Chapter 30 Lucas
lucas
My head has been swirling since we read the documents regarding Lettie’s father.
While technically, she now has leverage against him, I fear what he’ll do when he finds out we know.
It’s left me with more and more unanswered questions: who was my dad really?
Did my mom know he wasn’t a wildlife photographer, or was that just the story they fed me to keep me from asking questions?
Was she involved, too? Obviously, she knew Anna.
She was part of the ranch, but was that organic, or because my dad was working with or against her son?
Will I ever get answers to these questions?
One can only hope, but I’m also not holding my breath.
I don’t need another massive letdown. A setback in the grief I’ve been working through for twenty years.
Today is the day I decided to clear out my mom’s house.
We leave for our first string of away games of the new year tomorrow, and Reed suggested we make it a team effort to clear it out so that it wouldn’t be looming over my head while we were gone.
He also said that it could help with closure, should I decide to work through unresolved feelings on the ice.
I don’t disagree, so here we are, armed with more than enough contractor trash bags and a rented dumpster that’ll get picked up once it's full. “Let’s do this,” I say as I snap the end of the rubber gloves I just put on.
My teammates all laugh, descending on the house, but Lettie hangs back, her eyes searching me.
She’s so much like Ms. Anna, seeing more than what people say.
Reading between the lines, seeing past the front people hide behind.
“Are you okay?” Her head tilts to the side as she brings her hand to rest on my forearm.
I shake my head, but my smile splits my face in half. “Not in the slightest.” I chuckle. “But I’m not alone, you won’t leave me alone. You see me, Lettie Girl.” I kiss her forehead. “I love you, thanks for being here.”
Her face softens, “I love you, too, Goldie. There’s nowhere I’d rather be.”
My teammates have already started to clear out the kitchen, “I don’t want to keep anything but the pictures of my dad. Everything else can go, if it’s in good shape, let’s donate it.”
“Aye Aye,” Andrews hollers as he salutes me.
My eyes roll as we venture further into the house.
I freeze outside her door. I was ten last time I stepped foot in that room.
I had convinced myself it was a boundary line I needed to respect.
Dad wasn’t in there anymore, and my mom deserved her privacy.
Nerves skitter through me as I mentally battle with what could be on the other side.
Will I find something that shows she cared, even the tiniest bit, or will it be bare and empty, just like the rest of our interactions? I don’t know which would be worse, but I guess we’re about to find out. With all three of my favorite girls next to me, I push down on the handle.
The door creaks open, and I cautiously step through the threshold, half expecting a haunted house jump scare, but the reality of it is so much worse.
Someone flips the light on, illuminating the walls and all that adorns them.
Jerseys, my jerseys are framed on either side of her TV like trophies.
One from college and one from the Hawks.
My draft announcement, college stats, and the interview I did with Hannah a few years back. It’s all here. She kept everything. For twenty years, I begged for scraps, a single acknowledgement, anything, yet this room sits like a mocking shrine, spitting in the face of everything I thought I knew.
My knees hit the ground with such force that they crack. “Lucas!” Lettie's voice cuts through the ringing in my ears. She reaches for me, but I'm already leaning forward. My chest hits the floor with such force that it drives all the air from my lungs.
Three sets of hands land on my back, anchoring me to the moment, but I feel nothing. Blissfully numb as I stare at the wall. Her walls are lined with my life’s accomplishments, as if she had any right to celebrate.
A frame that sits a bit lower catches my attention. The day I signed my letter of intent for college, my punkass self smiling, holding up my new jersey, eyes bright, so damn proud. But I remember clear as day, all I could think in that moment was ‘Where are you when I need you?’
“She could have said something,” I mutter, voice heavy, rising with each passing moment.
“Anything. She could have said anything.” My throat burns as my words become frenzied.
“But no, she built a freaking museum instead.” I jump off the floor, tearing the frame off the wall and shattering the glass against the tall dresser in front of me.
I let go of it and throw a punch through the frame that holds my Hawks jersey, the glass slicing through the skin at my knuckles. But I can’t find it in me to care.
My chest heaves as I push a bloodied hand through my hair.
The silence that follows is suffocating.
My jaw aches from clenching it. “What do I do with this?” My voice cracks, and I hate it.
I hate that after everything left unsaid, every time I begged, every holiday I suffered through in silence, every unacknowledged birthday, she found a way to drive the knife in one more time.
She loved me in secret, like I wasn’t worthy of being loved out loud.
My anger surges again, sharp and wild, tangling with grief until I can’t tell which is which. My fist makes contact with the wall again, pushing the already stinging shards of glass in a bit deeper. Lettie flinches at the sound but doesn’t move away.
I crumble, not all at once, but piece by tattered piece. I’ve always been able to break freely here. It’s been the place I come to let it all out. It’s not grief I’m choking on, it’s regret, guilt, it’s rage.
Regret that I didn’t have more time with her, that I didn’t come see her more.
Guilt that I’m not as devastated as one should be when losing a parent.
And rage because every chance I had to hear her voice was taken from me in the blink of an eye.
It was too soon and not soon enough. A juxtaposition just like much of the rest of my life.
Stepping back, I look at the wreckage before I turn to the women sniffling behind me.
“Shit,” I mutter as I take in the tears trailing down each of their faces, “I’m sorry.
” My eyes meet my teammates who are huddled in the doorway, and my shoulders slump.
This isn’t me. I’m not the violent guy, and I hate that I’m unraveling in front of them.
I should have just done this with Lettie.
“Don’t apologize, Monroe,” Hannah says through quiet sobs. “I can’t imagine how this feels for you, after everything she’s put you through.”
I chuff, “Yeah, it’s a slap in the face but…”
“Let me clean up your hand.” Abby cuts in as she walks into the bathroom, rummaging through it until she finds a first aid kit. She sits on the bed, looking over her shoulder at Lettie, who nods before walking out of the room with Hannah.
I hiss when the first bit of antiseptic hits my heated skin, “Sorry, I need to get this all out, though.” She sends me a look that leaves me feeling thoroughly chastised as she picks at the glass in my hand with a pair of tweezers.
Once she’s done, she wraps gauze around it and secures it with medical tape.
She holds my hand for a beat, “I’m not going to ask if you’re okay, but I need to know this isn’t you taking a nosedive. I’ll bench you if I don’t think your head is in the right place.”
I shake my head, “I’m not okay, Abs. I’ll lean on you guys, but even you have to admit this is a bit insane, all things considered.”
“It is, and I know it’s a lot to take in.” She sighs, patting the top of my hand softly, “But I know you, and we all love you. I want to make sure you don’t lose yourself in this.”
I swallow roughly as Hannah and Lettie come back in with a broom and a dust pan. “I know, I appreciate it,” I say before I’m moving to help them clean up the evidence of my pain. Lettie gives me a small smile. I know she wants to say something, but she won’t. Not while they’re here.