46. Bailey #3
“Parts of the interview Kiera gave were the truth, but a lot of it wasn’t.
There was so much that went behind my decision to leave.
Kiera’s son, Carter, did reach out to me because he thought we shared a dad.
I didn’t believe him at first until he showed me all of these articles about how Dad was engaged to Kiera.
His age matched up with the timeline, and if I’m being honest, he looked like you, Dad.
I was angry and hurt. I made a mistake when I lit the fire at the house, but I’d found a letter from Dad to you, Mom, and it sounded like an admission.
The fire got out of hand too fast, and I couldn’t stop it. ”
Dad’s face is indecipherable, but the darkness in his eyes shares the quiet fury he’s trying to smother. I can’t tell if he’s mad at me or the situation. It might be both.
“Why didn’t you come talk to us?” Mom asks, keeping her voice calm. I’m impressed by their ability to sit here, letting me explain.
The weight on my shoulders is heavy as I recall the day.
“I tried. Before I came in, I heard you talking about Kiera with Dad, questioning whether she would have set the fire. Dad said something about the engagement, but I still wasn’t convinced.
So I asked if you guys had been together since college, and you lied, saying you had been together the whole time.
If you had been together ever since college, then it wouldn’t have been possible for Dad to have broken off an engagement with Kiera like the articles said. ”
“I-I forgot about that. I replayed so many of our conversations in my head during the time you weren’t here and that one never even dawned on me,” Mom says, shaking her head in disbelief.
“I’m sorry I lied, Bailey. Your father and I have a complicated history, and while it’s part of our story, sometimes it’s easier to leave the past in the past.”
“It’s okay. I get it now. The past just always seems to have a way of being dredged up,” I say before moving on to explain my problems with Hunter, and how he intervened between me and Kait.
Mom sighs as the final pieces of that mystery click into place for her, but I don’t think Hunter’s a bad person.
He just did a bad thing. Hopefully, we’ll get to a place where we can rebuild our relationship.
“The day I found out Kiera had lied was hard. I was angry and hurt, but most of all, I felt guilty. I had painted you as these monsters in my head when it couldn’t be further from the truth.
I’m so sorry,” I admit, shifting uncomfortably.
I know exactly what my parents’ tempers are like, and while they’ve been calm so far, I think the next part will send them over the edge.
“Kiera tried to justify her lies, claiming she meant to tell Carter and I the truth when I showed up, but she saw how much I looked like Dad. She said I acted like you and . . .” I sigh, trying to ground myself by focusing on Kaitlyn’s thumb rubbing back and forth on the back of my hand.
“It was like she had gotten a part of you back, and she didn’t want to let me go. ”
Well, at least I could predict one thing right.
Mom explodes into a combination of French and English, calling Kiera a number of vulgar names that make me feel like I need to clean my ears out.
I don’t catch all of them, but I’m impressed.
It only takes me a second to realize Dad’s frozen, staring at his hands clasped so tightly, his knuckles are white.
He clears his throat, dragging a hand over his jaw, slow to make eye contact with me. It’s not anger on his face like I expected, but regret and fear.
“Bailey . . . fuck .” His breathing is ragged, and the tone of his voice causes Mom to halt in her tracks. “Kiera never . . . she never tried anything with you, right?”
Mortification flames on my face when I realize what he’s asking.
“ No. Dad, no. She never did anything like that,” I blurt out, and a quick glance at Luna tells me how horrified she is.
“She was just . . . nice to me. She made me feel like I was welcome. Sometimes she’d talk about you and ask questions, but it was never more than that. ”
“I’m going to kill her,” Mom says, her voice taking on a lethal tone.
“I’m going to strangle her and then—actually, I don’t know what I’d do next, but I promise to make it extremely painful.
” I can’t believe I’m smiling right now.
It’s just so like her it’s refreshing, breaking the tension of the moment.
Even Kaitlyn giggles quietly next to me.
“Well, technically, if you plan to do anything, this would make it premeditated, which carries a longer prison sentence. It’d be in your best interest if something happens by accident,” Luna thinks out loud, and Mom looks at her in shock.
Lu holds her hands up in defense, her face turning red.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have interrupted, and I know I’m unfortunately her daughter, but I haven’t spoken to her since the day Bailey left.
What she did is unforgivable, but it’s nothing compared to what she did today. ”
I clear my throat, directing a look in my friend’s direction. She’s just trying to help. I know she never meant for any of this to happen.
