Chapter 35
We All Lost the Bet
Clay
Once Leni settles after the nightmare, I help her shower, getting her cleaned up and ready for battle as she says.
Family dinner can be intense on a good day and tonight seems like it might not be a good night.
I’ve never felt more like a stranger in this house than I did this morning.
It’s weird, being here and feeling like I don’t belong.
This place was the first place I ever felt wanted.
The first place I ever felt safe enough to let my guard down.
Tonight, it feels like I am going into battle. Probably the most important one I’ll ever face, considering my entire future is sitting in that wheelchair. Brown wavy hair pulled up into a messy bun, soft curves interrupted by the casts and braces.
“I love you,” I breathe into her, dipping down at the waist to kiss her lips. “No matter what, I’m here for you. I’m on your side.”
“I know,” she whispers, pulling me closer and kissing me deeper. “I love you too, Clayton Sue Traeger.”
I groan at the nickname. Shaking my head, I move around to the back of her chair. “You ready, love?”
“No,” she whines, slumping into her seat, before quickly jolting out of the position. “Ow, remind me not to do that again.”
“You okay?” I lean around her, assessing her, ensuring she doesn’t sugarcoat her answer.
“Yeah, my ribs aren’t quite ready for slouching yet.” I help her settle into the chair more comfortably, trying to ease some of the tension I can feel that’s built up.
“Alright, baby, here goes nothing.” I press one last kiss to her temple, before we head into the lion’s den.
Dinner starts out with quiet conversations.
Two or three people chatting together, Ethan and Mercer avoiding my gaze at all cost. Making it clear I’m not welcome here tonight.
Brooks has his hands full with Tessa. Pepper steps in where she can, grabbing things Tessa throws on the floor.
She’s giggling when Pepper slams them back onto her tray in a dramatic fashion.
That quiet little baby I met at the hospital is so different around the two of them now.
Adler and Toby are more concerned with forming a poker strategy for next month’s game than they are with anything drama related. Ma and Pa oscillate between mooning over Tessa and Leni, like they can’t decide who they’re more excited to have at their table.
Half way through, I can tell Leni is getting tired.
Today is the most she’s sat in the three weeks since the accident.
It’s wearing on her and I wish I could clear the place out, take her to bed, and let her rest, knowing that she needs it.
She wouldn’t want me to do that, so I move myself closer, positioning my body so she can lean on me.
Her body sags into me, a breath blowing out when I take some of the weight for her.
Her head tips up, as much as it can in the neck brace, with a small smile on her lips.
“Thank you,” she whispers. I lean down and peck her cheek, moving those cute little bangs off her face again.
“Gross.” Adler screws up his face, then winks at us.
“Can we get this over with?” Ethan finally turns to me, with much less animosity in his eyes than I expected.
Leni sighs, trying to sit up again, but I hold her to me. “Let me hold you, baby,” I whisper into her ear. “You tell them what you’re feeling. I got you.”
She nods into my shoulder, her hand reaching down to find mine, our fingers interlacing. “Fine.” Her head tips into me, leaning to the left so she can look Ethan in the eyes. “Where do you want to start?”
“Why were you hiding in the cabin?” He taps his fingers on the table, leaning forward.
“The school cut my program, so I lost my job. Edna’s son sold her house and moved her to a nursing home, so I lost that, too.”
“Why didn’t you tell us you were home, though?” Toby tips his head to the side, hurt flashing in his eyes. I catch Ma glance over at Pa, squeezing his hand once, while everyone else keeps their eyes trained toward Leni. Towards us.
“Because I know how you guys are,” she sighs. “I knew it was going to be a big deal. I didn’t want to deal with all the lectures.”
“We’re not that bad,” Mercer groans.
“Ehh,” Adler chimes in, scrunching his nose. “You kind of are.”
“Shut up, Adler!” Ethan snaps. “Leni, we would have helped you. You don’t have to do everything on your own.”
“I know.” She sinks deeper into me. Her head moves to look across the table at Mercer. “But at some point, it became less about helping me and more about you guys deciding you knew best. Even when you didn’t have all the information, you still tried making decisions for me.”
“We worried.” Ethan shakes his head, still digging into the idea that they’re not to blame for any of it. “We’re allowed to worry.”
“Yes, you can worry. Of course, you can worry,” Leni sighs. “You don’t get to decide that what I’m doing is wrong.”
