Better (Too Good series) (27 page)

“I think being in love takes two. You fall in love with another person because of the way he makes you feel or because of the little discoveries you make about each other. It’s a reciprocal thing. To be in love, you’ve gotta experience it back and forth. You following this?”

Cadence nodded.

“But loving someone doesn’t require the other person to do a damn thing. People love others who don’t even know they exist. It’s personal and private—to love someone. And it’s not selfish. You aren’t expecting something from that other person. You love him because that’s your gift.”

Cadence remembered something from her past. “Mark said a long time ago that his love for me wasn’t conditional—that he doesn’t love me because I love him.”

Fanny smiled. “Then what the hell are you doing, Cadence? People would give their right arms to have someone tell them those exact words. He loves you! Forgive him.”

Cadence rubbed her forehead.

Fanny took a breath. “So those are the differences between being in love and loving. Mark can’t possibly be in love with Andy because she’s no longer here to reciprocate. Be he’s sure as hell in love with you. AND he loves you. So if I were you, I’d pay attention to that.”

Cadence nodded.

“The problem is that you’re stubborn. Your pride has been hurt, and you can’t let go of it to forgive him. Sounds like someone else I know.”

Cadence snapped her head up. “Don’t you dare . . .”

“What? Compare you to your father?” Fanny asked.

Cadence stood up
, and Fanny grabbed her arm.

“Honey, you’re my ride
home,” she reminded her.

Cadence plopped back down on the be
nch. She was seething, and Fanny saw.

“Hear
me out, you little steam engine,” Fanny said. She took Cadence’s hand. “Look at what your father’s pride has done to your relationship with him. Just think about it for a second. He did an awful thing to you, and his pride won’t allow him to ask for forgiveness.”

Cadence tried to pull her hand free, but Fanny clamped on
to it like a lifeline. One way or the other, she was going to make Cadence understand.

“Pride breaks even the strongest people. It wrecks relationships, ma
rriages, friendships. It’s ugly and can warp even the gentlest hearts. Cadence, look at me,” Fanny said.

Cadence looked up reluctantly.

“It’s happening to you. Your pride—if you cannot check it, if you cannot learn to break it, if you cannot learn to forgive Mark—your pride will be your undoing. It will destroy you and Mark.”

Cadence stared into the old woman’s eyes. She saw wisdom and love and a softness that comes from years of experience in learning how to be selfless—how to put another person first. She wondered if her eyes would reflect that when she was older. If she didn’t start learning now, they never would.

“Are you hearing me?” Fanny asked.

“Yes
, ma’am,” Cadence replied.

“Are you thinking about it?”

Cadence nodded.

“Then I’ve done what I’ve come here to do,” Fanny said. She stood up slowly. “Come on. Let’s go home for tea.”

Cadence smiled. “I hate tea,” she mumbled.

“Well, I thought at some point it’d grow on you,” Fanny said.

“No, but I do what you tell me. I take it, and I drink it when it’s offered to me.”

“Well, Cadence, that right there shows me that you’re not a completely hopeless cause.”

Cadence burst out laughing. Fanny giggled too as they headed down the flower-lined path towards the car. She silently prayed for Cadence’s heart, and Cadence knew it.

***

Cadence searched the bottom cupboard for the rum, but all the liquor was gone. She swore there were several bottles just the other day. What? Did Mark drink all of it?

“Mark?!” she called.

He rounded the corner of the kitchen and stood over her.

“Where’s the rum?” she asked.

He shrugged. “I gave it away.”

“Why?”

“I didn’t think it needed to be in the house,” he replied.

She narrowed her eyes at him. “Why?”

“Because I don’t wanna encourage any more of—” He paused and waved his hand around. “—this.”

“What’s ‘this’?” she asked, mimicking his hand wave.

“You. Drinking.”

She stood up. “Excuse me?”

He scratched the back of his neck. “I think you’re drinking a little too much, Cadence.”

She laughed disdainfully. “Seriously? What? Are you my dad?”

“No. He’s an asshole. I’m not,” Mark replied.

“That’s debatable,” Cadence mumbled.

Mark drew in his breath. “I just thought that maybe you’d wanna ease up a little bit. Every time I see you, you’re throwing back.”