“Lia, sit down,” Dad says, and I think he might be as ready as I am to get the next part over with. I can’t imagine it’ll be easy to hear his son was a sex worker, but it wasn’t any easier living it.
“We can’t let her get away with this,” Mom argues, not catching the subtle hint he was trying to give.
“We’re not going to let her get away with it. I’m only suggesting you sit down, so Bailey can finish,” Dad says, and I look at Kaitlyn to see how she’s doing.
“Thank you for being here,” I whisper, and she gives me a smile.
“Whatever you need, Walker.”
I don’t think I’d be keeping it together during this if she weren’t next to me.
“Carter asked me to leave. He didn’t want me there, and I can’t blame him, but it wasn’t something I expected.
I didn’t know how to come back and face all of you.
I could barely live with myself for how I’d acted and treated everyone.
So I took buses and found my way to New York.
I didn’t have a plan. I just wandered . I worked in construction when I lived in Charlotte, but I’d paid rent while living with Carter, so I used the leftover money I stole from you to feed myself, buy a winter coat with other necessities, but it ran out.
The shelters are harder than you think they’d be to get into, and I didn’t know what to do.
” My stomach rolls as I think back to the first time I said yes.
“I was sitting on a corner, contemplating whether I was hungry enough to start dumpster diving for leftovers when this guy came up to me.” I can still picture it like it happened yesterday.
I’ll never forget his face. “He asked me how much?” I croak out, struggling to say it out loud.
“Tu vas bien. Je t’aime,” ? 2 Kaitlyn murmurs, and I inhale a few strangled breaths. The room is so quiet you could hear a pin drop.
She loves me. My parents love me. Luna loves me. It’s going to be okay. I’m okay.
“At first, I didn’t know what he was asking, but then it clicked. I could have said no or told him to leave me alone. Instead, I asked if he had a couch I could sleep on that night.”
I didn’t sleep at all that night. I just laid there, staring at the ceiling of this guy’s apartment, the taste of mouthwash potent in my mouth, but I’d been able to wash off the layer of dirt coating my skin.
“It was easy if I shut off my mind, because I didn’t care what happened to me.
It felt like my penance for the pain I inflicted on all of you.
I told myself I deserved everything happening to me because I didn’t just talk to you guys.
Some people were kind, and just struggled with human connection. ”
Don’t look at them. Don’t .
I vaguely register someone moving to sit on the other side of me, reaching to hold it. Luna . She’s heard all this before. She was there for me when I decided to start giving a shit again. To care whether I lived or died.
“I called Luna for help in the middle of the winter because I couldn’t do it anymore.
She drove up, took me to a clinic to get tested to make sure I was okay, and it was the first time since I’d been on the streets where I was treated like a human being.
Luckily, everything came back fine. I refused to take her money, but Lu threatened to stuff it down my throat if I didn’t take it. I didn’t really have a choice.”
“I would have done it,” Lu murmurs next to me. I laugh under my breath, turning to look at her for a moment. I find nothing except warmth and compassion in her face.
“I started staying in homeless encampments instead of on my own. Most of the time people left us alone, but occasionally people would fuck with us for kicks. The scar on my temple is from this group of teenagers who tried to steal my backpack, and shoved me down some stairs to get it. I met Javi a couple weeks after Luna left, and you guys know the rest from there.”
“Thank you, Luna,” Mom says, sniffling. “Thank you for being there for him when we couldn’t be.”
“I’m sorry about my mother, and the part I played in this. I shouldn’t have told Carter anything, but I was angry after everything, he couldn’t even reach out to you himself to ask how you were doing. I’m so fucking sorry.”
I squeeze her hand, hoping she knows I don’t blame her. I’m not happy the whole world knows, but it’s the push I needed to come clean to my parents. I don’t know if I would’ve without it.
“You don’t need to apologize. We hold our own share of the blame for not being honest with our kids when we should’ve been. I’m sorry, Bailey. I’m sorry we failed you, and I hope you can forgive us,” Dad says, his dark eyes shining.
“There’s nothing to forgive,” I say, meaning every word. “We’re Walkers, which means we’re always there for each other.”
I finally understand what it means, and there’s no other family I’d rather belong to.
This is my home.
1 ? It’s okay, my boy. It’s okay.
2 ? You’re okay. I love you.