by Cora Carmack
her eyes snapped to mine. For a few seconds neither of us said anything, and I knew I’d crossed a line. I pulled back, and put another foot between us.
Her face went soft, and she said, “I’m sorry.”
I thought she meant for her reaction to my touch until she stepped behind me and began buttoning her coat. She fastened it all the way up to her neck, and threw on her scarf, too. She undid the clip holding back her hair so that it fell around her face.
She still looked beautiful, but I knew what she was doing.
“Max . . . what is going on?”
She tamed her appearance with the same ease and efficiency that she had before her parents’ arrival on the day we met. I turned and looked behind me, but I couldn’t see her parents anywhere.
“Damn it, Max, we talked about this . . .”
“I know.” Her eyes met mine, and they weren’t blank anymore. “They sent Bethany and Michael to pick us up. I just can’t start with her. I can only fight this battle once.”
The minute she had hidden all the things that made her Max, her body relaxed and all the tension that had plagued her disappeared. I had the sinking feeling that I wouldn’t see my Max again for the rest of the trip. Not that she was mine anymore. Or ever had been really.
“I promise I’ll do it, Cade.” She sounded more like she was trying to convince herself than me.
I sighed and said, “Okay, fine. Let’s go meet the Antichrist.”
She squared her shoulders, like she was preparing for battle. I followed her glare across the terminal to a couple dressed in business attire, and I recognized the man as an older version of the brother I’d seen in her mother’s photo album.
The couple started toward us, linked at the elbow. Her brother was in a suit, his tie loosened slightly. The woman on his arm, Bethany, looked to be mid-to-late twenties. She was wearing a red dress and black heels that looked more appropriate for a cocktail party or a political campaign than picking someone up from the airport. She had long, flowing blond hair that reminded me of Sleeping Beauty. She was smiling widely and giving a small wave that I imagined she had perfected during her run for Miss Oklahoma.
Max looked like she wanted to take out all her nerves and fears on a punching bag with blond hair. I could see already that this was going to be a very long trip.
“Mackenzie, sweetheart!” Bethany called. “It’s so good to see you! We’ve heard so much about your little boyfriend that I just insisted that Michael and I be the ones to pick you up. I had to see this for myself.”
I leaned closer and reminded her, “Breathe.”
Bethany’s appearance was meticulous, from her manicured nails to her blond ringlets; they stopped simultaneously, as if all of their movements as a couple were choreographed, and stared at Max. Her sister-in-law looked at her from head to toe, and then clucked pitifully. “Don’t you look tired from your flight.”
Max gave a grim smile and opened her mouth. I rushed to cut her off. “It’s so nice to meet you both,” I said, holding out my hand. Michael shook my hand first. He looked like he could care less what his sister looked like. He was more concerned with the BlackBerry he kept pulling out of his pocket. “I’m Cade. Though it sounded like you already knew that.”
Bethany smiled. “Yes, all Betty and Mick have talked about is how much of a”—she paused and looked back at Max—“good influence you’ve been on our Mackenzie. Lord knows she needed someone to whip her into shape. I’ve been trying for years, but an Ivy League education can only work so much magic.”
I returned to Max’s side, unsure whether or not to touch her. Her fists were clenched tightly at her side, so I took that as a no. Bethany kept talking. “Now, Mackenzie, don’t you worry for a second about that bad dye job. It might be tough, since it’s the holidays, but I bet my hairstylist can squeeze you in and get all of that taken care of.” Bethany’s gesture didn’t cover Max’s hair so much as all of her.
I watched Max inhale and exhale very slowly. This appeared to be another instance where her coping mechanism wasn’t quite working. I considered turning her around and walking away. I didn’t want to see her put up with this any more than she wanted to deal with it herself.
“Listen, Beth—” She said the name with such malice that I was sure she was thinking of another b-word.
I cut in before the conversation could become dominated by four-letter words.
“You don’t like her hair lavender?” I asked. “I think it’s beautiful.”
Max stiffened beside me, my attempt to put her at ease failing miserably.
Bethany smiled. “Oh, bless your heart. That’s sweet, but you don’t have to coddle her. If there’s anything our Mackenzie is it’s tough. She can handle it.”