“Every time you see me?” she snapped. “That’s been, li
ke, five times in the last two weeks! Suddenly I have a drinking problem?”

“Let’s talk about that for a minute,” Mark said. “Why have I only seen
you five times in the last two weeks? We live together. Shouldn’t I see you more?”

“I’ve been busy with school,” Cadence lied.

“You’ve been busy getting wasted,” he countered.

“Fuck you!”

Mark rolled his eyes. “You’re mad at me. I get it. I get what this is all about. And I don’t know what more I can do, Cadence. I’ve apologized to you. I’m sorry. Genuinely sorry for lying to you. Why can’t you accept that?”

“Because it’s not enough!” she screamed. She pushed past him and grabbed her purse and book bag from the dining room table.

“Where are you going?” Mark asked.

“Non
e of your business,” she barked.

His feet moved before his brain registered his intentions. He grabbed her book bag strap and forced her to a halt.

“Let go!” she screamed, twisting against his hand.

“I will,” he said softly. “Just tell me where you’re going.”

“No!”

“Tell me where you’re going, Cadence!”

“No!”

His brain cried “Stop!” but he ignored it. He pulled her to the floor and climbed on top of her, trapping her hands above her head. She screame
d in his face, and he muffled her cry with his mouth.

He kissed her hard and didn’t wait for the inev
itable bite on his lips. He sank his teeth into her lips first and listened as she yelped in pain. He thrust his tongue deep inside her mouth, and she pushed against it with her own, trying to purge it. She wrestled against him, grunting and straining and snapping her teeth. Her face reflected a violent anger that promised him further torture and heartache.

He trapped her face in his hands, forced her to stay still as the tears plopped one by one from his eyes onto her cheeks and forehead.

“Forgive me,” he cried.

She stared blankly at him.

“Forgive me!” he roared in her face.

He kissed her again—feverish and desperate. This time she didn’t fight. This time she responded. A little. She opened her mouth
to him, let him kiss her deeply, giving him the illusion of forgiveness. He knew that’s exactly what it was, but he’d gone so long without tasting her mouth, that he didn’t care if it was fake. He didn’t care about her anger. He’d keep kissing her because he was desperate to be close to her, even if it didn’t really count.

He pulled back and studied her face. There was nothing. No light in her eyes. No flush to her cheeks. She had morphed into a living dead person. He couldn’t stand to look at her anymore and turned his face away. He climbed off of her and walked to the couch. She lay on the floor a minute longer, staring at the ceiling, deciding where to go. No place seemed particularly fun, but there was only one place where she could escape with liquor.
And it wasn’t here. So she peeled herself off the floor, grabbed her purse, and headed out the door.

“Where have you been?!” Mark shouted
as soon as Cadence walked through the door.

“What the hell?” she
shot back.

“Your brother’s in the hospital! I’ve been trying to get in touch with you!” He grabbed her upper arm and hauled her back out the door. He escorted her to his car and all but threw her in the seat.

“Oh my God,” Cadence whispered. The panic was immediate. “What happened?”

Mark slammed the
door and started the engine. “Car accident.”

“Oh my God.”

“One of his friends died,” Mark went on.

“What?!”

“Charlie. I think his name’s Charlie. He was driving. They were wasted.” Mark pulled out of the parking lot and headed for Northside Hospital.

“WHAT?!”

“I spoke with your mother over the phone. She was hysterical. She tried to call you.” He flashed her an angry look. “Where the hell have you been?”

“I was with Carrie,” she said absently. She couldn’t process anything he’d just told her. She couldn’t
invoke what she thought should be an appropriate response to the information. She should be bawling hysterically, but her eyes were bone dry.

“Getting drunk?” he spat.

She ignored him. “What else do you know?”

“Nothing. I told you everything I know.”

Mark tossed a bag on her lap. She hadn’t noticed him carrying anything.

“Ge
t yourself together,” he barked as he turned onto Roswell Road. His tone held a degree of disgust.

Her hand shook as she
pulled down the visor and flipped the mirror open. She didn’t want to look at herself. She knew she was a hung-over mess. She didn’t want to look so disheveled when she saw Ollie for the first time. It was shameful and insulting, so she opened the bag to see what Mark had packed to help her look respectable.