“When did we ever do that?” Mercer sits straighter.
“You sure you want to know?” Toby leans forward, looking around Adler to get his eyes on Mercer.
“You guys remember Aspen?” Leni asks. I even remember the name.
Mercer and Ethan wouldn’t stop texting about how much of an asshole the guy was.
They did not like him at all. The few sneers let me know they do remember him.
“I was living with him.” Leni taps my arm, silently asking me to help her sit up, so I do.
I gently lift her, so she’s sitting tall.
“He asked me to move out, gave me until January third to be out of the apartment.”
“Fucking prick,” Adler mumbles. Ethan taps the table with his index finger before cracking it with his thumb.
“I didn’t know you were living with him.” Mercer’s brow furrows.
“Well, I was.”
Mercer looks at me briefly, but I shake my head. I didn’t know. I only knew what they told me about Leni back then.
“So we ran off a few boyfriends.” Ethan crosses his arms over his chest. “That hardly makes us the villains you make us out to be.”
“No, I know. I pushed you guys away. I know I played a part in that, but you guys always took it too far.”
“What else?” Pa asks, when it’s clear the boys are going to sit there and sulk, instead of actually listening to what she has to say.
“Someone called Patty’s and got me fired,” she complains. Her voice is hard, edged with annoyance.
“Yeah, not gonna apologize for that one,” Brooks finally joins in the conversation. A hint of humor in his eyes. “It’s funny you think we’d let you work at a strip club, Leni.”
“I was bartending, Brooks. I had thirty dollars in my account, and my rent was due the week after you got me fired. My last check didn’t cover it.”
Brooks flinches. Pepper gives him a disapproving glare over Tessa’s head.
“Fuck, I’m sorry, Leni. I didn’t know.” Brooks holds eye contact with her.
“Thanks,” Leni whispers, leaning herself back into me, shoulders caving a little under the strain of holding herself up. “That’s the point, though. You guys never bothered to ask what else was going on in my life. You saw something that I did as wrong and tried to fix it.”
“So what?” Mercer chimes back in. “We’re supposed to turn off twenty-seven years of being big brothers?”
“No.” Leni rolls her eyes, turning at the waist to look at him. “You can stop telling me what to do, though. Stop assuming you know what’s best for me and stop blaming Clay when you’re really mad at yourselves.”
Ethan scoffs, but Mercer looks down at his empty plate. “It’s our job to protect you.”
“And you did,” she says. “For eighteen years, you guys were always there for me, you took care of me. Showed me how to take care of myself. I’m practically middle-aged now, leave me the fuck alone.
Who cares if I make mistakes along the way?
That’s what you’re supposed to be here for.
To pick me up when those mistakes happen.
Not preemptively stopping me from living life. ”
Brooks sighs, scooping Tessa out of her highchair when she starts to fuss. “She’s right.”
“I disagree.” Ethan uses his thumb to toy with the class ring he wears on his right ring finger.
“I still think Clay is partially, if not fully, responsible for what happened ten years ago, and three weeks ago. He shouldn’t have let you drive like that.
Should have called one of us and told us to go look for you. ”
“Clay wasn’t the only reason I left.” Leni squeezes my arm when she feels my muscles stiffen.
“You didn’t have to leave,” Mercer mutters, toying with the fork on his plate. Avoiding looking at her.
“Mercer,” Marcy starts, her voice low, warning. “What did you do?”
He sighs, long and deep, before looking to Ma, avoiding everyone else’s gaze. “I requested the call logs for the incident.”
Ethan’s eyebrow shoots into his hairline. “That’s how you found out? I thought you talked to her about it.”
“Not exactly,” he mutters.
Adler whistles, a long, low note.
“Damn, that’s brutal, bro.” Toby looks from Mercer to Leni, and then back to Mercer when Leni quirks an eyebrow at him.
“I might have blackmailed her into talking about it then.”
“Holy shit.” Adler sits back in his chair, eyes wide.
“Mercer, what the fuck?” Brooks pinches the bridge of his nose, shaking his head.
“I needed to know what happened.” Mercer groans into his hands, scrubbing them down his face before he looks at Leni and then me. “You weren’t talking. Either of you. And then Clay drops this bomb that you did find him, but you didn’t tell us—”
“You don’t have a right to every single thing in my life, Mercer.” Leni’s good hand balls into a fist.