Unbroken (5 page)

“I don’t think about him one way or another. He was nice to me, and he’s paying me three hundred for the night, so I don’t have any complaints whatsoever.”

Nix laughs. “Yeah, I feel ya there. He offered to pay us, but I told him to pay Cabe. We can put that toward the new album and promo, rather than in our pockets. I’m happy for you, though, Bree.”

At seventeen, Phoenix is the only cousin I have who’s my age. His brother Cabe is twenty one, and his sister Bevin is nine. But we were like best friends and always have been.

I sit myself on the edge of the stage while Bella, the female lead singer of SoS, continues to strum away and tune her guitar. I can’t help myself, really, as I take in the ambiance of the ballroom. It’s adorned with tea lights and tapered candles, and only one light is on: the spotlight over the stage. The sole table in the room is covered in red rose petals, and heart-shaped balloons are hanging from the ceiling like a bad Valentine’s Day ad.

“Damn. Whoever his girl is is lucky as shit. I can’t imagine being adored this much,” I say.

Phoenix raises an eyebrow. “What happened to Maddox?”

His question reaches inside my chest, wraps around my heart, and squeezes. It’s such a simple question, while the answer is anything but.

Shaking my head, I give him a small smile. “Maddox and I are no longer a going concern.” When he looks like he’s going to ask another question, I hold a hand up. “Don’t even try it. I don’t want to talk about it.”

There are scores of things I haven’t talked about with anyone yet, not even my siblings or my parents. And although he’s not number one, Maddox Bradley is at the top of that list. There are things I want to keep to myself, things I only let out beneath the beating of the water when I shower each morning, crying just loud enough to relieve myself of the pain and grief, but not loud enough for anyone to hear me.

His arms come up to wrap around my shoulders and I rest my head against his. “You’ll be okay,
prima
. And if you’re not, you know Cabe and me have your back.”

This is how we’ve been since we were kids. We would always just sit next to each other, because we’re the closest in age, and talk for hours. But whenever there was something I didn’t want to talk about, Phoenix would just hug me around the shoulders and tell me everything would be okay. Then, he’d threaten some sort of bodily harm to whoever it was that upset me.

Laughing, I nudge him with my shoulder. He groans as a result, and I laugh again at his histrionics. “So you’re telling me that if he gives me problems, my rock star cousins
will kick some ass for me?”

He smacks his hand over his chest where I nudged him as though I did permanent damage, and smiles. “Of course. There’s nothing we wouldn’t do for you, Bree.”

…

THERE ARE A MILLION THINGS I have to do each day.

I have to get up at 5:30 a.m., wake Dalis up, and make sure she has her uniform on. Then, once she’s dressed, I wake Cason up and let him get himself together. While he’s showering, I do Dalis’s hair if Nomi’s busy, and then I get dressed. We have to leave the house by seven, because we carpool with Nikkolas and Sarah. We have to drive to the outskirts of Harlow to take Dalis and Cason to Reid Middle School—Cason’s high school is right beside the middle school. Then we drop Emerson off at day care before we get to school
finally
.

I get out of school at noon—thanks to working three times as hard as my friends, as well as taking summer and adult school classes to get ahead—and then I catch the bus to Hastings, the auto shop where I’ve worked for six years. I work there until six thirty, and then I take the bus back to the Quinn household. Mama lends me her car to pick Cason and Dalis up from their tutor’s house, and then come back.

It’s exhausting, and leaves little to no time for a social life if I don’t have anyone around to help me. Thankfully, most days, Mama is more than willing to take some of the burden off of me.

She’s always told me that I’m a prideful young man, way too prideful than I should be at this age. Any time someone tries to help me, I’m adamant in my refusal of their assistance. I don’t like handouts. I don’t like being a burden on those around me. I took the responsibility for my siblings, so I want to keep it. I don’t want or need anyone taking care of me.

Despite all that, somehow Ma convinced me to let her take the burden off of me. She takes the kids on the weekends so I can have some type of life. She invites us for dinner on Sunday, that way I only have to cook dinner Monday through Thursday. And when we’re not staying at her house, she makes me check in once a week to make sure things aren’t getting too much for me.

The weekends are the best, even though most times, all I do is put in overtime at Hastings. If I’m feeling particularly happy or sad, I hang out with Nic and Colin, or I go visit Mom at the cemetery.

Today is the first day since I started high school that I have a day off. Cason and Dalis had a minimum day at school, I’m off of work, and I don’t quite know what to do with myself when no one needs me.

I like to be needed. No, I need to be needed. It keeps me from focusing too long on my problems.

Everyone’s at school except me, and I can’t afford to spend money unnecessarily when there are bills to pay back at home. So whatever I decide to do for fun today, it has to be free. But in Harlow, whatever’s free isn’t very fun.

Having Mr. Quinn’s car today makes things easier, because I don’t have to worry about bus fare. Mama usually comps me for the gas I use, so I have total freedom until dinner time.

Driving around Harlow always leads me to one place: Harlow Cemetery.

She’s buried right by her father. He passed the year before she did, and he loved her very much. I remember that. I also remember that the day of her funeral was the last time we ever saw our grandmother. She was blindsided by the fact that our father was keeping us in Harlow instead of moving us to Mom’s hometown of San Francisco, and he didn’t want her to see us. So she fled after the funeral, and we haven’t heard from her since then.

