Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Myles got into his car before he so much as looked at his phone. Roughly eight thousand texts in addition to the missed calls were from Jet, and Myles scrolled through them to see what Jet thought was so important.
The texts started with “are you there,” then moved through a number of variations of “where the hell are you,” getting progressively more profane and aggressive. He’d barely read through a third of them when the phone rang again.
“Jet, hi—”
“What the hell, Uncle Myles?” He was furious. “Where the fuck are you?”
“Language.”
“Fuck that.”
“Take a breath.”
“You weren’t answering your phone, and I didn’t know—”
“I’m fine.”
“But I didn’t know that! I got someone to drive me over, and now the Y won’t let us take her home. Where are you?”
“Two minutes away. I’m coming.”
He should have replied to the first text, but years of dealing with cops on the street had kept his mind on worrying about Wyatt. Knowing his kids were safe but Wyatt was not had distracted him.
It would be easier to leave the car where it was and walk around the corner to the Y, so he did, the muted thump of his cane hitting he cement every other step a reminder of how much he’d overstretched himself with that stunt.
“Jet, you need to calm down,” he said into his phone as he went. “I will be there in a minute. I’m hanging up now. I suggest you take a few deep breaths before I get there. You can be mad at me, but you had better show some respect.”
Myles didn’t have to hang up the call. Jet did.
“For fuck sakes.”
He slowed his walk to call Lucky and give him a heads-up about what had happened. He wanted to warn him about Wyatt, but also reassure him that Jet’s panic had been premature.
“Hey,” he said when Lucky picked up.
“Are you okay?” The strain in Lucky’s tone made Myles’s gut twist.
“Yeah. Fine.”
“You can drive?”
“Shit. Lucky—”
“Can you drive?”
“Yes. This wasn’t a relapse. I—”
A shallow stream of relieved swearing interrupted him.
Myles waited it out.
“Okay. Well. Can we talk when you get back?”
“Yeah, of course. I swear, this was not what you’re thinking. I’ll tell you everything when I’m back, but…”
“But what?”
“Do you have a shelter bed?”
“For who?”
“His name’s Wyatt.”
“Yeah. Of course I do. I’ll sort it out. Are you bringing him back with you?”
“No. He’ll be there after five sometime. A cop named Clairemont is bringing him.”
“Good. It’ll be nice to see him again.”
“The cop?”
“Yeah.”
“Of course you know him.”
“Of course I do. Hurry up and go get your kids.”
“Yeah.”
“And Myles.”
“Yeah?”
“Sorry for my assumption. I guess Jet’s panic was infectious.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t pick up his first call. I should have.”
“I’m sure you’ll hear about that, but cut him some slack too. He’ll never admit how scared he is. Sixteen isn’t that old, no matter how he wants to pretend he doesn’t need you.”
“I know.”
“See you soon.”
“See you.”
When he walked into the Y lobby, he spotted Jet sitting at a table in front of the café counter. He had a muffin and a box of orange juice for when Shelly came out of her class.
“Blueberry muffin,” Myles observed. “That’s her favourite.”
Jet didn’t look at him.
“How did you get here?” Myles asked him.
He scowled.
“I drove him over.” Ozzy stepped out from the shelter of a wide beam, where he had been leaning watching a swim practice. “What the hell?” He gripped Myles’s face and turned it to the light. “Who hit you?”
Jet’s head snapped up at that.
“Leave it,” Myles muttered.
But of course Ozzy wouldn’t. “What happened?”
“You got in a fight?” Jet was on his feet now. “Why? How?”
“Really?” Myles glared at Ozzy, who now had one of his hands and was studying his bruised knuckles. He yanked his hand free. “Leave it!”
“Who did you fight with?” Jet demanded.
“Can we—”
“Who?” Jet was in his face now, but Myles glared at Ozzy over his head.
“Thanks for that,” he snapped.
Ozzy shrugged.
“Jet, please.” Myles backed him off a step. “Everything is fine. I’ll go put your name on her list of people allowed to pick her up. I should have done that in the first place.”
Jet stood, mutinous, arms crossed. “You should have answered your phone.”
“Please,” Myles said. “We can talk about this later.”
“Always later,” Jet muttered, but was interrupted by a burst of children’s voices and Shelly happily skipping over to them, a piece of pink construction paper flapping in one hand.
