Chapter 23
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
A black Jeep was already parked under the carport, June dragging on a cigarette like it was her last breath.
I punched Rick in the arm. “That’s who you were texting?!”
He gave me a sheepish smile. I pulled my knees up onto the seat, hugging them close.
“You’ve got to get out,” Rick whispered, placing a hand on my back and giving me a few pats. It reminded me of when Dax had comforted me after the first break-in, and my insides ached for his company again. I couldn’t help but feel relieved that he’d got away before seeing my life truly unravel.
I peeked out the window at the woman I had believed was my sister for the last thirty years pace behind her car and my heart broke all over again.
Would she still want me now? She was the reason I’d been brought into this family, from what Dad had told me yesterday.
We’d become so attached at the children’s home he couldn’t bear to separate us.
Shared trauma does that to people, I guess.
Did she resent me for overstaying my welcome now that she knew? That’s if she did know.
We weren’t exactly best friends, and we’d enjoyed tormenting and outdoing each other as we grew up, the way that most siblings do. Would she be glad to have this ultimate trump card over me? She really could be the favourite daughter now.
She was the only daughter. Colin’s only living child. My head started spinning again, and I felt overwhelmed by the loss. So much of it.
The door to the car opened, and June stood in a grey pencil skirt.
Clearly, I’d missed the grey memo today, which was surprising given my mood.
Her silvery eyes filled with unshed tears, and she flicked ash from her cigarette.
Her gaze raked over my curled-up frame on the passenger seat, and her throat bobbed as she swallowed.
I didn’t need to ask. She knew.
“Did Rick tell you?” I exhaled, leaning my head against the seat. I couldn’t look at her anymore; it was too much.
Half of me hated seeing her there, the proper daughter. The other half of me felt a wild surge of gratitude for that loving six-year-old who’d once rescued me from hell. Without her, who knows where I’d be now? Probably next to Olivia.
June had been my lottery ticket, and as much as I was filled with envy at the blood in her veins, that meant she belonged; I could never hate her for it. Not ever.
She leaned into the car and wrapped an arm around me, unexpectedly pressing her face into my hair.
Her other hand diligently held her cigarette outside the window.
Neither of us spoke, but the occasional snorts into my neck told me she was crying.
I didn’t dare speak. If this was goodbye, I wouldn’t survive it.
“Are you okay?” she whispered into my ear, tangled beneath my hair, the way she used to when we shared a bed as kids.
I shook my head.
I had no energy left to be stoic Riley today. I was broken.
It felt like someone had dropped a sheet of toffee on the ground and I’d shattered and scattered. I didn’t even know where to begin putting myself back together—or if I had the strength to try.
She sniffled again, then stood up, wiping her nose on the sleeve of her crisp white shirt. I hadn’t seen her this upset since Josh’s funeral.
“Why are you here?” I asked quietly, not wanting to prolong another missile of pain if it was coming my way. Might as well get it over with.
Her brows drew together, and her spine straightened. “Rick texted me.” Her tone said obviously without needing the word.
I glared at my friend, who’d conveniently chosen this moment to take another call. Bastard.
“I can’t believe he told you.”
June put her hands on her hips, her cigarette dangerously close to what I was sure was a very expensive skirt.
“He didn’t.”
“What? Then who?”
“Dad,” she said, surprised at the question. Her eyebrows still bent.
“When?” The blood drained from my face. Had Dad lied?
I mean Colin. I wonder how long it took to remember the name changes for family you weren’t related to anymore.
Maybe she’d known all along after all. Oh well, I guess it was better out in the open where she wouldn’t need to continue with the lie of being my sister. She was probably relieved.
“Dad called me last night after you left.” She cleared her throat. “I guess he wanted everyone to know.”
“Good to see he was finally on a truth-seeking mission,” I replied bitterly. “But now you know. You’re under no obligation to stay.”
“What?” she asked, looking confused again.
“We’re not family,” I said, staring straight out the windscreen. “There is no onus on you to keep acting like we are.” My throat squeezed and my eyes stung.
