A Twist of Hate (24 page)

              She studied the flecks of bronze and gold in his emerald eyes. “You wouldn’t leave me, would you,” she asked, already knowing the answer.

              “Nope.” He took her hand and kissed her palm. “Not ever.”

***

              Camden drove.

              He couldn’t go to school. The theater department was no longer a haven. He couldn’t go to the park and sit on the bench across the street from Siobhan’s house. That would be too much like facing his cowardice head on. He couldn’t go to the Livingstons. Brian was still at Raines-Hartley and probably still furious with him.

              No matter how far or how fast he drove, Camden knew he couldn’t outrun the fact that the person he most wanted to talk to was the one person he couldn’t face.

***

              For two days, Siobhan relentlessly pestered her doctors to release her from the hospital. Friday morning, they gave in with the proviso that she schedule visits from a home health care nurse. One week after what the media referred to as “the Prep School Rampage,” Siobhan was in her own home for dinner. Mr. Curran invited Carol Livingston and Patrick Dougherty to join them. The parents gathered for coffee and tea in the kitchen following the meal while a weary Siobhan took to her bed.

              “Brian’s having problems,” said Mrs. Livingston. “Physically, he’s improving every day. I’m concerned that he’s drawing an unreasonable amount of emotional support from Siobhan. I’m all for whatever helps him through his healing journey, but it places an unfair burden on Siobhan. She’s dealing with her own journey.”

              “I don’t think she views it as a burden,” Mr. Curran said. “She’s taking each day as it comes. She hasn’t complained, she doesn’t cry. Other than speaking with the detectives or prosecutors, she doesn’t talk about Michael Littlefield or the attack. She misses Camden. I told her to call him but she refused. She says she can’t beg him to see her, that it’s something he has to want for himself.”

              “She’s right,” Mrs. Livingston agreed. “Brian won’t call Camden either, but for different reasons. Camden has become the target for Brian’s anger. Brian’s level of anger in general worries me. It shows in fits and starts. A nurse came for his home visit yesterday, and he yelled at her because her hands were cold when she changed the dressing on his shoulder.” Mrs. Livingston stared into her mug of ginger mint tea. “The only time he allows me to touch him is after he’s had a nightmare.”

              “He dreams about the shooting?” Mr. Dougherty asked, accepting a coffee refill from Mr. Curran.

              “The nightmares started the first night he was home from the hospital. He wakes up terrified, screaming Siobhan’s name. I’m his mother and a mental health professional as well, yet I’m not sure how to help him.”

              “How is Camden holding up?” Mr. Curran asked.

              “He tore down the treehouse,” said Mr. Dougherty.

              “He what?” said Mr. Curran.

              “You’re kidding,” said Mrs. Livingston.

              “He took a sledgehammer to it.” Mr. Dougherty rubbed his right temple. “It’s a miracle he didn’t open his wound. He doesn’t eat, he doesn’t sleep. I hear him at all hours, walking around his room or in the pool house. I’ve tried to get him to visit Siobhan. I’m baffled as to why he won’t. I hate saying it, but he’s acting just like his mother.”

              Mrs. Livingston pursed her lips, pinching back her opinion of Camden’s mother. She first met Maureen Dougherty at a third grade parent-teacher conference.  Mrs. Dougherty had appeared to love Camden very much. Mrs. Livingston had no any idea why she abandoned her family. The one thing she did know was that Camden had been the innocent victim of her decision, and now, more than ever before, Camden was suffering the repercussions of his mother’s abandonment.

              “Brian said some things, some very cruel things, at the hospital on Sunday,” said Mrs. Livingston. “I think that’s why Cam hasn’t been in touch with him.”

              “So what can we do to help our kids get their lives back?” asked Mr. Curran.

              “My husband and I are speaking at a seminar in Chicago,” Mrs. Livingston said. “We wanted to cancel, but this seminar has been in the works for a year. I’m not comfortable leaving Brian all alone while he’s recovering. Damon, could Brian stay here Friday and Saturday night? We’ll be back early Sunday morning.”

              “We’d love to have him, Carol,” Mr. Curran said. “It might be a good idea to get all three of them together.” He turned to Mr. Dougherty. “Do you think you could get Camden over here sometime this weekend?”

              “I’ll try,” Mr. Dougherty sighed, “but I can’t promise anything. “Camden’s got his mother’s passive-aggressive stubborn streak. It’s impossible to get him to do something he doesn’t want to do.”

