Chapter 42
Chapter forty-two
Ingrid
Sitting in the parking garage of the hospital, I said nothing as Tristian climbed in beside me. He didn’t put the key in the ignition, didn’t move… and we just sat there. For what felt like forever.
“You okay?” he finally asked.
“I-I don’t… know.”
A minute passed. Maybe two.
The garage was almost completely silent except for the distant sound of an elevator somewhere and the low hum of the fluorescent lights overhead. I stared at the concrete wall in front of us.
“Can I ask you something?” I said, and he nodded from the corner of my eye. “How did it feel,” I asked, quietly staring ahead. “The first time you felt like you lost her.”
He didn’t answer right away.
“Like the world was falling apart,” he said finally. “And nobody else noticed. Everything kept moving… the hospital, the doctors, the machines—and I stood there thinking, she’s already gone. And nobody’s saying it.”
“You never said it.”
“If you don’t acknowledge your nightmares… they aren’t real.”
“My mother watched me live a nightmare with my father… but she never acknowledged me.” Tears came to my eyes. “Did you ever get used to it?” I asked. “Losing someone you loved more and more each day?”
His hand found mine, clutching it tight. “No,” was all he said.
I looked down at our hands, my cheeks growing wet as I smiled softly.
“I remember when Camila and I were little. I was five… maybe six. When I couldn’t sleep I’d leave our room and go find Mama… And she let me climb in beside her and Papa. Never said anything or asked what was wrong, just pulled the covers over me and held me till I fell asleep between them.”
I shook my head. “Then one day, the door was locked. Thought it must’ve been Papa that put a stop to it, but he was always away on business. And that door never opened again. I held onto that for years. Like if she held me once she could do it again.”
Tristian rubbed the back of my hand. “And she never did,” I continued.
“After that it was just distance. I grieved her more every day even though she was still living.” I let out a tired shrug, more tears springing to my eyes.
“She’s dying though,” I said softly. “So I guess… I get to grieve her for real this time.”
A few more moments passed and Tristian let go of my hand as he opened the car door. I wiped my face, confused, pressing the back of my hand against my eyes, trying to pull myself together. A second later my door opened.
He stood there and held out his hand.
I took it and he pulled me out and straight into him, one arm around my back, one hand cradling my head, pressing me into his chest without a single word. I gripped the front of his jacket and let myself stay there. Let myself breathe him in, feel him against me.
He held me through all of it. Hand moving slow through my hair. Not telling me it was okay. Not rushing me through the moment, because in some way, I knew he needed this too.
The car ride over to my childhood home was silent. Tristian sat beside me. He’d grabbed my hand in his, gently squeezed my fingers.
I still couldn’t really process what was going on. Still couldn’t get over the fact that I finally stood up to my father or what Mr. Locke had said about my mother. She was dying…
“If you’re not ready yet, Ingrid, it’s okay,” Tristian said softly. “It’s been a long day. You don’t have to do this now.”
Shaking my head, I breathed out deeply, trying to force my tears back, looking up at the picture-perfect home, the facade of the model family. His thumb swept over my knuckles gently, “I endured… so much pain to keep the peace. I kept secrets to keep our family together… I—I did my part.”
“You did do your part, I know that, baby… But sometimes, we can only do so much. We can only take so much.”
“She could’ve stopped him,” I said, my voice breaking. “She could’ve told me if she was sick. She knew. And she let it all happen anyway.”
Tristian’s thumb gently traced the back of my hand like it was the only way to keep me sane. “You needed her to be the safe parent, the one you could rely on,” he said quietly. “But she wasn’t. And that’s not your fault.”
I shook my head. “I needed her to love me,” I whispered. “Love isn’t supposed to feel like abandonment.”
He stayed silent, the words hitting hard as I was reminded of our own experience where I almost felt abandoned by him. Where my attachment issues got the better of me. But I squeezed his hand back silently to tell him I was still here, that I forgave him because he was still here.
“I won’t let my mother keep pretending that everything… that everything is okay. I need to do this, for me.”
He nodded once. “I can go in with you…” he muttered.
But I shook my head. “No… you just being here is enough. I’ll be back,” I said softly, and he nodded, watching as I stepped out of the car and walked up the familiar driveway of my old home.
The front door groaned as I pushed it open, a sound that used to send a spike of terror through my gut.
But the house was silent now—a pristine, curated mausoleum dedicated to the lie of a happy family.
Every polished surface felt like a mockery, every framed photo proof of the secrets buried beneath the floorboards.
I walked through the house, feeling like an intruder almost. My footsteps barely made a sound on the hardwood floor.
But on the inside, I was screaming and crying.
I found her in the kitchen, seated at the island. Tea in hand, hair perfectly done, back straight, poised like always. She looked up when she heard me. Didn’t say anything, and for a moment, I didn’t either.
