Chapter Thirty
Scarlett
Twelve Years Ago
Ryden spent every single day after school punching the sack.
Literally.
He strung up on old bean bag, filled it with sand, and went to town on that thing.
Every. Single. Day.
Corban really messed him up, messed up all of us.
Everyone except Clara. Yeah. I decided to call her that now.
Not Ryden’s mom. She didn’t do much mothering.
I pitied her, I really did. She was a victim of Corban, but she let every single thing slide. It didn’t matter if he was pounding Ryden. It was always, ‘He had too much to drink,’ ‘ He wasn’t coherent, he wasn’t in his right mind,’ no, it was just another reason to forgive him.
Must’ve been easier that way.
Ryden was taped to a hospital bed for three days, one eye sewn shut, a permanent scar above his eyebrow slicing the hair in two. I visited him every day, stole Sinead’s “pinch change” on the way out to buy him a granola bar from the vending machine.
He could only smile at me.
So I smiled at him. Any chance I could get, I skipped school and sat in that stupid plastic chair. There were calls but my so-called parents didn’t give enough of a crap to check the answering machine, so I called them myself and said I was sick.
Crazy, how my neglect had gone so unnoticed by everyone but Ryden.
Even in his daze, I was still his favourite person.
After the third day he could mutter some words, and the fourth, he was able to speak.
He stretched his arms out like an eagle and I told him he was exactly that. “Right from the beginning, Ry.” And I hugged him. So tight. He’d never die on me. I wouldn’t let him.
After a week, he was discharged. His mom picked him up without Corban (good sense, for once), and I sat in the back seat because I didn’t want to leave his side.
I trailed him into the kitchen now, humming a song he wrote before the accident.
“You don’t need to follow me, Dove.” He called me that all the time now. It etched around my gated heart.
“So you want me to ignore you forever, then?”
He gave me a little shove. “You know that’s not what I mean. I’m good, seriously. Doctor’s cleared me.”
“You never know.”
“You going to take care of me?”
I grabbed his hand. “We take care of each other.”
He paused, sharp edges and soft eyes, squeezing my fingers. “That’s right.”
“Did Clara come to visit?”
He rolled his eyes. “Obviously, Scar. She’s my mom.”
“SHE LET HIM BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF YOU, RYDEN!”
I didn’t realize I was standing on his kitchen chair when he grabbed me by the waist and tugged me down. “She’s upstairs.”
“And where’s the SAVAGE?”
“Scarlett,” he pinched the bridge of his nose, wincing. “Ow.”
“SEE!” I grabbed his face in both hands, “You’re still injured because of that dirtbag!”
“Scarlett enough already, it’s dealt with. He’s out of the house.”
I stammered backwards, hand on heart. “What? He’s out?”
Just a nod. “Out.”
“Why?” I shook my head, swatting at him. “Why didn’t you tell me!?”
Ryden wrapped his huge hand around both of mine. “I was going to before you became a human blowhorn two seconds ago.”
I zipped my lips.
“Mom kicked him out after the cops arrested him.”
“Oh, so he’s just detained then. That’s the real reason. Cops took the decision out of her hands,” I blew a breath. “I can’t believe her.”
“She’s got a restraining order against him. I’m alive. And she’s still my mom.”
“I WATCHED HER DO NOTHING!” My chest heaved. “I BEGGED HER TO DO SOMETHING, AND SHE STOOD THERE WHILE HE WAS BEATING YOU!”
He opened his mouth to speak but no words came out. Only a sigh.
“Hello?” I pried.
“She’s,” he inhaled, “she’s got issues of her own.”
At that point I’d asked Ryden how his mother had developed such an intense attachment to this asshole who was a disgusting waste of space, straight-from-hell human being.
I didn’t know how people could develop feelings to cretins like that (I learned that word from Emory who learned that word from the fan-fic she read.
It was a good word), and I was still confused.
But then again, I looked at my life, who Sinead and Flack were, why I’d still choose to go home even though I’d found shelter in Ryden – not like Clara would care if I slept under his bed or not. But maybe he was right.
Maybe I was so used to my own suffering I couldn’t see it in anyone else.
I was wrong. But I couldn’t admit it. So I used anger as a weapon. And my knight was Ryden.
No one was touching him again.
***
Things were fine for a while.
Me, Emory and Ryden spent our summer bathing in sunlight by the manhole near the ice cream shop. I smoked weed for the first time, Ryden didn’t dare try it. Emory was the one who supplied it from her ‘contact.’
“Who is he?” I’d asked, spitting out the taste of skunk.
“Who?” She exhaled so beautifully, it looked like clouds and vapour dancing across her lips.
“Your contact,” I air quoted.
“Just some guy I’m seeing.”
“Give Scarlett the scoop or she’ll never stop asking,” Ryden said, strumming a tune on his guitar.
Emory shrugged. “It’s really not that serious, but he gives me free joints and I get to share the love with you guys!”
“I don’t much enjoy the weed,” I narrowed my eyes, battling the aura of the wind.
“The weed!” Emory and Ryden burst out laughing. “THE WEED!”
“I think I peed my pants,” Emory cackled, “oh, my gosh, I peed – the weed – I am such a songwriter,” she looked at Ryden, “careful, I’m coming for your job.”
He held up his hands. “Why don’t we work on something together?”
“In her state?” I laid down on the grass, looking up at the sky. “You’d be better off asking a bowl of slime.”
“Hey!” She laid down beside me, head on my shoulder, as we listened to Ryden’s melody.
I’d heard the same song a million times, but he always stopped about halfway. Said he couldn’t finish it, didn’t know how.
I hoped with everything that one day, he would finish the song he’d been so desperate to write.
I hoped that one day, I’d be there to hear him perform it.
[She did.]