“You’re all here!” She grinned and jumped in place in front of Jet, holding up her art to him. “Look!”
“Shells, that’s great. Tell me about it, okay?” He led her towards the table and the snack he’d bought for her.
As angry as he was at Myles, his demeanour with his sister was calm and kind, and Myles marvelled. The kid was something else.
“He’s very good with her,” Ozzy observed.
“I know that.”
“But he’s also a kid.”
“No shit.” Myles stalked towards the customer service desk.
“So is it really fair to leave her care to him?”
Myles stopped and turned on him. “You think that’s what I’m doing? Is that what he told you?” He snarled, mostly at himself. “Don’t answer that. It’s none of my business what he tells you.”
“No. It’s not. But today, I think you got sidetracked. Or, more likely, dragged into some kind of rescue mission that had nothing to do with you.”
“There was a kid, Ozzy, Jet’s age, and he was getting beat up.”
“And you had to jump in and be the hero.”
“I had to not let him get pulverized by two grown men twice his size. You would have done the same.”
Ozzy pursed his lips, but finally grunted. “Probably. But Tris would have rightly torn a strip out of me, because I have to think of him now, and getting into the middle of a fight does not put him first.”
“Maybe he would. Or maybe he would have pushed you into the brawl because he knows as well as we do what it’s like to be the one who can’t defend himself.”
“Doesn’t change anything. You have them to think about.”
Myles grunted.
“I’m not trying to be a dick here.”
“Just comes naturally.”
“Comes from being your friend, asshole.”
“That’s great. Thanks.”
“Can I help you?” The perky clerk behind the counter grinned at them, blithely pretending their snark wasn’t happening. “I’m Kimmy. What can I do for you?”
“I need to add my nephew’s name to Shelly’s pick-up list, please.”
Kimmy nodded. “Sure thing.” She squinted at him. “We have a first-aid station—”
“I’m fine.” Myles mitigated the snappish tone with a weak smile.
“If you need it,” she said, her tone mild if less perky, and she pointed to a door off to one side of the lobby.
“Thank you.”
“What’s your last name?”
He managed to get Jet added to the list, and after a second of hesitation and a glance at Ozzy, who sighed and gave the slightest of nods, he added Ozzy’s name too.
“Thank you for that.”
“No point in putting his name on there if he has to get someone to drive him over here anyway.”
“I appreciate you having my back.” They left the front counter and went back to observing the swim practice while Shelly ate her food.
“Going to tell me what actually happened?”
“Does it matter?”
“It distracted you from your kids, so yeah. It matters.”
Myles shrugged. “Pretty much what I already said. A homeless kid getting beat up by two grown men. I couldn’t do nothing.”
Another sigh deflated Ozzy’s entire frame. “No, I suppose you couldn’t.”
“The fight was nothing.”
“That’s why you’re limping worse than ever, are bruised and will probably have a black eye.”
“It wasn’t much. It was the endless statements to the cops. They were great but thorough, and I didn’t want to—you know.” He frowned. “I did ignore my phone, because cops… You know how they turn on you.”
“We aren’t those guys anymore, Myles,” Ozzy reminded him.
Myles let out a breath. “Easy enough to say when you aren’t in the moment, standing in front of them.”
Ozzy clapped a hand on his shoulder, a fleeting reminder they used to be closer than brothers.
“Anyway, I told the kid about Lucky’s shelter. One of the cops, Clairemont, said he’d drive him over after his shift.”
Ozzy nodded. “He’s a good one. He helped Marcus last summer.”
So that was how Lucky knew him. Myles had heard Marcus’s story, though he hadn’t yet met the diner owner.
Ozzy turned to face Myles. “But the Cabin is still being renovated. The kitchen isn’t done, and the living spaces are only half painted.”
“But you have a room? A bed?”
Ozzy held up both hands. “Not me, I’m just the contractor. You have to talk to Lucky about that.”
“I did. Called him.”
“Good, because he was genuinely turning into a basket case, thinking you might have relapsed.”
“Sorry. That why you’re here?”
Ozzy nodded.
“In case I was drunk and being a dick.”
Ozzy pulled in a long, steadying sigh.
“I’m sorry I worried everyone.”