“…I went to see him,” I said finally.
She didn’t ask who, but she didn’t have to. Her shoulders tensed. “How is he?” she asked, looking back down at the mug.
“How is he? He’s… he’s in prison for domestic abuse.” My voice cracked. But I didn’t flinch.
She blinked slowly before she took a gentle sip of her tea.
“And you?” she asked, her voice soft. “Are you okay?”
I stared at her. My jaw tightened. It was the first time she’d asked me that in years. And it felt more like a formality than a question.
“No,” I forced out, more tears threatening to spill from my tired eyes. “No, I’m not okay. My father is in prison for abusing me.”
The words hung there. I half expected her to do… well, I didn’t know what she would do. I didn’t, however, expect her to continue drinking her tea without batting a single eyelash.
“How… How can you still pretend everything is okay?” I choked out.
She was silent. She just sat there, a hollow porcelain doll, while her daughter bled out in front of her from wounds she had helped create.
“I was a child,” I whispered. “I was your child. And he… he made me feel like I was nothing. And you let him. You watched him break me, and all you ever did was turn away.”
She finally set her mug down, delicately. Like she didn’t want it to spill over. Unlike me.
“I didn’t know what to do,” she said, barely above a whisper.
“You didn’t try to do anything,” I snapped.
“You didn’t hold me when I needed you. You didn’t ask me if I was okay.
You didn’t even look at me when I cried myself to sleep every night.
Or when he took his anger out on me.” Bitterly, I added, “Or Camila. Because everything that happened to me, happened to her first. You just stood by while he hurt us. You let him.”
She looked away. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“Maybe that you’re sorry for not being there for me. Maybe… maybe that you’re sorry I had to keep our family together on my own, forcing the tears down with a smile on my face. Maybe you could tell your daughter you’re sorry for not protecting her.”
Her lip trembled. But she didn’t say the words. Not even then. She just looked at me… like I was someone she didn’t know. Like I was too much to face.
“I’m sorry you feel that way,” she offered weakly.
I shook my head. “That’s not the same as being sorry,” I whispered, still waiting, wanting her to say the words that would make this all okay.
But she just looked through me, her eyes as empty as our home.
The woman I had spent a lifetime trying to please was nothing more than a ghost—a shadow cast by the man who had truly ruined us both.
“I waited for you,” I said. “Every time he raised his voice. Every time I had to make myself smaller just to get through the day. I thought, maybe one day… maybe today would be the day you’d say something. Do something.”
A tear slipped down my cheek. I didn’t bother to wipe it. “But you never did.”
She stood from the chair, pulling the cardigan tighter around her body before placing the mug in the sink, her back to me as she stared out of the window into the garden, the shallow, manicured garden that hid all the deadly thorns behind fragile roses.
Even now, she couldn’t face what she’d done. Or what she hadn’t.
“I went to visit Tristian’s mom in the hospital with him today…” I said. “And Noah... he said—” I swallowed hard, throat tight. “Is it true… are—are y-you...”
She didn’t turn, just carried on looking out into the world beyond the window as she said simply, “I have a brain tumor… It’s inoperable.”
The confession hung in the air. She’d delivered the news with the same clinical detachment she’d used to ignore my screams.
“How long?” I managed.
“Six months,” she said. “Maybe less.”
I stared at her back. The same back that used to face me in every argument.
Every time I cried, she walked away. Every moment I begged for attention, and got nothing but the cold turn of her shoulder.
Still, even now, confronted with her inaction in the face of all my father had unleashed on me and Camila as she stood by, and the admission of the tumor that would inevitably kill her, my mother still would not try to make things right with her daughter. She still wouldn’t turn to face me.
I took a deep, shaky breath. “I hope when you see him again,” I said, my voice flat and resigned, “you’re reminded of the daughter who kept hoping you’d love her someday.”
…Still nothing.
So I left her there… exactly where she’d always been, facing everything but me.
Going back out into the cold, I found Tristian against the dark gleam of his Mercedes, his silhouette broad and lethal, tracking the front door until I emerged. The moment our gazes locked, the predatory tension in his shoulders released, replaced by relief.
I found myself in his embrace again, with no more tears left to cry, no more sadness, just silence, pain, and the warmth of his comforting grip.
His arms wrapped around me tight as he nuzzled his face in my hair like I was the only thing left in this world grounding him, just as he was for me.
The weight kept me steady on the ground, reminding me that things would be okay even if they weren’t.
I let out another shaky breath. He didn’t ask for details, not that I would be able to voice anything at this point.
For a little while, he just held me.
I pressed my forehead to his chest and closed my eyes.
“You were right…” I whispered. “She didn’t tell me what I needed to hear, but… I said what I needed to say to her.”
He kissed the top of my head. “You don’t have to explain. Whatever you said, doll, that was enough,” he whispered.
That was enough… And somehow… it was.