***

              Mr. Dougherty returned from the Currans to find Camden in the pool house. He sat on a chaise, gazing into the still water. He looked up when his father entered.

              “I’m sorry, I was out later than I expected to be,” Mr. Dougherty apologized. “I called, but you didn’t pick up. I left a message. Did you check your voicemail? Damon Curran, Carol Livingston, and I had dinner. Siobhan was released from the hospital this morning. She was resting when I was there, but Damon says she’s doing very, very well.”

              Camden dropped his head into his hands. “Dad,” he croaked, his voice rusty from disuse.

              Mr. Dougherty sat on the chaise beside Camden’s. “She misses you.”

              “I miss her, too, so much that it’s killing me, but…”

              “But what?” his father prodded gently.

              “I can’t,” he groaned.

              “I don’t understand. I’m trying to but I just can’t understand why you won’t even talk to her.”

              Camden rose stiffly. “I can’t.”

              “Are you upset with her?” Mr. Dougherty ventured.

              “No, of course not. I’m upset with me.” Camden walked through the rear doors of the pool house. He kept walking until the night swallowed him.

***

              He hadn’t planned to go to Siobhan’s house, but his yearning drew him there. It was late, much too late to ring the doorbell, even if he’d been inclined to. He climbed up to her bedroom and peered through her windows. The moonlight illuminated the small person sleeping beneath the handmade quilt on the big bed. He touched the glass, barely suppressing the urge to tap it and whisper her name. He wanted to wake her and beg her forgiveness. He wanted to make everything right, to make everything the way it had been before the night of the play. His heart cried out to the stars with the sure knowledge that everything had changed forever.

***

              Siobhan sat up. The sudden motion sent a sharp pain through her injured side. Her blood racing, she turned to the windows. Shadowy clouds cloaked the moon hanging low in the dark blue sky. She scrambled out of bed and went to the windows. There was nothing unusual outside—the roof of the solarium and the trellis, the garden beyond it, alive with its first spring bloom. She touched her forehead and fingertips of her uninjured hand to the cool glass.

              “Camden.”

   She wished her tender invocation had magic that could somehow bring him to her. But it didn’t. She closed her eyes, the sharp ache in her heart dulling every other pain
.

Chapter Thirteen

“Young isn’t synonymous with stupid. Young people understand that actions have consequences. Some young people just don’t care.”

—Cyril Edwards,
Parents Plus Magazine

              “That boy is here.”

              Siobhan left the bathroom to find Grandma Curran standing just inside the bedroom door. She frowned at Siobhan’s sudden smile.

              “Camden’s here?” He was the only person to whom Grandma Curran exclusively referred as “that boy.”

              “No,” Grandma Curran said sharply. “That
other
boy.”

              Hope died in Siobhan’s eyes. She peeled off the plastic bag that had protected her cast from the shower. She began drying her hair with a corner of the thick ecru towel around her.

              “Have you been crying?” Grandma Curran asked, her tone accusatory.

              “No.” Siobhan slightly turned to stop her grandmother reading the lie in her face. “I got shampoo in my eyes.” Shampoo hadn’t caused the anguished tears. The last time she had been in her shower, Camden had sat her on the built-in seat and combed her hair as warm water gently buffeted her body.

              “I offered to help you.” Again Grandma Curran’s words sounded like an accusation rather than a gesture of courtesy.

              “I managed.” Siobhan went to her bureau and withdrew a set of pastel cotton undergarments and a white cotton nightdress. “I’d like to get dressed, now.”

              “Your daddy has lost his mind,” Grandma Curran declared bleakly.

              Siobhan wearily tossed the clothing onto her bed. She held the towel securely about her. The last thing she wanted was a fight, but Grandma Curran seemed determined to draw her into another winnerless argument. “Why don’t you just come out and tell me what’s on your mind? Say whatever it is you’ve been dying to tell me since I woke up in the hospital.”

              Grandma Curran set her face in the hard lines Siobhan had come to both love and hate. “That boy ain’t comin’ back. You think because he’s got money, a fancy car, and fancy manners, that he’s gonna treat you like you’re one of those white Prescott girls? He ain’t. A snake is a snake, don’t matter if you find him in the Garden of Eden or at the gates of Hell. That boy ain’t no better than the one who shot you!

              “Forget him,” Grandma Curran demanded. “Find yourself a nice black boy to settle down with.”