Max took a step forward, and I stopped worrying about whether or not it was okay to touch her. I clamped my arm down on her shoulder to hold her in place.
I said, “Do you think we could get on the road? I don’t know about Max, but it’s been a long trip, and I’m anxious to get settled in.”
“You don’t have any checked bags?” Bethany looked at the Max’s duffle bag and my backpack slung over one arm. “Tell me you don’t have your dress wadded up in there.”
Max’s face went pale. “What dress?”
“For the Charity Gala at the hospital. Your mother has been talking about it nonstop. She didn’t tell you to bring a dress?”
Max groaned and said, “I vaguely recall her mentioning something like that, but she didn’t say we had to go.”
“Well you do.” Bethany looked pleased at Max’s misery. She huffed as if Max had just ruined Christmas. “I guess we’ll have to squeeze in a shopping trip in the morning along with a hair appointment. I don’t know how your family survived before I came along.” Bethany looked up at Max’s brother and said, “Are you ready, sweetie?”
He paused whatever he was doing on his BlackBerry and said, “Whenever you are, honey.”
The two shared a kiss that left even me feeling like I’d overdosed on sugar.
“Follow us.” Bethany turned and trounced away, her curls bouncing slightly with her movement.
‘I’m going to kill her,” Max breathed. “You’re going to find her body chopped up and wrapped in individual boxes under the tree.”
“It’s scary how much I actually think you might mean that.”
We followed at a distance, and I kept my hand around Max’s shoulder the entire time. I don’t know if she even noticed. She was too concentrated on sending imaginary Chinese throwing stars at the back of Bethany’s head.
“She is everything I hate about my family,” Max said. “She makes me sick.”
I didn’t like the girl either, but Max spoke with a kind of venom that worried me. “Every family has one,” I told her. “And in a few days, you’ll be gone and won’t have to see her for another year.”
“You don’t get it.” Without looking away from Bethany, she said, “That was me. I was just like her all through high school. I was just as fake and vile and—”
I pulled her to a stop and said, “And now you’re not. You beat yourself up because of who you were and because of who you’re not and even because of who you are. You’ve got to stop.”
She stared at me, and I could tell I had penetrated her walls, if only for just a moment. Then Bethany turned over her shoulder and called, “You’ll have to forgive the car. There was a mix-up at the rental company, and they gave someone else the BMW that Michael reserved. This was the best they could do on such short notice.”
“Let’s go,” Max said. She pulled away and walked a few paces ahead of me all the way to a brand-new Toyota SUV that probably cost more than a new liver on the black market.
Michael opened the front door for Bethany, and placed a quick kiss on her lips before opening the trunk for us. I threw our bags in, and opened the door for Max.
“What a gentleman,” Bethany said. “Your taste really is improving, Max.”
There w
as going to be blood spatter all over these nice leather seats if she wasn’t careful. Max sat stiffly against the seat, her fists clenched in her lap. I placed a hand over one of her fists and squeezed. I figured the best thing I could do was to get Bethany talking about herself.
Once we were out of the parking garage and on the road, I asked, “So, how long have you two been married?”
“Oh two years this June. We had the most glorious June wedding. Everything about it was just perfect.”
Michael put the car in drive and said, “Only as perfect as you.”
Bethany aww’d, and the two of them looked away from the road long enough to share a quick kiss.
Max made a noise like she was going to hurl and said, “Perfect driver, too.”
“Any chance we’ll be hearing wedding bells in your future?” Bethany asked.
I couldn’t look at Max. I played my role, kept my eyes on the audience, stayed in character, and said, “We’re just taking things slow, seeing how things go.”
“Oh.” Bethany’s lips turned down in a pout and she gave Max a look of pity. “Of course you are.”
I followed Bethany’s eyes to Max in time to see her press her forehead against the window and close her eyes. She pulled her hand away from mine, and began to close herself off again.
I asked, “How long until we get to Max’s parents’ house?”
“It’s about a thirty-minute drive,” Michael answered.
“If they don’t kiss us into a ditch first,” Max said.