“Riley, you don’t seriously think I buy any of that bullshit, do you?”
Someone snorted, and I looked up to see Rick leaning on the other side of the car. Traitor.
June sighed and crouched beside the open door in her pointy white heels, tugging at the hem of her skirt to keep her goodies covered. She needed to invest in different outfits for when she was dealing with me.
“This is as much of a shock to me as it is to you. I’m so fucking angry at Dad.” She dragged the last of her cigarette and stubbed it out on the gravel. “But don’t you dare disrespect me by saying we’re not family. Don’t you dare.”
The warning in her eyes was sharp enough to slit a jugular.
I bit my bottom lip, trying to hold the stinging back.
“He lied to me too,” she whispered, pulling my hands into hers. “But you are the only sibling I’ve got left in this world. The only sister I’ve ever had. Don’t take that away from me.”
Her grey eyes were hollow, and my insides squirmed seeing her so wounded.
“I’ll still be your sister,” I said, squeezing her hand. “If you want me.”
She climbed straight into my lap and wrapped her arms around my neck. I had a moment of gratitude for her tiny size before I held her tightly in return.
“Without a doubt. We chose each other back then. We must have—for Dad to be so convinced it was the right thing. I still choose you now, and I’ll choose you forever. You’re my sister, Riley Walls. Sorry about it.”
I sniffed and rubbed my face into her white top.
The floodgates of my tears lifted. That shirt was seriously a goner.
Unclipping my seat belt, she led me out of the car, squeezing my hand once I stood.
My legs wobbled beneath me, and I was grateful I’d gone with my white platform sneakers instead of my feel-better wedges.
“Now, I believe we’ve got some questions to ask,” she said, as we looked up at the front of the house we’d grown up in—for the second time in a month.
My vow never to see the man’s face again hadn’t lasted 24 hours.
The house looked exactly the same as yesterday, yet it was completely different.
“Ready?” she asked as Rick joined my other side.
I nodded, feeling braver than I expected to. “I'm ready.”
“Another envelope.” I snorted with irony, my hand drooping with the weight of the sealed oblong in my hand.
It felt like I’d been unknowingly playing a real-life version of Clue since I’d accepted the brown envelope from Trevor, collecting leads to my future.
Destiny should be able to be found with less emotional whiplash.
“It arrived ten years ago. It was addressed to you, so I never opened it. This one came when you were seven,” he said and handed me a larger-sized packet with the seal broken.
I felt betrayed all over again. He’d had some of this information for twenty-eight years.
What had I been doing the day it arrived?
Had his stomach dropped through the floor like mine just had?
Or had he simply hidden it away as I walked past my true self, lying on the kitchen table, completely unaware?
“You’ve cleaned,” June muttered, arms folded as she stood in the middle of the room.
I hadn’t even noticed. No clutter on the walk from the front door to the open-plan kitchen and living area where we now stood.
Dad shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his sweatpants, still avoiding our eyes. Rick had made himself scarce, admiring the hedging in the garden. Apparently, he was now a gardening adult too.
So much had changed in my friend over the past month, and as happy as I was for him, something about it gnawed at me—even though I felt guilty admitting it.
I was scared of losing everyone. Everything was shifting in irreparable ways. That included Rick. I didn’t know what his playing happy families and finally buying his little slice of suburbia meant for me.
I wanted everyone to stay stuck with me in the murky weeds. Except I knew they couldn’t, and definitely shouldn’t.
A bigger part of me knew I couldn’t stay here either. How long had I chained myself to the same place in life, too afraid to change, too paralysed to commit—always bracing for the worst-case scenario?
Well, change had arrived anyway.
With a swift kick to the vagina bone.
And it was far worse than anything I could have imagined.
“It felt like time,” Dad said with a shrug, finally looking up. “Listen, girls, I’m really sor—”
“Don’t.”
June cut him off with a glare sharp enough to kill. She reminded me of herself as a child, just before she stomped her foot.