              There it was, the point of every discussion with Grandma Curran. All roads led to the quest for a nice black boy. A mirthless laugh escaped Siobhan. “I’m not planning to settle down with anyone, black or white.”

              “Then why are you making yourself crazy, pining for that boy? He doesn’t want you!”

              Those words struck a place no bullet could ever reach. “Has he told you he doesn’t want me?”

              “Does he have to? He’s not here, is he?”

              “He’s coming back to me.”

              Grandma Curran snorted.

              “You don’t know him, Grandma.”

              “And I suppose you do?”

              “Yes! I know he’s scared and hurt, and that—”

              “Lord, have mercy, open your eyes!” Grandma Curran nearly cried. “What’s the difference between sweet words and a loaded gun if you still end up hurt? Ain’t but one thing either of those boys wanted from you. Be glad you didn’t lose more of yourself to them than you already have.”

              “Lose myself,” Siobhan muttered, hating her grandmother in that one instant. “I didn’t lose anything to Camden. I gave myself to him,
all of myself
. And you know what else? I’m not sorry.”

              “You should be!” Grandma Curran rushed at her. Siobhan thought her grandmother might actually slap her, but she settled for a sharp wag of a finger in Siobhan’s face. “You ought to get on your knees and beg the Lord to forgive you. Your daddy didn’t raise you to be a…a—”

              “What?” Siobhan snapped, refusing to be cowed. “I have no regrets, Grandma. When I was in the back of that ambulance, I was so scared. I thought if I closed my eyes, I’d never see Daddy, or you, or any of my friends ever again. I thought I’d never go to college, or get married, or have children. Camden told me that I’d be okay and I wasn’t scared anymore. I knew that no matter what happened, at least I had been lucky enough to share a piece of my life with him. I am so grateful for my life, and I’m so thankful Camden has been a part of it.”

              “You still live under your father’s roof,” Grandma Curran began. “You eat his food and wear clothes his money buys. You got no business, no right, to lay with that boy. Don’t you value yourself any more than that?”

              Siobhan gave up. Grandma Curran had reduced everything to sex, the one unforgiveable trespass. “I value my whole self, Grandma, not just a bit of skin that you seem to think is some kind of symbol of worth. I’m old enough to decide who should be president, but I can’t decide who to share my heart and body with?”

              “The president ain’t gonna get you with a baby! The president ain’t gonna get you with a dirty lady disease!”

              “Neither will Camden.”

              Grandma Curran narrowed her eyes until little more than the wrinkles fanning from their corners were visible. “You are just like your mother,” she hissed.

              “Thank you,” Siobhan said, fully aware the comment hadn’t been meant as a compliment.

***

              Siobhan almost stumbled over Brian when she left her room. He was sitting on the carpet in the corridor, his back to the wall beside her door.

              “That was harsh,” he said, awkwardly maneuvering onto his feet. “Your grandmother kicks hard when you’re already down.”

              Siobhan helped him stand up, then had to lean on him in turn.

              “I think she wanted me to hear what she had to say.” Brian slipped his left arm around her waist. She gripped the banister as they carefully descended the curving staircase one step at a time.

              “She makes me so angry,” Siobhan said. “I hate her when she’s like that.”

              “You don’t mean that.”

              “She hates me, too. She’d never say it to my face, but she never liked my mother, just because she was white and had the audacity to fall in love with her son.”

              “Would your grandmother have thought any woman was good enough for your dad?”

              “Actually, no.”

              “Your grandmother must have done something right, or else your dad wouldn’t have found the courage to follow his heart.”

              Siobhan stopped to rest at the base of the stairs. She ached with every breath. “I wish you could have met my mother. She was amazing.”

              Brian stroked her cheek with the backs of his fingers. “Then your grandmother was right. You are just like your mother.”

***

              Camden answered his door and Courtney saw that she wasn’t the only one who had changed in the past week. “You’ve lost weight,” she said. “It looks good.”

              The lines and planes of his face were a bit sharper, eliminating his boyishness. His jeans rested lower on his hips and a bit looser at his thighs. His belt was cinched a notch tighter. The sum total of his suffering gave him the look of a tragic superhero.

              “You cut your hair.” Camden’s observation came with the same enthusiasm he might use when noting that once again the sky was blue.

              Courtney brushed her hand over the close-cropped scrub where her long tresses had been prior to an impulsive decision in a Fifth Avenue salon. “I wanted something new. Something super different. Do you like it?”