36
Max
Mom threw open the front door of their two-story house and squealed when she saw us. The Joker probably had a more realistic smile than I did. When both my parents came into view, Cade’s hand curved around my waist, falling just below the line of my coat. I could feel the heat of his fingers through my shirt, and it was like five little daggers of doubt to my back.
This was too hard. My body and my mind and my heart were at war, and my sanity was the collateral damage.
Dad shook Cade’s hand, and Mom pulled both of us into a hug simultaneously.
“Come in! Come in! Oh, Cade, Mick and I are just so happy you’re here.” She released me and hugged him around the neck for a few seconds. His arm was still around me, so I’m sure we resembled some kind of radioactive waste monster that had begun sprouting extra heads and limbs. When she pulled back she lifted a strand of my hair and clucked her tongue. She said, “Oh, honey,” and frowned, but didn’t say anything further. It gave me a little bit of hope that maybe she could handle the rest of it.
But just a little.
I met Cade’s eyes, and his flicked to my mother.
I took a deep breath and said, “Mom?”
“Yes, dear?”
Her eyes met mine. They focused on me in a way they hadn’t in years. Normally, she’d look at me for a second or two before glancing everywhere around me. She blinked, still looking at me, waiting for words that I just couldn’t seem to pry from my lips.
Instead, I asked, “What room is Cade staying in?”
“Oh, we’ve put him in the guest room upstairs, right next to your old room.”
I looked at Cade, and he gave me a stiff smile.
Every time we took a step forward, I seemed to take a running leap back.
Mom continued, “Why don’t you two get settled in. Dinner is almost ready though, so be quick!”
I nodded and went to grab Cade’s hand. He stepped out of my reach and gestured for me to lead the way instead. His shoulders were even stiffer than his smile. I walked up the stone pathway through my parents’ large, ornate front door, and he followed. He paused in the doorway to take in the high, arched ceiling and Mom’s tendency to decorate every inch of available space.
“Stairs are over here,” I said.
He nodded, but didn’t reply.
The entire way up the stairs, I could hear his heavy footfalls, and each one made me flinch. By the time I opened the guest room door at the end of the hallway, I could feel his emotions like a cloud at my back. He threw our bags down on the bed, and turned to face me.
I normally loved the way Cade looked at me . . . all of the ways. The way he’d looked out in the audience while I sang. The way he would keep his head down on our walks home, but look at me sideways. The way he’d looked at me when I’d been spread out beneath him. I could tell, just by his expression that he believed in me . . . all of me.
But his expression now was none of those things. He didn’t look angry . . . well, yes he did. But mostly, he looked sad. And he looked disappointed, an expression with which I was all too familiar. And that indefinable something that I’d always seen in his gaze was gone. So was his belief in me.
I shut the door behind me, and the click echoed through the silence of the room.
“I’m sorry.” I seemed to say that to him a lot, more than to any other person in my life except for Alex. “I know I said I would tell them . . . that I wouldn’t pretend anymore—”
“You’ve said a lot of things.”
I sucked in a breath, but my lungs still felt empty.
“Cade.”
“I just don’t understand you.” His hands went to his hair, and he began to pace back and forth in front of the bed. “I thought you were fearless,” he said.
A noise ripped from my throat, and even I didn’t know if it was a laugh or sob.
“Well, you were wrong.”
“You get up onstage in front of hundreds of people and bare your soul. You don’t take shit from anyone. You go after what you want. You’re amazing. But then when you’re here, it’s like you’re a completely different person.”
“Oh, come on. It’s an act, a crutch, a mask, take your pick. I project fearless, and you project perfection. It doesn’t mean either of us actually are those things.”
His pacing changed course, and he came at me. I had to crane my head backward to meet his gaze. “How do you think this is going to turn out? You can’t keep who you are a secret forever. What are you going to do? Wear turtlenecks for every visit? Never come home during the summer? Not invite them to your wedding?”
I swallowed.
“I’ll tell them. I just need time. I need to prepare them so that they’re not so shocked. They’re holding money over my head.”
He scoffed. “The world holds money over everyone’s head. It’s a fact of life.”
“Like it’s that easy. I don’t know why you suddenly think you can judge me.”
“Because I know you!”
