Chapter 6 #2
Luke paused, the spoon in his hand hovering above a jar of coffee grounds, following my line of sight. A wistful smile pulled at his mouth, but it didn’t reach his eyes.
“That’s my sister, Carrie.”
“Not Leia?” I teased.
“Believe it or not, my parents considered it, but they figured that would be too on the nose, so they went with the actress’s name instead.”
“Uh-huh. Makes sense. Because there’s nothing on the nose about Luke Skylar Walker.”
There it was again, my mouth taking the wheel without permission.
He chuckled. “Trust me, I had that same argument as a kid. But my parents stand by it. They figured it’d be cruel to saddle their daughter with a name that’s only associated with Star Wars.
Too much opportunity for teasing. But when I came along, they were all, Luke is a common enough name to slide under the radar. ”
“Ah, so you aren’t twins.”
“Nope. She was four years older.”
The way he spoke in the past tense hit like a pin drop in a silent room. “Was?”
Luke’s jaw clenched. My shoulders drew tight in reflex, my breath halting in my chest. That expression visited me in my nightmares.
Now you’ve done it. He’s going to get mad and you’ll deserve it for running your big mouth and asking questions you have no right to.
Did you never learn that curiosity kills the cat and to mind your own business?
As Luke crossed the kitchen toward me, in an automatic defensive motion, my hands rose to shield my face, but the blow never came. With caution, wary of what I might find, I lowered my hands. Luke hadn’t approached me, he stood at the photograph, his fingers tracing the frame.
“She died when I was eighteen,” he said, voice cracking.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered.
He nodded in acknowledgment, his eyes never leaving the photograph. “She was beaten to death,” he added after a long moment. “Her senior year of college, a month away from graduation.”
I fought the impulse to offer another apology.
What does an apology mean when you’re standing in the unyielding shadow of someone’s murder?
It wouldn’t resurrect her. At best, it offered a placeholder for the sorrow and pain and perhaps the shared understanding we were both, in our own ways, survivors of someone else’s violence.
“We were both on spring break,” Luke said.
“I was supposed to visit her, we’d talked about it for weeks.
I played football, but during the off-season I ran track to stay in shape.
The team made nationals, and I had to push my trip back a few days.
Carrie was so damn proud. Told me she always knew her baby brother was built for big things.
Made Mom and Dad swear to record every event, so she could binge-watch everything with me when I got there.
I had my bags packed in the car, ready to drive straight to her place the second I got home.
And when I . . . god.” He shook his head, breath leaving him in a harsh exhale.
“Sorry. I’ve told this story countless times and it still gets to me. ”
He stared at the photo as if by sheer focus he could will her to turn, laugh, and pull him back into that frozen moment with her. No one should have to share a story like this standing alone.
Despite the pain that announced itself with every move, I pushed myself up from the couch and crossed to his side. I let the back of my hand brush his. He glanced at me, eyes shining, but he still found a soft smile to send my way as his fingers threaded through mine.
He turned back to the picture and drew a slow breath. “When I got to her apartment, I knocked. No answer. So I knocked again, louder. I thought maybe she was asleep or in the shower or something. She’d given me a spare key, but the door was already unlocked and . . .”
He broke off, eyes squeezing shut.
He didn’t have to finish; I filled in the rest. I’d spent years imagining a version of that ending for myself.
There’d been so many nights, taking a beating either from my father or Vincent, I’d been certain they’d kill me.
I’d wondered who would find me, how long it would take, what story would get told afterward.
On those nights, I’d hoped I’d live through it, not always because I saw life worth living, but to spare whoever might find me from having to see me like that.
But Luke hadn’t been spared. Not only did he lose someone he loved, he found her. “I’m so sorry,” I whispered. “That must have been beyond awful.”
“I’ve seen some ugly shit in my time, but to this day nothing will ever compare to that. It’s an image forever branded in my brain,” he said with a sniff.
Glancing at his face, I saw he was crying, not even trying to hide it.
He didn’t wipe the tears away or blink them back.
He let them fall. A man like him, unafraid of his feelings, refusing to posture or bury emotion under bravado .
