Chapter 11 #3
“Caleb,” I said softly as I put my hands out. Despite not seeing any blood on Caleb’s arm or on the blade of the knife, I was more scared than I’d ever been.
Tears streamed down Caleb’s face. “I didn’t lie!” he shouted. “I didn’t, Jace!”
“I know you didn’t, Caleb. Please put the knife down.”
He looked at the blade as if just then realizing he had it. “It hurts too much,” he whispered. “It’s too much.”
“Baby, look at me,” I urged, even as I took another step toward him. Caleb raised his eyes.
“I promised you I wouldn’t do it again,” Caleb said softly. “I… I lied about that, but I… I don’t want to let you down.”
“Nothing you say or do could ever let me down. And I knew it would be hard for you to promise me that for real. But look at yourself, Caleb. You had the chance, but you stopped yourself. I don’t care why you did, I just care that you did.”
He seemed confused and I had no doubt it was because there was just too much going through him at the moment. “Tell me about the letter,” I said as I closed the distance between us.
Caleb shook his head. “He… he called me. From prison. Six months ago. I don’t know how he got my number, but he told me he missed me and that he wasn’t mad and that he loved me more than anything. He sounded like…”
“Your dad?” I offered.
Caleb nodded. “He started to cry and tell me he was sorry and that he didn’t understand why I wanted to hurt him. He thought I hated him, but… but I didn’t. I did write him a letter and I told him I was sorry, but I didn’t say anything about lying to the police.”
Caleb’s voice kept going higher and higher as the desperation took over. He was waving the knife around.
“I was sorry he was in jail! I was sorry I put him there, but I just wanted him to stop!”
“People believe you, Caleb,” I offered.
“They don’t!” he shouted. “That reporter said Eli and I made all this up to get back at my dad! She didn’t mention the videos! Or Nick!”
Caleb suddenly took several steps back from me, but I got the feeling it wasn’t to escape me. More because he needed to move.
“I shouldn’t have said anything!” he yelled. “I should have destroyed that flash drive.”
I knew he was talking about the flash drive his brother had copied some of the videos of Jack assaulting all three boys onto. The videos that had gotten thrown out of court on a technicality.
“No—”
“Things could have gone back to normal! Maybe Nick would still be alive if he hadn’t… if he hadn’t…”
“What, Caleb? Hadn’t what?”
“Tried to protect me,” he whispered.
“You think that’s why Nick copied the videos?” I asked.
Caleb nodded. “He kept asking me if my dad was doing that shit to me and I kept telling him no. I promised I’d tell him if my dad ever touched me.
I think he used the threat of leaking the videos to keep my dad from messing with me.
But it didn’t stop him and I was too ashamed to tell Nick that I couldn’t say no. ”
“What happened to Nick isn’t your fault,” I said.
“He’s dead because he walked in on me and my dad. If I’d just told him the truth—”
“There’s no way to know what would have happened, Caleb,” I said.
He’d calmed considerably, but it didn’t bring me any kind of relief. It was like he was sliding a completely different direction – like he was shutting down before my very eyes.
“Eli would have been okay… he had Mav.” Caleb continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “Nick was planning to move in to the dorms at school. I could have… I could have found a way to live with it.”
“It would have destroyed you, Caleb.”
His eyes lifted to meet mine. “It did anyway, Jace.” He looked at the knife in his hand. “Nick is dead and twelve people looked Eli in the eye and basically told him he deserved what happened to him. How are any of us better off from telling the truth?”
“I know it doesn’t seem like it, but things will get—”
“Don’t,” Caleb cut in. “Don’t tell me it will get better.”
Frustration coursed through me because I really didn’t know what to tell him. Platitudes about him having a bright future meant shit at this point. He was hurting now . His efforts to do the right thing were being thrown back in his face now .
He didn’t need promises about the future. He needed them for now.
And I had no fucking clue how to give him that.
I watched in silence as Caleb carefully put the knife on the bed. “I need some air,” he whispered.
“Caleb,” I began, but he pushed me away when I reached for him and stepped past me.
I followed and stopped in the doorway between the bedroom and kitchen when I saw him start picking up the contents of the drawer he’d spilled in an effort to get to the knife.
I was about to go help him when he stilled in the process of reaching for a spoon.
I followed the path of his gaze and knew instantly what he was looking at.
I felt my insides twist as he ignored the spoon and went to where the plastic bags were sitting discarded by the steps leading above deck. One of them had spilled and the shock of bright pink was hard to miss against the backdrop of white plastic.
Caleb reached for the package. He had his back to me, but I didn’t miss his next words.
“Sno Balls,” he whispered.
I’d bought the treats to put a smile on his face, but instead, he began sobbing.
And I knew this time it wasn’t about his father and the terrible events of the morning.
“Why?” Caleb cried between sobs. He turned to face me, the package of Sno Balls clenched between his fingers.
But I didn’t have an answer for him.
I was completely clueless to understand why I had to keep him at arm’s length, but I couldn’t let him go, either.
All I knew was that I was a piece of shit for doing this to him again.
I’d done it when I’d first gotten him out of the hospital and again at Christmas later that year.
I’d been a selfish asshole who’d wanted to relish how good being around him made me feel, even though I’d known I wouldn’t be sticking around.
And I’d done it again the previous week when I’d all but forced him to come with me after the attack at the cabin.
He would have been safe with Mav and Memphis and his extended family back home, but I’d selfishly wanted the old Caleb back.
I’d wanted to be the one who made him feel safe and warm and protected.
I’d wanted to benefit from his kind heart and guileless laugh.
I’d wanted to have a little bit of that rightness back in my life that I’d only ever felt around him.
When I didn’t answer him, he shook his head. “I can’t do this,” he managed to get out. “It hurts worse.”
His words sliced me open. The fact that my actions could hurt him even more deeply than all the shit he was going through was threatening to make me violently ill .
“I need to go home,” he said, his voice an odd mix of hurt and resolve.
I needed to agree with him. I needed to do what was best for him and let him go. I needed to find the words to tell him I was sorry for not being able to keep my promise and make things better for him. But the reality that I would likely never see him again was strangling me.
There were a lot of things I needed to do, but I didn’t do any of them. I didn’t say the right thing and I didn’t tell him it was okay and that I was sorry. No, what came out of my mouth as I strode toward him was a sign of my complete and utter desperation… and my cruelty.
“I need to cash in my chips.” The words sounded strangled and I wondered if I’d even said them out loud. I knew I must have when Caleb’s eyes went wide. He backed up several steps until his back hit the wall next to the steps leading above deck.
I didn’t stop until I had him crowded up against the unforgiving wood. I clasped his face with my hands. I searched his eyes for fear, but there was none.
Only a hint of confusion and…
Trust .
That goddamn unflappable trust.
“Please, Caleb, tell me it’s okay.”
His skin felt wonderfully warm beneath my hands. His hands had come up to grab my wrists, but he wasn’t trying to push me away. His lips parted deliciously, but he didn’t speak.
He didn’t need to.
The fervent nod he gave me was answer enough.