He didn’t, not at all. If he really knew me he wouldn’t be here. He wouldn’t care about me. But I couldn’t say that, so I just backed away from him and shook my head. I wanted this conversation to be over, but he wasn’t done. He said, “I think you’re just scared.”
“Of course I’m scared!” My volume got away from me, and I slapped a hand over my mouth, hoping my parents hadn’t heard. I took a deep breath and continued quietly, “I’m terrified . . . Always.”
Terrified that I’ll never make it. That I’ll wake up one day to realize my parents are right. Terrified that I’ve poured my everything into a career and life that will never happen . . . that I’ve wasted the life that should have been Alex’s.
“What are you scared of, Max?”
“Of everything. Absolutely everything.”
I didn’t say that included him, but I didn’t think I had to. I think he knew.
“Is that what you wanted to hear, Golden Boy?”
He sighed, and put his head down. I was used to disappointing people, but I had never wanted it to be him.
He said, “No, not at all.”
“Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you.”
God, I was. So sorry.
He took a step toward me, and I took three back.
I cleared my throat and said, “I’m going to put my things up next door. There’s a bathroom in the hall if you need it. Just pop over when you’re ready.”
Then I ran.
I hated how afraid I was. I hated the way fear could eat away at everything until even the constant things in life, like the earth beneath my feet and the sky over my head, seemed like figments of my imagination.
The fear made me feel pathetic and small, but I couldn’t get past it.
It wasn’t just the money or the risk of angering my parents.
It was a thorn on the dark side of my heart that told me I was inadequate, that there was some measure of what it meant to be good, to be important, and I didn’t reach it. As long as no one else saw that thorn, it was a secret I could protect, a wound I could nurse in private.
Talking to my parents would open it up, start the bleeding fresh, make it impossible to ignore.
I pushed my coat off my shoulders and pulled my shirt over my head. I threw my duffel bag on the bed and tore it open. I scrambled for a turtleneck and found a black one. I was pulling it over my head when my door opened.
I couldn’t see through the black fabric, but I spun away as quickly as possible, so that my tattoos faced away from the door. I tried to tug the sweater down so that it covered my stomach, but the stupid turtleneck was caught on my head. I said, “Hold on a sec, Mom.”
My head pushed through the neck opening at the same time I heard, “It’s Cade.”
I felt like my heart turned to face him before I did.
I finished pulling my shirt down to cover my stomach, and met his gaze. There were so many emotions in his expression—anger and sadness and desire—but I couldn’t tell which one was winning.
My voice was raspy as I said, “Ready.”
He didn’t move for several long moments, just pinned me to my spot with his intense gaze. Anticipation and want built in me until my knees felt weak. Just when I was ready to give in, he stepped back and into the hall.
Mom called my name a few seconds later. “Dinner’s ready!”
I squared my shoulders and joined him at the door. As we descended the stairs, his hand touched the small of my back, and it took all of my concentration not to tumble down the stairs. I faced a potentially life-changing holiday. I could lose my family, lose their support, and lose the life I’d built for myself. And yet somehow, all I could think about was his touch and how much I missed it. As disastrous as this trip was likely to be, I never wanted it to end.
37
Cade
Everyone was seated and waiting for us in the dining room when we came downstairs. This was the first time I’d been in a house that had an actual dining room instead of a table crammed into the kitchen. Her parents were seated at each end of the table, and Michael and Bethany sat on one side, opposite the two empty chairs meant for us. I pulled out Max’s chair for her, and then sat down beside her.
The dinner wasn’t quite as elaborate as the meal Mrs. Miller had prepared for Thanksgiving, but it was close. I could only imagine what Christmas Day would be like.
“Mick?” Mrs. Miller asked. “Will you say grace?”
I started to bow my head, and then Max blurted out, “Can I say it?”
Even Michael looked surprised.
Mrs. Miller blinked a few times, but smiled. “Of course you can, sweetheart.”
She reached out her hand to me, and I took it.
I turned to Max, and held her gaze as I laced our fingers together. Every head lowered, and I followed. But I kept my eyes open and fixed on Max.
She stared at her empty plate as she spoke, as if it might help her find the words.
“Dear God, thank you for this food and for family. For fear and forgiveness.”
