6. Leo
CHAPTER 6
Leo
Two days after talking to Myles, I decided to bite the bullet and call my sister.
I’ve been sick to my stomach the past couple of days. I had finally talked myself up to call her, and I went as far as waiting in line, only to walk away from the phones once it was my turn. But I knew that if I didn’t just suck it up and call, I never would.
That's why I'm standing in front of the pay phone right now, staring at the numbers. I need to hurry because I only have a certain amount of time for a call. Wetting my lips, I wrap my hand around the phone and bring it up to my ear.
Without thinking about it too much, I dial her number and listen to the ringing until I hear her voice. It has the same amount of confusion that Myles held in his voice, with a hint of sadness, and that alone breaks my heart.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Chlo.”
“Leo? What? I thought this was Jeremy calling because he fucked up again.” She sighs in relief that it isn’t her asshole of an ex, but then she becomes concerned. “Why the hell are you calling me from a prison?”
“It’s a lot to explain. Is Dad there?” My heart is beating so hard. I worry she can hear it on the other end.
“Yeah, we are sitting at the kitchen table. I’ll put you on speaker.” The sound of her setting the phone on the table hits my ear before she says, “Okay. He is here.”
“What’s going on?” My dad asks Chloe.
“Your son is calling from prison,” she says, and I hear a sharp “ What? ” from him.
“I don’t have enough time to explain the whole thing, so I’ll give you the Cliff’s Notes.” I swallow hard, preparing myself to be honest with them. “I helped my patient escape, and I got caught. I’m serving up to five years.”
“You what?” They both yell at once.
“I’m sorry. I want to explain it all to you—I really do—but there is a time limit on how long I can use the phone.”
“You helped your patient escape?” Dad huffs in disbelief.
“You are going to be in prison for five years?” The tone in Chloe's voice changes rapidly as if all of the pain andsorrowthat has been eating her alive over the past few days, the feeling that she has been trying so hard to suppress, is now rising to the surface because of everything I just told her. “Leo, what the hell were you thinking?”
I shake my head and say, “I don’t know.”
“Mom just died!” Chloe reminds me of the gut-wrenching reality I’ve been trying not to think about.
I can hear the hurt in her voice and feel it in my chest as the emotions spewing from her rip at my heart. On top of being in prison, I can’t think about how my mother died.
“We are all going through a shit time, and you do this?”
“I’m sorry, Chloe. I don’t know what I was thinking.” I sigh.
“We needed you!” Her voice cracks, but she gains the courage to speak again, and this time, her sadness turns into a raging fire. “Life has been hard after Mom passed, and I have been struggling! I needed my big brother to lean on and grieve with, and you chose to be selfish and not think about our family and the heartache we are experiencing!” There is a sniffle on the other end, telling me she is now crying. “How the hell am I supposed to tell Carter, who just lost his grandmother, that he won’t be seeing his uncle for five years?”
“Chloe,” my father says, trying to calm her down.
“No!” The kitchen chair screeches, and I hear the moment the wooden chair falls over at her abruptness. Her voice grows distant as she tells my dad, “I don’t want to talk to him right now.”
I listen to her footsteps leave the kitchen until I hear the faint sound of a door slamming upstairs.
“You messed up, Leo,” my dad says.
“I know.” I hang my head low, tears filling my eyes. “I wish I could take it all back.”
That annoying robot voice cuts into the call, telling us we only have a minute left. I peek over my shoulder to see the line growing longer. There weren’t this many guys here when I came to the phones.
The automated message ends, and I hear my dad sigh before he says, “I want to know what the hell happened. Can I come to see you?”
“Yes.” I jump at the opportunity for him to visit me.
“Okay. I’ll figure out when I can make it, and I’ll try to calm your sister down.”
“I would love it if she visited, too, so I can explain everything.” No matter how badly I want Chloe to visit, I know it is a long shot.
I understand the reasoning behind her not wanting to see me. She may not be ready to hear what I have to say or to look me in the eye. And I don’t expect her to be able to forgive me for what I’ve done.
And quite honestly, I'm not sure if I am ready to face her either.
Is this what Veronica felt like when I mentioned her sister visiting? All these nerves compiling in your body at the thought of seeing someone you love after you’ve done something unforgivable.
I force her out of my mind because just the thought of her leaves me feeling disgusted.
“I’ll see what I can do.”
It is the last six words I hear before the line cuts out. I don’t waste another second standing there because if I do, the guys behind me will get irritated, and when they get irritated, they like to show you just how angry they are… with their fists.
I turn on my heels and head back to my cell. I’ll be in the dark for the next couple of days, even weeks, not knowing when my dad will come to visit.