She cleaned her eyes first, gliding the makeup-removing cloth over the smudged blackness of her liner and mascara. She used the mouthwash next, but she had nowhere to spit it, so she swallowed instead. It burned her throat, much like t
he vodka she drank the night before. She brushed the knots out of her hair and pulled it into a ponytail. She noticed a fresh shirt in the bag, and changed out of her smoke-laden one, ignoring the passengers in passing cars staring at her.

She closed the bag and sat back in her seat.

“Will he be all right?” She hadn’t asked earlier because she was too scared of the answer.

“Yes,” Mark replied.

She sighed relief, clutching the door handle because her body was shaking, and she didn’t know how to stop it.

She followed Mark down the hospital corridor for Oliver’s room.
Mr. Miller opened the door. He nodded and moved aside, allowing Cadence in first. She ran to her brother’s bed, and he smiled when he saw her.

“Ollie,” she breathed, grabbing his hand. Her knuckles grazed the IV, and he hissed. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, sitting down beside him carefully. She never looked at her father. She was unaware that her mother was in the room.

“I’m an idiot,” he said.

Cadence shook her head.

“I am,” he insisted.

He spoke like it was a stupid skateboarding accident. Like he shouldn’t have run that rail because it was too steep, and he knew he’d break his arm. Did he not know about Charlie?

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Cadence said.

“I drank. I got drunk. I shouldn’t have done that. I shouldn’t have said it was okay for Charlie to drive. How is he?”

Cadence looked at her dad for the first time. He shook his head ever so slightly, and she turned back to her brother.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I think I heard he’s fine.”

She hated the way her lie sounded. She hated that she had to do it. But they were all aching for his recovery, and a lie would help it along faster. What did it matter who lied?

“We’re in big trouble, Cay,” Oliver said.

“No you aren’t. You’re not in trouble.”

He nodded, unconvinced.
“Big, big trouble. Will I have to go to juvie like you?”

Cadence cringed. “No, Ollie. No one’s sending you to juvie.”

“I’m tired of my life,” he said.

She smiled sadly. “You’re too young to be tired of your life.”

“I miss Kim.”

“I know you do.”

“I think I need a change.”

“Don’t we all?” She looked him over. His head was wrapped. His eye was bruised shut. He had a deep gash in his chee
k, freshly stitched. His arm was broken.

“I was knocked out,” he said after a moment. “I don’t remember anything.”

“You don’t need to remember it,” Cadence replied. But she knew at some point he would. He would recall little pieces here and there until he could put the puzzle together. It may not be a whole picture, but it would be enough to give him a memory. A bad one.

“Will you stay the night with me?”
he asked.

“Of course.”

“Will you tell Mom and Dad to go away?”

Cadence tensed. “I don’t know, Ollie. They’re worried about you just as much as I am.”

“Will you tell them to go away at night? I just want you here.”

She agreed
and looked at her father once more. He nodded as the tears fell.

Mrs. Miller raised hell when nighttime rolled around. She urged her husband to fight Cadence, force her to let them stay. Cadence
never saw her mother so angry. She tried to talk to her—explain that it was Oliver’s decision—but Mrs. Miller ignored her on the way out the door.

Mark left after he dropped off dinner. Cadence needed time alone with her brother, and he hoped their conversation would change her heart. Maybe soften it. Maybe allow her to recognize her own
self-destructive behavior and gather the courage to walk away from it.

“Did you really mean what you said?” Cadence asked.

“What did I say?” Oliver replied.

“That you’re tired of your life?”

Oliver nodded. “I’m unhappy. And none of this crap I’m doing is helping at all. Just a temporary fix.”

“Most sixteen-year-olds aren’t smart enough to recognize that,” Cadence pointed out.

“Yeah. Most nineteen-year-olds aren’t either.”

“Clever.”

“Wasn’t trying to be,” Oliver said.

“So what? Now you have the authority to tell me to get my life together because you’re lying in a hospital bed?”

“That’s usually how it goes,” Oliver replied.

Cadence laughed. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

“You wanna end up in a hospital bed?”

“No.”

“All right then.”

“It’s not like I’m out of control or anything,” Cadence argued.

“Cay, I’m not a freaking idiot. I know you’re being reckless. And I get it. You’re lashing out because you’re angry with Mark just like I lashed out at Mom and Dad because I was angry with them.”