. . it stunned me. He was some mythical creature, a unicorn in human form, he had to be.
“Did um . . .” Don’t push your luck, Oliver. Just because he didn’t get mad at your first question doesn’t mean you have the right to ask more.
“You can ask, Ollie, I don’t mind. If the question isn’t something I’m ready to or want to share, I’ll tell you.”
What a revelation, that I could ask and the worst that would happen was no. With Vincent, the act of wondering aloud had been dangerous. To “pry” into his life meant mockery, contempt, or violence, sometimes all three braided together until I didn’t know which hurt most.
“Do you know what happened?”
“The cops pinned it on the guy she’d been dating, second-degree murder for domestic violence.
That fucker will rot in prison. They also slapped him with a fifty grand fine.
Maximum penalty.” He let out a hollow, humorless breath.
“Fifty. Thousand. Dollars. Her autopsy showed defensive wounds. She fought back, for her life. And the goddamn court decided fifty thousand dollars was enough to cover the loss. You can pay ten, fifteen times that if you smash up a building or burn down a business. Property damage gets more justice than a woman’s life. Tell me how that’s not fucked.”
“It is. It is fucked,” I said.
He dragged a hand through his hair, and when he spoke again, the anger had splintered into something more agonized.
“I know I’m angry at all the wrong things.
The most fucked-up part is me. I was supposed to protect her.
I loved her more than anything. I thought I knew her better than anyone, but I didn’t know about that.
I reread every text, replayed every call, searching for signs I should’ve seen.
If I’d just paid more attention . . . listened better . . .”
I wanted to tell him that love isn’t clairvoyance.
That abusers hide in plain sight and the abused did everything they could to aid in that hiding.
But I realized he probably knew that, perhaps even more clearly than I did.
Unable to offer words that might mean something, I squeezed his hand. In comfort and solidarity.
“For years, I hated that we’d gone to nationals,” he went on.
“I was out there chasing a meaningless trophy while my sister fought for her life. If I’d gone when I said I would, maybe she would’ve told me.
Maybe I would’ve noticed something. Maybe I could’ve gotten her out in time.
Maybe she’d still be here, living her best life. ”
“It isn’t your fault. You couldn’t have known what would happen in your absence.”
“Yeah, I know. I’ve spent many therapy sessions working through that guilt. I can mostly accept that as fact nowadays. But guilt can be a clingy bastard, and there are times when I can’t help but think out of everyone, I failed her most.”
I understood blame like that, not the kind others cast, but the kind you shoulder yourself.
I knew too well that guilt didn’t have to make sense to stick.
All it needed was an opening to seep through, to root itself to memory and grow in the dark.
Carrying guilt for someone else’s sin was a language I spoke fluently.
In a strange, awful way, that Luke spoke it too made me feel less alone.
“Anyway, it kinda blew up everything I thought my life was gonna look like. Not that I had some master plan to begin with, hadn’t even landed on a college yet.
But after what happened to Carrie, everything I thought I wanted went out the window.
My purpose became not letting her death be in vain.
I couldn’t change what had happened to her, but maybe I could stop someone else’s life from being cut short.
Maybe I could be the reason another family didn’t get ripped apart. ”
“So you chose to become a bodyguard.”
“Well, in the biz we call it a personal protection officer, but yeah. I knew I wouldn’t last as a cop, didn’t want to get shoved into some messed-up system and forced to conform until I didn’t recognize myself anymore.
And I’m not built for the schooling required to be a psychologist or social worker.
But I found out security firms sometimes work with domestic violence cases.
That seemed like something I could do. I enrolled in a program, got all my certifications, licenses, permits, and here we are. ”
“Here we are,” I repeated.
He turned, facing me. “Now that you know where I come from, I hope you hear this the way I mean it. I’m so damn glad that you called.
I’m glad you’re still here and you’ve got the chance to live, to take back your story.
I know reaching out was hard, but you did it.
That took strength. That strength is going to carry you through this. ”
“You . . . you keep saying that,” I murmured. “That I’m strong.”
“That’s because you are, and if you can’t believe anything else right now, I want you to believe that.”
“You don’t think I deserved it?”
“Not even for a second.”