I grab my backpack and her flowers out of the passenger seat. I drop onto the grass in front of her headstone and cross my legs. Reaching inside my backpack, I pull my Coke, chips, and a bottle of water out, and then grab the bouquet of flowers so I can put them in the cup near her grave.

Taking a sip of the Coke, I lean over and rest my hand on my grandfather’s stone. “I miss you, Gramps. And if you see Gramma, tell her I miss her, too. It’s been too long.”

There’s a silver cup inside the ground, and I reach for it. I crack the water bottle open and fill it up. I don’t waste a second in taking the flowers out of their cellophane wrapping and inhaling their scent. They don’t smell special or anything. In fact, I’m pretty sure all the flowers smell exactly the same. But they look pretty.

I buy her the same flowers every time I come here, because they were her favorites: lilies, accented with snapdragons. I remember that they were her favorites because right before she passed, I sat on her bed and she took my hand.

It was so cold. Her hand didn’t feel like her hand anymore. But I held it anyway, because I couldn’t imagine
not
holding it. She ran her thumb over the back of my hand and looked me straight in the eye.

“Brody, honey, I want you to promise me something,” she said.

I crawled into the bed with her and wrapped my arm around her middle, trying as hard as possible to avoid touching the IV in the crook of her arm. Laying my head on her shoulder, I nodded.

“Anything, Mommy,” I told her. I was twelve, but I was a little boy again in that moment. “Anything.”

“Promise me that you’ll visit me often, baby boy.”

That was easy to promise, because there was no way I was going to get through life without visiting her. “Of course I will. I’ll even have Dad tell me how to take the bus there, that way I can go by myself sometimes.”

She smiled, but she was so sad that it barely reached my eyes. I hated seeing her sad like that, and I hated knowing there was nothing that I could do to take that sadness away. She didn’t have long left with us, and that was the worst part. Knowing that our days with her were numbered, and she was going to miss
everything
.

“And one more thing, B.” She grinned when I nodded again, too choked up and emotional to respond. “Don’t
ever
bring me roses, because if you do, I swear I will haunt your ass until the end of time.”

I raised my eyebrow at that, confused. “Well, what do you want me to bring you? I thought every woman liked roses?”

She shook her head. “Nah,
girls
like roses, baby. I’m a woman, and women like much more sophisticated, thoughtful flowers. Bring me lilies. Preferably with snapdragons. Those are my favorites.”

“Okay, Mom.” I hugged her again, and she kissed my forehead. “I love you so much.”

“I love you more. I always will.”

She died two days later, in her sleep. It was the best way, the best we could hope for, or that’s what everyone told us. She’d suffered beautifully for so long, and even when she was in pain, she pretended like she wasn’t, for our sakes.

Pressing my thumb and forefinger to the bridge of my nose to keep my emotions at bay, I close my eyes. I lean forward and run my hand over the smooth stone where she lay. I trace her name a repeatedly, hoping for some divine intervention, some sign that she’s here with me even when she’s not. I don’t know what I’m hoping for. A whip of the wind, thunder or rain, a heavenly sign.

But nothing comes.

And when it doesn’t, I sit back and do what I normally do.

“Hi, Mom,” I say quietly. “I miss you so much. I can’t believe it’s been six years since you left us. Things are kind of hectic here. Dalis graduates from middle school this year, but thankfully she graduates a week before I do. Cason’s finally pulled his grades up after his slip last year. Mama Quinn is doing exactly what you’d expect of her. She’s taking care of us. But every time she does, I can’t help but wish it was you. I wish you were still here. Six years, and it’s still not fair that you had to go…”

Three hours later, I’m emotionally spent from my visit with Mom, like I always am. My heart is heavy and I’m missing her more than usual. Everything’s piling up today, and I had to let it out before I fucking exploded.

I don’t have any obligations for the rest of the day, and I’m so exhausted. I decide I’m going to head back to the Quinn household and take a nap. Usually, I don’t have this kind of luxury, but since I do today, I’m going to take full advantage of it, especially considering the day’s events.

This house isn’t my second home. It’s my
only
home. The house I live in, or am supposed to live in permanently, hasn’t been a
home
since my mother lived there.

I shut off the car when I pull up in front of the house and take a calming breath. I enter through the backdoor, because there’s a stairway in the kitchen that leads directly to Nic’s old room.

Every time I set foot in this room, I’m bombarded with memories that have taken place in this bedroom, particularly the one that took place the day of my mother’s funeral, when I couldn’t stand to be in our house anymore. Everyone was there for the repast, and when the Quinns decided it was time to leave, I asked to go with them. I was tired of everyone’s “I’m sorry for your loss”. Or “She’s in a better place now.” Or my personal favorite, “At least she’s not suffering anymore.” I was sick of it, but not nearly as sick as I was of everyone giving me and my siblings that look like we were a group of puppies abandoned at the side of the road.

Nic had brought me up to her room, kicked off her shoes. She climbed in bed, gestured for me to follow, and she held me while I cried myself to sleep.

The memory hits me like a ton of bricks, because that’s what I feel like doing now.

Except she’s not here.

I’m alone.

Again.

FOUR