“You lied to us our entire lives. Poor Riley doesn’t even know who she is anymore. Do you know what that can do to a person?”
Dad sat on the couch, his pain visible on his twisted features.
I couldn’t take it. I hated what he’d done, but just as I felt with June, I couldn’t hate him.
He had lied my entire life, yes, and my future therapy bill would be astronomical.
But I couldn’t hate him for saving me from that place.
I didn't know who I was, but I was still here.
If I died, there would be someone to claim my body. There would be people at my funeral.
“It’s okay, June.”
I held onto my fierce sister’s arm. She really was like a pitbull—my protector. My chest ached with love for the role she’d stepped into without either of us realising. She looked at me then, her red-rimmed eyes full of fear. She didn’t know what this meant for us either.
I blew out a long breath. “We can get through this.”
It didn’t feel like a lie when I said it, even though I had no idea how.
I thought of everything we’d already endured.
Losing Mum. Well—Mum’s, plural.
The children’s home.
Josh’s death.
Each time, we’d adapted. Survived. And we’d do it again.
We were all here—less than twenty-four hours after hearing devastating news. That had to count for something.
If we didn’t care about each other, we wouldn’t be angry. Or hurt. Or betrayed.
We’d feel nothing.
“I know you’re sorry, Dad,” I whispered, barely getting the words out as I looked at him sitting on the edge of the couch.
The guilt on his face was unmistakable. I wished I could make him feel better, but I didn’t have anything left to do that with.
I was too angry. Betrayed. That ratty part of me that always knew she wasn’t good enough for the world felt validated and so deeply rejected.
“Everything’s in there,” he dipped his head in the direction of the envelopes in my hand. I nodded back and wiped my nose on the back of my arm. I was definitely channelling broken cup again today. Giving dad’s pained face a last look, I turned on my heel to go. I couldn’t wait to get out of there.
“Please still let me be your dad,” he blurted out. I froze, letting his cracked words wash over my back. I desperately wanted my dad—but it was too early to override the pain. Maybe one day.
I wouldn’t offer false hope. He didn’t deserve that kindness.
Instead, I let guilt rise again as I slipped out the door, letting June close it behind us.
God damn empathy.
Why couldn’t I just be angry?
It would be so much easier if I didn’t feel sorry for him too.
“What are your plans now?” June asked, inspecting the empty cigarette box in her hand as we stood at the back of her black Jeep.
Strangely, I felt clear.
“I’m going to read this,” I said, lifting the weighty packet in my hand. “And then I’m going to yoga.”
I was clearly losing my mind.
June choked on her swallow. “You’re going where?” She scratched her ear like she couldn’t have heard me right.
“Yoga. Well—if it’s on. I’ll have to check. I’ve never been before,” I shrugged. “Do you think I need special clothes, or will this do?”
She looked over my skinny jeans and white t-shirt. “You’re asking the wrong kind of human. Are you sure you’re okay to be on your own? I could come back with you.” She looked seriously concerned.
I shook my head. “Rick’s still here.”
I wasn’t going to let her know that he wouldn’t be caught dead in a yoga class.
“How about you? What are you going to do?” I nodded toward the empty cigarette packet in her hand.
She exhaled. “Start all over again. Quitting, that is,” she added quickly at my alarmed expression.
“Good. We’ve hit our quota of traumatic events for this family.” I held my only sister by the shoulder, making us look more like adults on even ground than the competitive siblings we’d once been.
“We'll have to outsource future suffering to another family,” she joked, chewing the inside of her cheek. June’s face crumbled, and she grabbed me in her arms, hugging me tight. I didn’t stiffen. Neither of us did.
“I love you,” I whispered into her coconut-scented hair.
“I love you too,” she squeaked. “More than you could ever know.”
“Oh my God, get a room,” Rick teased, emerging from behind the Jeep. I’d wondered where he’d gone.
I rolled my eyes, but his face was soft.
Wit was our love language.