Chapter 14 - Tucker
Tucker
I sat in the cop car for what seemed like an eternity. I wondered what the charges would be. Trespassing. Rape. Since we hadn’t done it, maybe only attempted rape. Either way, it was true that I was eighteen, and she was not. That might be statutory rape. I wasn’t sure.
I wondered how much I’d screwed up my life. Would I go to jail? And even if I didn’t, I had this arrest on my record. Would my college even take me now?
I’d blown everything.
Eventually, the cop came back to his car. We drove in silence. The second car didn’t follow us, but peeled off in another direction.
“What’s going to happen to me?” I asked the officer.
“We’ll go downtown and notify your parents.”
Gram. I would have to tell her. How much misery could one family heap on her? A dead son. A dead grandchild. Dead daughter-in-law. Her one remaining grandson winding up in jail.
The ride to the downtown facility took about twenty minutes. I recognized the tall brick building. I’d passed it on the freeway many times, sometimes joking with Bill that one of us would end up there at some point. And here I was.
I didn’t know much about how this worked other than what I’d seen in movies. I figured I’d be fingerprinted and my mug shot taken. Big men with tattoos would push me around.
But when we entered, I was taken to a small office.
A lady was there. She didn’t look too scary. The woman and the officer spoke outside the room, and I was left alone. I guessed they didn’t see me as much of a threat.
After a minute, the woman returned.
“Let me go over your name and address and some other details, and then we’ll call your parents,” she said.
“Am I going to jail?” I asked.
“Let’s get your family on the phone. We’ll go over the situation with them.”
“I’m eighteen,” I said. “Do we have to involve them?”
She set down her pen and looked me in the eye. “Are you in high school?”
“Yes. I graduate in a few weeks.”
“Then let’s call your parents.”
“I only have a grandmother,” I said. “My parents died in a car crash when I was twelve. It was here in town. You could look it up. Melissa and James Giddings.”
She folded her hands together. “I see. And your grandmother raised you?”
“She’s lost everybody in her life but me.” I lowered my head. “And now this.”
The woman sat for long moments, looking at me. “Was that your girlfriend you were with?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“How long have you been together?”
“Almost four months. We met in the hospital. We both have epilepsy.”
She let out a long gust of air. “Do you drive?”
“Yes. My car is back by her house.”
“Do you have a friend or someone who could go get it for you?”
“Yeah. I could call one of them.” Hope rose in my chest that she was going to let me go. It was a damn sad story. I couldn’t help it. It was the only story I had.
“Well, here’s the deal,” she said. “What happened tonight is not that unusual. Some mom or dad doesn’t like their daughter’s boyfriend and tries to press statutory rape charges against him.”
“We didn’t—”
“Irrelevant.” She picked up a pencil and tapped it on the desk. “The girl is seventeen. That’s the age of consent in Texas, so you’re fine on that count. But the mother could still get you on small charges, like trespassing or criminal mischief.”
“Who decides that?”
“The prosecutor, but he won’t even see the case if I don’t put it in the system.” She sat back in her chair. “You seem like a nice boy. I’m not really of the mind to muck up the record of a kid about to graduate when all he’s done is choose a girl with a mother like that.”
“She’s terrible,” I said.
She held up a hand to stop me. “You make your friend get your car. Do not go near that house, do you understand me? If that woman spots you and she calls the police again, I won’t be able to help you. Do you understand?”
“I understand.”
“You have to recognize when you’re stuck. And until that girl turns eighteen and walks out of her mother’s house, you’re stuck. The two of you have to bide your time. Until then, you have to know this is a losing proposition.”
I disagreed completely. Helping Ava was never the wrong thing.
I had to stick by her all the way until she got her freedom.
A seizure could cause her to lose everything.
The most important thing to me was ensuring that she continued to be the person she wanted to be—fierce, independent, and eager to learn.
“Is it possible for me to ask you to do something for me?” I asked.
“And what would that be, Mr. Giddings?” She sounded incredulous that I would ask after she had gotten me off the hook.
“Ava is in danger with her mother. She filed an abuse report at the hospital a few months ago. If you could ask someone at the hospital to follow up on that, I promise I’ll leave her alone until she’s eighteen. I need her to be safe.”
The woman’s gaze on me was fierce. “I believe your heart thinks all this is true, but I’ve seen a lot of drama in my years, and I’m telling you—let this go. If the abuse charges had been ruled as credible in the hospital, CPS would have taken Ava already. I’ll escort you downstairs.”
I was angry, so angry. She wasn’t listening. She didn’t know.
Hot tears threatened to spill from my eyes, but I refused to let them fall. I would save her. I had promised myself that. Promised Ava.
The woman led me downstairs. I used my phone to call for a ride. Then I called Bill and asked him to have Sarah drive him over there to pick up my car and bring it to my house.
I texted Ava over and over again, from the minute I got outside, all night. She never answered.
I didn’t sleep. Didn’t tell Gram. I paced my room until noon. And then I decided that I had to go over there. It was worth the risk. I’d take jail over abandoning her when she needed me.
I drove over to her neighborhood and slowly rolled up to the duplex.
But as soon as I saw it, I knew something was different.
The windows didn’t have curtains anymore.
With a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, I parked and walked up the stairs to peek into the front window.
They’d left in a hurry. The big furniture was there, a sofa and a bookshelf, but the closets and cabinets stood open, cleaned out.
I walked next door. When I knocked, Grandma Flowers came out on the porch.
“I reckoned I’d hear from you,” she said. “They’re gone.”
“You know where they went?”
“I wish I did, child,” she said.
“Did you see Ava when they left?”
“I did. She was crying.”
My poor Ava. “She won’t answer her phone.”
“Her mama’s got control,” she said. “There was a whole lot of carrying on after the cops came. I saw you in that police car.”
“What happened after I left?”
“They packed up,” she said. “Doors slamming. By morning, they were all loaded up in a U-Haul.”
“She can’t just disappear,” I said. “How will I find her?”
“If Ava has faith in you, then you must be up to the task.”
Grandma Flowers asked me to stay, but I was too upset, too angry, too tired.
I drove home and collapsed on my bed. When I refused to eat or get up to go to class the next day, Gram came into my room.
I didn’t tell her everything that had happened, only that Ava’s mother found out we were still talking and moved her away.
I hadn’t heard from her, and I didn’t know if I ever would.
She stroked my hair like she had after the accident. I felt the losses compound on me. Mom. Dad. Stephen. Now Ava.
The world had taken more from me than I could bear.