“You’re perceptive.”

“Nobody has to be perceptive to see that. It’s, like, totally obvious,” Oliver said.

“So you aren’t mad at Mom and Dad anymore?”

“Of course I’m mad. I’m pissed at them. But I was hurting myself over it. And you’re doing the same thing. I mean, look at you. You’re a mess.”

Cadence looked down at her shirt. “I am?”

“Everything about you. You look like shit, Cay. I’m just being honest. You’re ugly.”

“Like an ugly heart?”

“No, I mean you’re just plain ugly. Bags under your eyes. Aren’t girls supposed to put lotion and shit on their faces?”

Cadence cupped her cheeks with her hands.

“You’re all sallow-looking,” Oliver observed.

“Sallow? How the hell do you even know that word?”

“I’m smarter than you. I’ve always been smarter than you,” he replied.

She rolled her eyes. “I suppose I’m slightly sallow.”

“You’re off-the-charts sallow. You used to be really pretty. What happened to you?”

“Mark,” she replied before she could stop herself.

“Nice try. Who are you? Avery? Stop blaming him for your bad choices.”

Cadence bristled. “He lied to me
!”

“Cay, get over it. It’s not like he kept some horrible secret about being a serial killer or rapist or something. He had a wife, and she died. Why can’t you be a little more understanding?”

“He said awful things to me.”

“When you guys were arguing? Yeah. That sounds about right. Most people say awful things when they’re arguing,” Oliver explained.

“I didn’t say awful things to him,” Cadence whispered. “He made me feel like I have no worth.”

Oliver thought for a moment. “No. You’ve convinced yourself you have no worth. I know what Mark said to you, and I can understand how you would interpret it the way you did. But I know that’s not what he meant.”

“Oh yeah? How so?”

“Because I looked at the situation from his perspective.”

Cadence sighed.

“Just listen. The dude had a wife. Like, picture-perfect family. Gonna have a baby. Decorating a nursery. All that stuff. And then, bam! It’s all taken away. You think he’s looking for a new problem to solve? You think he’s looking for some complicated woman with a ton of baggage? He’s got enough baggage, Cay.”

“He said I have a non-history.”

“You’re nineteen. You do.”

“Oliver! I went to juvie! I’ve got some experiences!”

“Fair enough
. But that’s not losing your wife.”

Cadence bristled. “I wasn’t aware we were putting degrees of importance on our experiences.”

“Calm the fuck down. All I want is for you to get some perspective. He doesn’t think you have a non-history.”

“But that’s what he said.”

“We all say stupid shit, Cay. He was angry. He didn’t mean it. You’re, like, the most important thing to him. It’s vomit-inducing, actually—how much he loves you.”

Cadence said nothing.

“He said it out of anger, and that’s wrong. He was wrong. He didn’t mean it. You’ve got to forgive him,” Oliver said.

Cadence scowled.
“So what? You’re all grown up now?”

“More than you.”

“Is this what happens when people experience trauma? They have these ultra-mature epiphanies?”

“I guess so. I mean, look at me. I’m the freaking Dalai Lama over here.”

Cadence snorted.

“And I’m trying to help out Mark.”

“Can we talk about something else?”

“Well, if you wanna talk about me, then you can forget it,” Oliver said. “I’m done. I’m telling Charlie, Pete, all of them that I can’t be
doing all that fooling around anymore. I don’t have time for it.”

“Were you doing it a lot?”

“Yes.”

“Drinking and getting high
?”

“Yes.”

“Were you getting bad grades?”

“Yes.”

“Were you getting in trouble at school?”

“No.”

Cadence nodded.

“
I gotta figure out how to get Kim back,” Oliver said.

“Want me to help you devise a plan?”

“Do you have one?”

“Sure. Here’
s the plan,” Cadence said.

Oliver listened closely.

“Say you’re sorry.”

“Okay. And?”

“That’s it. Just say you’re sorry.”

Ol
iver grinned. “You’re useless.”

***

Avery stood in the open doorway with her eyebrows raised.

“My turn,” Cadence said.

“For what?”

“To apologize.”

Avery pursed her lips. “You’ve been the biggest bitch on the planet for the past month and a half.”