              “It’s nice,” he said blandly, leading her into the living room.

              Courtney sank into an oversized leather wing chair. Camden took a seat on the sofa. “I talked to Siobhan today,” Courtney said. She tucked her legs beneath her and pulled the sleeves of her cranberry cashmere sweater over the heels of her hands. “Brian was with her.”

              Camden looked up from a spot of waning sunlight.

              “He wouldn’t come to the phone.” Courtney took the perfectly manicured, frosted boysenberry nail of her right index finger between her teeth. “He wouldn’t answer any of my calls from New York either. I guess he didn’t have time. He’s been with Siobhan every day.”

              Mr. Dougherty leaned into the living room. “Excuse me, kids.” They heard the jangle of car keys. “Cam, I have to leave for a few hours.”

              Courtney wondered if everything was okay. Mr. Dougherty looked as if he’d seen his own ghost.

              “I won’t be gone long, son. If you need anything, anything at all, don’t hesitate to call. I won’t be gone long. I promise.”

              Courtney’s delicate eyebrows lifted. Mr. Dougherty was wearing jeans and a polo shirt. She had never seen him in anything other than a business suit. Camden’s father really had changed. Then again, so had everyone and everything else.

              “Your dad was being awfully mysterious,” Courtney said. “Aren’t you curious about what he’s up to?”

              “He’s probably sneaking to the office. He’s been home all week.”

              “So have you. Siobhan told me she hasn’t seen you since the night everything happened. She can’t be too lonely, though, with Brian keeping her company.”

              Camden anxiously pushed his hand through his hair.

              “He likes her, you know.” Courtney sighed. “I didn’t see it until recently. I tried to be mad at Siobhan while I was in New York, but I couldn’t make it stick. It isn’t her fault. She didn’t do anything to make him fall for her. She’s been my girl crush since I met her. If I was a guy, I’d probably fall in love with her, too.”

              Camden abruptly stood.

              “We’ve known each other since we were nine years old, Cam,” Courtney went on, rising from the chair. “Why didn’t we ever get together?”

              He shook his head and shrugged.

              “I had the biggest crush on you, up until tenth grade. When Brian asked me to the Winter Formal, that was that. I gave up on you.”

             
I gave up on you.
He wondered how long it would be before those words marched through Siobhan’s head. Perhaps they had already. Maybe that’s what Courtney was trying to tell him.              

              She took a step closer to him, her wide-eyed, indigo gaze fixed on him. “I guess you and Siobhan aren’t together anymore. If you were, you’d have at least talked to her, right?” Her gaze wandered over the expanse of his chest. “You’re not speaking to Siobhan. Brian’s not speaking to me. Siobhan and Brian are together.” Raising an eyebrow, she brought her gaze to his. “Maybe you and I should be together.” She reached for him.

              He gently caught her wrists and brought them to her sides.

                A blush of embarrassment colored her face. “I like you, Cam,” she said unapologetically. “It’s obvious you need to sort some things out. When you do, I’ll be here for you. Siobhan’s been through hell, but she can’t have both of you. Brian wants her, and maybe she’ll come to want him, too. You need to talk to her, Cam. Figure out what you really want, before it’s too late for all of us.”

***

              Brian bolted upright, gasping for breath. His throat, raw and dry, as if he’d been shouting at the top of his lungs at a Prescott football game, struggled to contain the scream climbing its way out of his chest. Sweat trickled into his eyes, burning them in the darkness. He reached for the lamp on his nightstand, but his hand moved through empty space. His eyes adjusted to the darkened room yet he recognized nothing. Even the large bed was unfamiliar. Still more unfamiliar was the weight easing onto the bed beside him.

              He knew he was dreaming, that he could only be dreaming, when a pair of slender arms circled him and drew his head onto a shoulder that seemed much too small to support it. The spice and floral scented embrace of his night visitor comforted him. Sleep fogged his brain and he still wasn’t sure where he was, but he no longer cared. He was exactly where he wanted to be.

              He drew away from her to cup her face, his heart pounding, risking the possibility of his touch causing her to vanish as all his best dreams had when seen with open eyes.

              She didn’t disappear.

              His hand dropped to that inviting place where her neck met her shoulder. He traced the soft skin of her jawline with the flat of his thumb, and he brought his lips to hers. Twinges of remorse and guilt intermingled with the more pleasant sensations that came with kissing this person who was not Courtney.