Chapter Fourteen #2
“But I know what it’s like to have a man kick in my door because my brother owed him money.
I know what it’s like to check every parked car outside because I don’t know who you have pissed off.
And I know what it’s like to count my money and wonder which bill I can pay late because I have to help you again.
I know what it’s like to be beaten because you didn’t end up paying that bill.
And don’t forget I was kidnapped, too, but I managed to get away. ”
I press down on the accelerator again, trying to keep myself busy so I don’t cry in front of him.
“I promise it will be different,” Rowan says. “We are family.”
As if I haven’t heard those words so many times before, all lies and broken promises.
A gas station comes up and I pull in. Rowan braces one hand against the dashboard when I stop too quickly and the tires crunch over the loose gravel, the car locking up beneath us.
“What the fuck?” he snaps.
The gas station looks deserted, but I don’t care.
I put the car in park and turn to Rowan and really look at him.
He has our dad’s mouth and his mother’s nose.
He looks like the brother I once had, but time has changed him.
His hair is now too long and greasy, and there are shadows beneath his eyes.
Some things are reminders of the good times, like the scar above his eyebrow, which he got from falling out of a tree in our backyard.
I remember sitting beside him while Mom cleaned the blood from his face.
He squeezed my fingers and told me not to look because it was gross.
I remember him holding my hand at our parents’ funeral, and the promises he made after we lost them, that we only had each other. I believed him, and he lied.
“You don’t get to keep using that.”
His brows furrow. “Using what?”
“That we are family.”
“I am your family.”
I scoff at him and undo my seat belt so I can lean across and undo his. “No, you’re simply someone I share blood with. Family is supposed to mean more than that.”
He looks away and laughs under his breath. “Oh, fuck off.”
“No.”
His hand reaches for the door, and I lock it, because he isn’t walking away from what I have to say this time. Rowan’s head snaps toward me.
“You’re going to listen,” I tell him.
“I don’t have to listen to shit.”
“You do if you want me to keep driving.”
His nostrils flare, and for a second I see the brother who slapped me when I wouldn’t give him money. My heart beats faster, but I don’t move.
“I was a kid,” I say. “Do you understand that?” He looks down at the door handle instead of at me.
“Mom and Dad died, yet somehow you were the only one allowed to fall apart. You got to be angry and disappear. You would drink and use whatever you could get your hands on, wasting every chance anyone gave you.”
“You think I wanted that?!”
“I think you stopped caring what it cost the rest of us.” Tears roll down my face, and I don’t bother hiding them.
He lifts his head and looks at me. “That’s bullshit.”
“I gave up everything for you,” I cry.
“I never asked you to.” His words hit like a fist to the gut. Rowan’s expression changed when he saw my first tears fall. Regret flickered, but it was gone almost as quickly as it appeared. Now he shifts against his seat and looks out at the pumps.
“You chose to help me,” he says sullenly. “You can’t throw it in my face now.”
I stare at him in disbelief; nothing is ever going to change with him.
“I chose to help my brother. But I didn’t choose to spend years being punished for loving him.”
“You always make yourself the victim.”
I reach down and turn the engine off. “No, Rowan. You did that.” The sudden silence between us makes the car feel claustrophobic.
“Every time I said no, you reminded me that Mom would be ashamed. Every time I tried to step away, you said Dad never would have abandoned you. You used two dead people to keep me exactly where you wanted me.”
“I was struggling.”
“So was I.” My voice cracks, and Rowan flinches, but I don’t stop.
“I was grieving too. I lost them too. But I had to figure out the bills and the house after you spent all the money they left us. I had to make sure Leni had what she needed. And I had to keep making excuses for you, so she didn’t see our brother the way I did. ”
“I love Leni.”
“Not enough.” I shake my head as cars fly past the gas station, though none stop in.
The world continues around us, while inside this car, everything is the same as it always is.
“Leni watched men come into the house looking for you. She watched me come home covered in bruises. Learned to check the door was locked at least three times before going to bed.” Rowan’s gaze drops to his hands.
“She knows the sound of you on nights you came home drunk, so she could go straight to her room.” I feel a tremendous relief lift off my shoulders at finally telling him.
“Leni left for college and barely comes home. And I was glad because I knew she was safe. My biggest regret was failing her.”
