38. Bodhi
38
BODHI
T he parking lot is almost empty now, cars having come and gone over the last hour, but I can’t make myself move. Exhaustion sits deep in my bones as I relive Lauren’s story right along with mine.
They’d left right after we’d said goodbye, and Tom had called not long after to tell me that Lauren agreed to make a formal statement.
She’s prepared to testify.
All because of me.
Tom had been right.
It’s a huge win but it’s bittersweet, the celebration alongside the agony held within the memories. The feelings wiping away the sanctuary I’d found with Ella, a false sense of safety that would never truly be mine.
Would it ever end?
Unread messages bearing her name mock me as I grip the steering wheel and pray for clarity.
For guidance.
For the hope that I deserve her patience and grace when I’ve never been able to grant it to myself.
You still have it; she’s waiting for you.
She cares about you.
But none of those things are the responding voice in my mind as my shaking hands turn the key in the ignition.
It’s only his voice.
Like it is every time I fall down this rabbit hole. The man who haunts my dreams and now my waking hours as he waits for his second trial. The man who tried to lure me into the darkness.
Who willed me to become something unrecognizable from the boy who’d been placed on his doorstep.
I squeeze my eyelids shut and will the memories away.
My chest aches and I rub my fist against the spot where her name is printed on my skin, the girl who should be my only fucking priority.
The one who deserved happiness and a life free from the horrors of this world.
Of Daryl’s world.
The girl I couldn’t protect.
The one who never had a chance to live.
It’s too much.
Without thinking, I dial Mason’s number and put it on speaker, letting my eyelids fall closed as I wait for him to answer.
“Hey, man, are you all right?”
“How do you do it?” I ask, unable to articulate all that it entails.
“Do what?”
Instead of answering, I swallow hard, my eyelids still squeezed shut. “I had no idea…”
“You were fucking ten, Bodhi. Ten. You were a kid. Nothing that happened in that house is on you,” he says, not needing the details but still knowing exactly what to say.
But I didn’t stop it.
“I know, but it doesn’t make it any easier.”
“But now that you’ve heard her story? Do you think she should let that weigh her down for the rest of her life? Should that be the defining moment in her life?”
“No.”
“Then why are you allowing it to be yours?”
“Fuck,” I bite out, my eyes welling with tears and my chest aching.
“You gotta let people love you, man. I let Lana love me.” When I don’t say anything, he keeps talking. “You asked how I do it—I let her love me. I let Beck love me and Holland and I love the hell out of them. Our makeshift family in Blackstone Falls and the one in Clementine Creek. I teach Beck what it means to be a man, the things you taught me about discipline, respect, and family. I show Holland the way a man should treat a woman and I show up for her. For them.”
“What happens if they leave?” I rasp, the question raw and honest and long overdue.
“Then you lean on your family. You mourn and you grieve them. Living or dead it’s all the same, but then you make the choice to live in that grief or make peace with it. I’ve made peace with it.”
“It’s not that easy for me.”
“And you think it was easy for me? You know what I came from. But if you think I’m gonna give my piece of shit father the satisfaction of thinking he killed me the same night he killed my mother you’re wrong. I survived. I survived and it was hard, and when I lost my aunt I survived that too. And Audrey. I survived losing you. ”
“Mason—”
All of a sudden I’m sixteen again and the blood on my hands isn’t mine. The scene plays out on the back of my eyelids. Police are everywhere, the harsh lights in the hospital and the smell of antiseptic disorienting, and the only thing bringing me back to reality is the cold metal on my wrists as the handcuffs click into place.
“I didn’t have a choice.” It’s a choked sob, the pain radiating like a zap of electricity through my veins.
“You didn’t. You saved my life, sacrificed yourself, and I still mourned you every single day you were gone. But you know what I did? I did everything I could to make you proud. I kept my head down and out of trouble. Did well in school and counted the fucking days until you were out.”
“I’m still proud of you.”
“And I’m proud of you— look how far we’ve come. Bad shit happened to us, brother, but I refuse to let that rule my life. Look where I am now—where we ended up. We’ve worked too hard for this. Bodhi,” he says, his voice serious, “you can’t be afraid to be happy.”
“I’m not…” I don’t finish the sentence because I can’t.
Because it’d be a lie.
“Come home, man. Come to Montana’s. The girls are with Ella and you need her, but you need this first.”
“I just?—”
“Trust me.”
“I do.”
“Be easy.”
“Easy and free.”