“You scared Jet, mostly. And that may have rubbed off on us some. I’m sorry we didn’t trust you.”
“Understandable.”
Ozzy grimaced, glared past Myles, then clapped a hand on his shoulder again. He pulled Myles into the fastest, tightest bear hug, then all but pushed him away. “Go talk to Jet.”
They both looked over to the table where Jet was laughing as he tried to keep Shelly from blowing so many bubbles in her juice she overflowed it all over the table.
As if sensing the scrutiny, he glanced up. His scowl was epic, and he turned back to Shelly immediately.
“Go easy on him. Part of being sixteen is thinking you don’t need parental reassurance but also really, really wanting to know someone’s there to back you up. He may have overreacted to a missed phone call, but that doesn’t make his panic any less real.”
“I know.”
“I’ll talk to Lucky about getting a room ready. You talk to Jet.”
“You don’t have to—”
“You came here to get help, Mick—shit. Myles. You came here because your friends are here.”
“Are we friends?”
“We’re not not friends.”
Myles glanced over at the kids again. “Did I jump in there because I was trying to—I don’t know. Avoid them?”
“You jumped in there because that’s who you are.”
“You never thought I should be that guy.”
“I was drowning, and you were saving everyone else but me.”
“I couldn’t—”
“I know.” Ozzy gripped his arm. “I know, Mick.”
Myles closed his eyes, letting the old name wash over him, trying to figure out where—or if—it fit him.
“Micky couldn’t save me. It felt like we were in the trenches together, but you were always running off to save someone else while I was floundering.
But the only person who could have saved me was me.
I figured that out eventually, and so did you.
” He smiled, and it was a bit sad, but only a bit.
“That’s why you left Micky behind, isn’t it?
He was no good for me. He wasn’t even any good for you, and he sure as hell had no place raising kids. ”
“He’s still me.”
“Is he, though?” Ozzy squeezed his arm, then let go. He gazed out over the pool, arms crossed. “I know I never met Natalie, but the way you talked about her, I feel like she would never have left her kids with Micky. But I can see her leaving them with you. With Myles.”
“God, why do you always end up being the reasonable one?”
Ozzy laughed. “Just who I am.”
In the pool, the swim practice had come to an end, and now, a class of toddlers was led out to the pool’s edge.
As parents slipped into the water, the kids were encouraged to jump in after.
Some did without a second thought. Others took longer.
Eventually, they all jumped and they all bobbed back to the surface, sputtering, but mostly grinning and laughing.
Myles turned his attention to Jet, who was also watching the pool, a strange expression of longing on his face. “How do I fix this?”
“Prove to him you can be there when he needs you.”
“He’s never going to admit he needs anyone.”
“Which means you have to pay more attention and be there, even when he doesn’t know he needs you.” He turned to face Myles. “No more running off to save other people’s kids.” He patted Myles’s shoulder. “And maybe a little less time spent at the bookshop.”
“Steven never leaves that building.”
“I’ll be honest. That sounds like a Steven problem.”
Myles shuddered. He didn’t dare tell Ozzy how much easier everything—breathing for instance—was when Steven crawled into his lap and took over. He wasn’t saving anyone when he was there. He was the one being taken care of, and he wasn’t sure he could give that up.
“Come on.” Ozzy pushed Myles’s shoulder gently. “Let’s get this show on the road.”
“Yeah.” Turning back to the kids, Myles raised his voice. “Let’s go, you two.”
Jet got up to toss Shelly’s garbage into the bin. “I’m riding back with Ozzy.”
“Jet—”
Ozzy smacked his arm. “Let it go. It’s fine.”
“I have to talk to him.”
“And you will. Give him the space.”
“Fine.” He had reached the table, and he took Shelly’s backpack from where it hung on her chair. “Let’s go, squirt.”
“Okay.” She hopped down, took his hand and reached for Jet’s with her other.
Jet smiled at her, took her hand, and they headed for the door. He only let go when he had to open the door; then he held it for everyone, and Shelly was off, talking a mile a minute about her classes and teachers and the other kids.
By the time Myles had managed to pause her long enough to turn to say something to Jet, his nephew was already in Ozzy’s truck and slamming the door.
“Right.”
Ozzy shrugged as he started the engine, and as he’d been advised, Myles let it go. Not like he had much choice.