She wanted me to get out of her house?
Fine, I’d get all the way out.
Slamming the door to my Jeep, I cranked the starter savagely and then threw it in drive. I wanted her to know I was doing exactly what she asked. “See Aria? You think I’m just like him, but I’m not. You tell me to get out, I listen to you. I get out of your house, I get out of my house, I get outside a five mile radius of you just because you said so.” I slammed the heel of my palm down onto the steering wheel. Then gunned the engine.
My blind rage got me exactly as far as the hairpin turn. Wrenching the wheel wrenched me back to myself again.
What the hell was I doing?
Where the hell was I going?
I was running again. I was trying to hide. Again.
But where the hell could I hide, now?
I hit the steering wheel again and the gripped it tighter. The now-bare trees shot past me in a blur. How had I gotten it all so wrong with her? She needed help. I thought I was doing the right thing….
Three years ago, I thought I was doing the right thing too. One more DUI and I’d lose my license. So I pressured Jesse into driving stick. “You’re ready,” I’d slurred.
Because it was convenient for me to believe he was. Because it made my life easier.
Startled, I realized where I was heading, but it didn’t fully sink in until I’d already knocked on his door.
Kenzie gasped when she opened it. “Derek!”
“I’m sorry.” Shame flooded me. The absolute certainty I’d felt only seconds ago had fled as soon as I saw her face. “It’s a bad time. I shouldn’t have come.”
“Sure you should have.” Jesse’s voice floated out from behind the door. “I like that you’re finally starting to drop by.”
The sound of shrieking kids made Kenzie stiffen. “Is this a bad time?” I mouthed to her. I hoped she’d say yes. Give me an out. Thinking about doing this, about coming to him with my hat in my hand, was one thing. Actually moving the conversation out of my head and into real life - where I couldn’t control his reactions or predict the outcome - was another thing entirely. And it scared me to death. “I can go.”
Kenzie’s answer was to draw in a deep breath. “For the last time, Mabel, give your brother back his binkie!” she bellowed at the top of her voice.
Then she brushed her hair back from her eyes with a prim smile. “Not at all, Derek. Come on in.”
I followed her into the living room. She headed right for the kitchen, but I stopped and shoved my hands into my pockets, and turned to the corner. “Hey, Jess.”
The house was controlled chaos, but Jesse radiated paternal serenity from his post in his chair. His prosthetic was propped up against the wall in easy reach. “Hey mountain man,” he greeted me, nonchalantly scratching his stump. “What brings you down to the flatlands.”
“I think I fu-“ I caught myself as a toddler streaked by. “I think I screwed up something. Bad.”
“How bad did you screw it? And how important was it in the first place?” Jesse didn’t pull his punches. Not even when I wanted him to.
“Bad enough she kicked me out of my own home.”
Jesse straightened up. “And you came here?”
“Should I go?”
“Fuck no.” Jesse didn’t seem to worry as much about swearing in front of his children as I did. “This is the perfect place to come when you screw up. I’m a damn expert in the subject.”
“He is!” called Kenzie from the kitchen.
Jesse grinned. “Sit down.” He gestured to the toy-covered couch. I perched at the edge, trying to take up as little space as possible, but something beeped anyway. An off-key version of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star started playing. “Thing needs batteries,” Jesse explained. “Just chuck it in the pile over there. So who is she?”
Instead of throwing it, I set the beeping toy down on the carpet. Then swallowed. She wasn’t hiding any more… I could tell him… I hoped. “Aria Dolan.”
“Yeah? Damn. Nice one.”
“I told you I screwed up. There’s nothing nice about it.”
Jesse narrowed his eyes and leaned forward. “What did you do? Lie? Cheat? Steal?”
“None of the above.”
“But you screwed up… How?”
“I think…” He was the hardest person to admit this too. Which was why I was here, telling him in the first place. “I pushed her harder than she wanted to be pushed.”
He blinked and then his expression flattened. “To do what?”
“Get… better.”
I didn’t know how or why understanding flashed in Jesse’s eyes. But he quieted and tapped his fingernail against his teeth, a habit of his that had driven me nuts back when we were closer, and still made me grit my own teeth now. “Everybody has their own path, Derek.”
“I get that.”
“And they have to walk it at their own pace.”
“I know.” I lifted my gaze up from my hands. “I pushed you too.”
Jesse shook his head. “You did. But I could have said no.”
I blinked. I hadn’t ever considered that.
“What about you?” he went on, ignoring my shock. “You want her to get better, right?”
“Of course I do.”
“But… Are you better?”
“Haven’t touched a drop in years,” I reminded him.
“I know, but… are you better?”
“What do you mean?”
“Drinking was the symptom, not the problem itself, man. We both were doing it, using drink to dull pain caused by something else. Me? It was my old man’s belt I was trying to forget.” He glanced at Kenzie who’d appeared in the doorway with a dishtowel in her hands. She nodded at him, and he nodded in return. “I see my therapist religiously. Every week. It’s a lot of money on a tight budget…”
“But we make it a priority,” Kenzie finished.
I shook my head slowly. “I was a drunk, now I’m not. That was my problem. What else is there?”
Jesse shrugged. “Dunno man. I’m not a therapist. I could tell you what I think, but then I’d be doing to you exactly what you did to Aria.”
I stiffened.
He held up a hand. “Look. You came here. You reached out instead of disappearing even further into your hide-y hole up there.” He grinned. “I’d say that means you’re starting to figure it out all on your own.”
I leaped from the couch, causing a minor avalanche of toys. Kenzie burst out laughing. “Look at him. Were you ever so eager to get back to me after a fight?” she chided Jesse.
“Baby, you’ve seen me hop on one leg just to chase you down,” he admonished. He pushed himself forward until he’d backed her, laughing, into a corner. “Get the hell out now, Derek!” he called over his shoulder as he pulled his wife into his lap.
“Way ahead of you!” I called as the door slammed behind me.