It’s a waiting game, but at least I have time to figure out how to tell him what I’ve done.
A week has passed since I heard my dad was coming to visit. To say that I am a nervous wreck is an understatement. My hands are sweating as I sit in the metal chair. A glass partition is in front of me, and a phone hangs on the privacy wall attached to the desk.
I figured the visitation room would have been the same as Black Lake’s, but I guess prison is different.
I tap my foot on the concrete floor but immediately stop when I hear a door creak open. Clenching my teeth together, I inhale a deep breath through my nose and exhale a sigh.
My father comes into view—only my father. I feel an ache in my chest, knowing that Chloe isn’t with him. Although she could be in the parking lot and working up the courage to come in here.
Dad pulls out the chair and takes his seat. Before reaching for the phone, his eyes scan over me to make sure I’m not getting beat up in this place. I study his expression as his eyes slip down to my beard.
Since I arrived, my beard has grown longer because I haven’t had the energy to shave it. After today, I will because I hate seeing my dad look at me as if I am a stranger. I don’t want to be a stranger to him or to anyone else, for that matter.
I’m the one to make the first move. I pick up the phone, and he follows suit. We remain silent, neither of us knowing what to say.
My foot begins tapping again before I force myself to say, “Thank you for coming.”
“You’re my son, Leo. Of course, I’d be here.”
“And Chloe?” I ask with a hint of hope in my voice.
He shakes his head. “She couldn’t make it.”
She didn’t want to come.
“Right,” I say as I clear my throat. “I want to tell you everything, so ask me anything you want to know.”
“I guess the first question is why?”
“I uh… I was in love with her.” His eyes widen at my words.
“Leo…”
“It sounds stupid, I know, but…” I swallow, attempting to wet my dry throat before I continue, “She had this energy to her—a pull, if you will—that I couldn’t fight. The more time we spent together during our sessions, the more I fell. It is insane to admit that I fell in love with my patient. I get that, but… I couldn’t help it. She was the light in my darkness.”
The mention of his speech causes his eyes to soften. He raises his hand, running it over his mouth as he processes my honesty. “It’s unethical.”
“It is. What Veronica and I did was absolutely wrong.”
“So she didn’t manipulate you into escaping?”
“No. It was my choice to run away with her.” I tell him. “The timing was awful, but you said the purpose of life was to love and be loved…”
“I did say that, but Leo… that doesn’t mean it should have been that way with your patient.”
“She was the first woman I’ve ever felt these intense feelings for.” My feelings for Veronica hit me like a semi-truck that came out of nowhere. I’m not sure exactly when I fell in love with her, but I know I fell hard.
“Love comes at the strangest times, and sometimes it’s with people that probably don’t deserve the love we can give them.”
“I thought she did deserve my love. I thought, maybe, me loving her would change her.”
“Sometimes love can’t change people. She isn’t wired the same way we are,” he tells me. “So you two ran and got caught.”
My eyes drop to the surface of the desk. “I got caught.”
“What do you mean you got caught?”
“When we were running, we came to this clearing, and the alarms started going off. Veronica completely turned on me.” I slowly lift my eyes to my dad and say, “She stabbed me in the stomach and ran. They don’t know where she is.”
“She stabbed you?!” He raises his voice with a mix of disbelief and anger.
“I was in the hospital for a while before I was brought here.”
“Jesus, Leo! You could have died!” The grip he has on the phone tightens, his knuckles turning white.
“But I didn’t, thank God.”
Footsteps sound behind me, and when I glance to my left, I see a guard approaching me. “Your time is up.”
That wasn’t nearly long enough. Why does everything have to be timed in this damn place?
I nod in understanding and turn to my dad. “I have to go. I know this was a lot to take in, and I’m really sorry about all of this. Please tell Chloe anything you want, seeing as she won’t be coming to visit me anytime soon.”
“I’ll talk to her.” I thank him again, put the phone back on the receiver, and stand. Dad watches me as the officer attaches the handcuffs to my wrists, and right before he is about to take me away, I hear my dad's muffled voice one more time when he says, “Please stay safe in there.”
I give him a gentle nod. My eyes fill with tears as the officer walks me out of the room, but I blink the tears away and steer my emotions toward something else. Not sadness, but hatred.
Hatred, not only for Veronica but also for me.
Veronica isn’t the only one at fault for my current position. I can’t place all the blame on her when this is my doing. The hostility replacing the sadness can’t be one-sided.
This is why I allow it to fall heavily on my side; as of right now, I’m the only person who suffers the wrath of the festering emotion.
I’ll hold it with me until the day I’m free.
After that, I’ll unleash it on Veronica.