“You didn’t fail her, Val.”
“I know that now. You did.” His face tightens at my words. “You failed us both.”
“Valli—”
“No, it’s your turn to listen. I have held this in for so many years.
” He leans his head back against the seat and closes his eyes.
“I paid your debts, I lied for you, I gave you money meant for bills, I let you sleep in the house after you stole from me.” His eyes open. “And I forgave you after you hit me.”
“I said I was sorry.”
“You were only sorry because you needed something from me.”
“That isn’t true.”
I sigh. “Yes, it is.” He looks at me, and I feel the excuses coming before he even opens his mouth. “Every apology, every promise, lasts only until you want something.”
He runs his hand through his hair and has the nerve to look sad. “You don’t know what addiction is like.”
“No, maybe I don’t,” I say, leaning back in my seat, suddenly exhausted.
“But I know what loving an addict is like.” The anger drains from me, only leaving hurt behind.
“I know what it’s like to spend every day wondering whether the next call I get will tell me you’re dead.
I know what it is to hate you and to hate myself for hating you.
And I know what it is to wish you would disappear and then panic when you finally do. ”
His eyes glisten with tears. “I never wanted to hurt you.”
“Well, you did. You broke me more than our parents dying.”
“I’m sick,” he says, and I can’t disagree.
“And I’m tired of living like this.”
It’s the truth; I am tired. Tired of saving him, tired of his excuses, tired of letting the memory of who he used to be outweigh the person he is now.
Rowan wipes his nose with the back of his hand. “You’re supposed to help me.”
“I did.”
He shakes his head; my words clearly only affected him for a second. “Then help me now.”
“I am.”
He looks at me, and I no longer see who he was—I only see the man sitting in front of me.
“How, by dumping me at a gas station?” Rowan snorts in disbelief.
“By giving you one last chance to live your life without letting you destroy mine.”
His laugh is bitter. “So that’s it. You have new people now and I don’t matter.”
“This isn’t about them.”
“It is.” He gestures toward the road behind us. “You think those men love you? They lied to you. They kidnapped me and kept me locked up, yet you’re still defending them.”
I run my hand over my face. “I’m not defending them lying to me.”
He laughs. “You’re going back to them.”
It’s not a question, it’s a statement, and I nod.
“Yes.” I was always going back to them.
Rowan studies me, trying to find something he can use. When he doesn’t find whatever he is looking for, I see him transform into the man I now know.
“Pathetic. You have known them for what, not even two months?”
I shrug.
“They will get bored and hurt you.”
I shrug again. “Maybe.”
“Then don’t come running to me when it all blows up in your face.”
A laugh catches in my throat—he’s delusional. “I stopped running to you a long time ago. I have been running after you.”
I start the engine again and turn onto the road, as this is getting us nowhere fast. We sit in silence for half an hour, and when he speaks, he says something I’ve been expecting.
“I need money.”
My stomach sinks; it’s always about money.
“How much?”
“A few thousand would get me started.”
I inhale and close my eyes for a second. Just one.
“Started with what?” I ask out of morbid curiosity.
“Find somewhere to live, clothes, food.”
“And drugs?”
His head jerks toward me. “Fuck you. But no.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Then why bother saving me?” he says.
I have to ask myself that same question, but it boils down to the same thing every fucking time. “Because you’re my brother.”
He gives me half a smile. “Thought sharing blood didn’t make us family.”
“It doesn’t, but I also needed you to know that I wasn’t the kind of person to leave someone locked in a cage when I had the power to open it.
” His smile disappears. “I didn’t save you because I have forgotten what you’ve done, or because I trust you, and I didn’t do it because I want you back in my life.
I did it because your life was in my hands, and I needed to make a choice I could live with.
That is the sole reason you being my brother saved you, and I can live with that. ”
“So this is all about you?”
I nod. “For once, yes.”
He sinks further into his seat, with nothing more to say because there is nothing he can ask from me he hasn’t already taken.
The bus station is almost empty when we arrive.
A cleaner pushes a mop across the tiled entrance, and a man sleeps curled up on a bench seat.
The departure board flickers above the ticket window, with the first bus of the morning scheduled for a couple hours from now.
Rowan peers through the windscreen. “This is where you’re leaving me?”