***
It was rounding the end of August and I wanted to go back-to-school shopping with Ryden since Emory was out of town with her foster parents and well… Sinead and Flack left me a half broken pencil and some duct tape.
“Not even an eraser?” I’d called into their bedroom, just to disrupt their sanctuary.
“Can it, Vi! I’m sleeping!” I think that was Flack talking, but some weeks I’d go days without hearing their voices. Sinead’s got hoarser, sounded a bit more like Flack by the minute.
“Enjoy your nap!” I called back, slamming the front door as loud as possible.
It was raining and I loved it. The birds hid in their little nests high up in the trees. I had this urge to sit in the wet grass and listen to them talking to each other. It would be way more fun with Ryden, though.
So I marched to his house, backpack and a palm of dollar bills in hand (the “pinch change” again) and walked up Ryden’s driveway.
No cars around. Weird for a Sunday.
I knocked.
No one answered.
I knocked again.
No one answered.
I learned my lesson last time with Ryden clinging so close to life that I barged right the hell in, and there he was…
Sitting at the kitchen table.
Holding a piece of paper.
Completely, and utterly, removed.
***
I tapped the wall.
He didn’t react.
“Ryden?”
He didn’t respond.
As I marched closer, I could see that it was actually a long, pink sticky note, with money taped to the back of it.
I rounded the table, eyeing a church envelope, a set of keys and money. About a few hundred dollars from the look of it.
“She’s gone,” Ryden whispered so softly I could barely make out what he was saying.
“What?” I felt every bill, turned the envelope over. “What is all this?”
“She’s gone.” Another murmur.
“Is this school money?”
“SHE’S FUCKING GONE, MY MOM IS FUCKING GONE!!!!!!”
It felt like a knife slicing across my skin. I almost couldn’t believe it. But the proof… the existence of his words was splattered all over the table like a roadmap.
Why else would there be money? Keys? A letter?
Where are the cars? Where are they?
“Ryden, there’s no way –”
But he was already up, crumpling the note and throwing the
first thing he saw across the room – it was a cereal bowl.
He muttered a string of curse words, throwing things around the room, destroying everything he touched. I moved in slow motion, bending down to pick up the note underneath the sink.
“FUCK YOU!” He repeated, “FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU…”
I flattened out the edges, ironing out the writing. It read:
To my Dove, (I flinched)
How I wish things could be different, but I know you will be okay.
You deserve to have a life restricted of pain and fear.
I’m sorry that my choices have been yielding so much of that in this household.
For that, I’ve chosen to leave with Corban.
I know if I’m with him, he won’t come back and hurt you.
That’s the last thing I want for you. You’re going to be a real adult in a few months.
Go out and be exactly who you’re meant to me, my sweet boy.
P.S. I’ve saved you some money. There is two thousand in the envelope.
Love always,
Mom
I dropped the letter. “Where’s the rest of it?”
“The rest of fucking what?”
The entire room was trashed. I swallowed. “Your mom’s letter. She said she left you two thousand dollars.”
He narrowed his eyes, stalking towards me. “That’s… That’s what you’re concerned about? The money?”
“No, Ryden, I’m just trying to make sense of everything! This is insane – scrap that, this is so fucked! She couldn’t have just left you – she loved…” I lost my breath, flashbacks of Clara standing by the door, watching as her abusive partner beat Ryden to a pulp.
“No,” Ryden clenched his fists. “She didn’t.”
“Ryden –”
“I think I need to be alone, Scarlett,” he whispered, tears flying down his face.
I stood tall. “You’re going to be alone from now on so don’t ask for it.”
“Excuse me?”
“What are you going to do, huh? Are you going to sit here in your kitchen and wait for the fairy godmother to come and whisk you away? Wait for things to fix itself?”
“Scarlett my mom’s GONE! I’M ALLOWED TO FEEL THINGS, I’M ALLOWED TO BE FUCKING CONFUSED AND ANGRY!”
“I didn’t say –”
“NOT EVERYONE CAN SHRUG OFF THE BAD LIKE YOU DO. NOT EVERYONE IS SO USED TO IT!”
I shrunk into myself.
He pulled out his phone, dialled a number I presumed was his mother’s, and threw it across the room at the voicemail.
“I’ve called her every single minute since I saw this note. That was two hours ago. A hundred and twenty calls, Scarlett. One, two, zero.”
I wrapped my arms around myself, avoiding eye contact. “I’m sorry.”
“Scarlett,” he said, moving in front of me. “Scarlett, no, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I know…” he inhaled, “I know your life isn’t your fault, Sinead and Flack… that isn’t your fault. But I’m struggling right now. I need you. And I’m sorry. But please, please be here with me.”
I could’ve slapped him. Despite the tears in my eyes. “I’m always here with you, you dumb idiot. Don’t make this about me.”
“You’re sad!”
“You pissed me off!”
“I just fucking need to breathe!” He pulled me closer, wrapping me in a tight embrace. “Be my air, please, please be my air.”
I rested my forehead against his, fighting off tears.
“What am I going to do?” He whispered. “Where am I going to go? Why would she do this? He had a restraining order, the cops arrested him, did she pay his bail? Where did she go? Why won’t she answer me? I’m her SON! I’m her…”
His breathing hitched higher and higher, body rattling with nerves, as if he couldn’t control his muscles, his hands – and the tears, they dripped down like acid. “She was supposed to love me,” he let out. “She told me she’d protect me.”
“Could this be some sort of prank? What if Corban wrote the note?”
“That’s her handwriting. She called me Dove.”
I swallowed. “You call me Dove.”
“You… are.”
“Then what’s she?”
He stopped, pulled away, looked around – the chaos, the broken bowl, the discarded envelope and the money – he sat back down, a ghost of the boy I used to know, now something else entirely.
“She’s nothing,” he whispered.