sure. Neither was Grady, from what I hear. Would it have killed you to check in with someone?”
“It might have, and I’m sorry for that, but I’m back now.”
“For how long?”
“Jeez, what do you think, you’re my father already? I’m here for as long as Mom will have me, okay? But that’s not what I’m here to talk to you about right now. Can you come out here?”
Duke eyes me wearily but stands anyway, joining me at the high-top in the corner by the pool table that I chose for us. His brows shoot up when he sees the beers, and when I take a seat on the stool and down half of it in one go, like I belong here or something, he gives me an impressed nod.
“Damn that’s good,” I say, smacking my lips.
He moves to follow suit, but I stop him with a look. “We should really be toasting first.”
Those heavy brows of his climb up his forehead again.
“I’d ask if you’re pregnant, but …” Those expressive gray eyes of his fall down to the drink in my hand.
“Hardy har har.”
I clink his glass with mine and let him take a hearty draw before I hit him with the news.
“We got ’em.”
His stare is hopeful, but not ready to assume, so I put his mind at ease.
“Brown Stone. I have it confirmed that we have what we need to get them off your back. And then some.”
“What does that mean?” he asks, that hope expanding out and leaking into his voice now.
I tell him what I can, not everything is ready to be shared publicly yet, not even with family. Nothing is worth risking the integrity of this case we’re building for the people of the Heights.
The next months will contain an extensive discovery period, and hearing this evidently prompts Duke to confirm a fear that’s been developing in me since finding out about his relationship with my mother.
“You know I refinanced the bar,” he says, twirling the empty pint glass between his hands. “Well, I didn’t tell you why. It was paid off years ago. But I took out a new loan on it to help pay for Laura Lee’s medication and treatments. One of those pills she takes is over a thousand dollars each, and that’s just one of a ton of prescriptions she’s got. Even with insurance, we can’t keep up with the costs.”
The tip of my nose wriggles, trying to stop that stinging from spreading, but I fail once again.
“She also refinanced her house, and the adjustable rate on the mortgage got so high she can’t pay it without working again, so I’m helping her as much as I can, but the same thing is happening to me here, plus her hospitalization, the pain management regimen, and …” His somber voice dies out after it breaks for a second time.
“Please let me help in the meantime. If you won’t take my money outright, let me invest in the bar. Something, anything, while we get the paperwork filed to halt their harassment on you here and get this in front of a judge who can stop it for good. It’ll be months before we get our case submitted and get a preliminary hearing scheduled for the residents’ suit, which might be able to do a lot more for you both long-term, but please don’t keep me from helping when I can, Duke.”
My eyes aren’t the only wet ones by the end of my plea. Our conversation lasts a long time—my educated guess would be at least 10 increments, or $800 were I on the clock—and it’s one that refills my cup.
“Do you know how much documentation is required to present a consumer protection suit of this magnitude to the attorney general?” I ask him, and he watches me with something like pride as he shakes his head no. “This is going to be a civil suit bigger than this neck of the woods has ever seen. The partners have assigned a significant amount of resources to this project back in New York, but I’ll be boots on the ground for now, and more may come out to gather evidence and statements as needed. Especially after I go back.” Neither of us comment on the elephant in the room, on what has to happen for me to go back.
Duke has a few questions, but mostly he just wants to hear as much as I can share, guffawing in disbelieving laughter at what the initial investigation found, what this means for Suds, and for the entire town.
“You gonna be okay here for however long this takes?” he asks me.
I look down at the table, swirl the last of my beer in the glass before tossing it back and draining it.
“Sure gonna try to be.”
“You’re a great person, Aurora. You hurt a lot of people a long time ago, but you don’t have to hate yourself over it forever. There’s nothing in life you can’t come back from. We all have pasts. We can’t separate ourselves from them. They’re a part of us. Maybe you need to make peace with your past instead of pretending it doesn’t exist. No good person is going to hold it against you when you take accountability for what you did and show you’ve changed. Especially not ones who love you.”
My eyes water again, but he kindly pretends not to notice and keeps talking. “Besides, the only reason it could hurt them so deep in the first place was because they loved you so much to start with. Give them the chance to fall in love with who you are now, while you still have time with them, okay? You’re surrounded by people who have big hearts, let them use them on you. Even if you’re not ready to forgive yourself, they are.”
I hug the man my mother’s always deserved, the one she got many years too late.
I don’t let myself wonder what all of our lives would’ve looked like if they’d found each other sooner, or torture myself emotionally by picturing him as the father figure Lexi and I could’ve used. But I do let his words sink in, healing the first part of that damage I caused in myself when I ran. Restoring the belief that there’s still something good in me, that I might be capable of more than inflicting hurt on the ones that I love.
Forgiveness of self might be a foreign concept for me, that might take years of work, but I’m going to get to work a lot faster on gaining forgiveness from the rest of the people I hurt.
I think this case might be the perfect place to start. For my mom, for the man she loves, and this town they call home.