by Jay McLean
She looks into the room, then up at me. “Who are you talking to?”
“No one.” I close the door behind me, attempt to look as straight as I physically can. “How did you know where to find me?”
“Small town, Logan.”
“What the hell are you doing here?”
Her features flatten, and she takes me in from head to toe, slowly. “You don’t look so good.”
I wipe under my nose. Sniff once.
“Jesus Christ, Logan,” she whispers, stepping back and crossing her arms over her chest, shielding her body away from me. As if I’m a threat. She’s my goddamn sister. I love her beyond words. I’d never fucking hurt her. I’d never hurt any of them. I only ever hurt myself.
“What are you doing here?” I repeat.
“I came… I—” She breaks off on an exhale and shakes her head, then starts again, her head higher, her voice stronger. “I came here because I know Lachlan asked to meet with you tomorrow.”
“Yeah, and…?”
“And I see you now, and… and I don’t think you should do it, Logan. I don’t think our baby brother should have to see you like this!”
I roll my eyes, frustrated, and brush past her toward the vending machines. Over my shoulder, I say, “Our mother’s dead, Lucy. You’re not her.”
She follows behind me, nipping at my heels. “Do you even know why he wants to see you?”
I push coins into the vending machine before making a choice. “Why?” I ask, distracted.
“Aubrey’s leaving, Logan.”
My stomach drops.
“She’s leaving for good. Tomorrow night, we’re taking her out to dinner to say goodbye. Lachy was going to ambush you, try to get you to come so you can convince her to stay. I think, in a way, I came for the same thing, because Aubrey—she’s become a really good friend to me, and while you were together, she became part of our family…” When I don’t say anything or even make a move to face her, she adds, “Did you know that Lachlan thinks he killed Mom?”
“What?” I huff out, stabbing at the buttons of the vending machine. “That’s dumb, and he’s never once mentioned that to me.”
“Me neither,” she says, “but he told Aubrey, and Aubrey told me. And when Cameron and I confronted him about it a few months ago, he said that it didn’t matter anymore. That he had Aubrey. He said that he always felt like he’d missed out on so much, that sometimes he hated us for being able to remember Mom in ways that he can’t,” she cries out, and all the way from the motel room, Mary squeezes my heart again. She squeezes so hard, I cringe in pain, so much pain my eyes water. “He said that we all got to see her in the kitchen baking or got to sit at the table while we drew pictures and she’d watch over us. He didn’t get any of that. Not until Aubrey.”
I shake my head, ignore Mary’s painful twisting and prodding. “Aubrey and I broke up. It happens. What do you want me to say, Luce?”
“Nothing,” she murmurs. “I don’t want you to say anything, Logan. And I don’t want you anywhere near Lachlan and Aubrey. Not like this.”
45
Logan
Obviously, I stayed the fuck away from all things Lachlan and Aubrey. I don’t know if Lucy ratted me out to the motel owners, but that night, I got kicked out. Of all the fucking people that went in and out of that place—hookers and Johns, pushers and junkies—they honed in on me. I was so fucking high when I got in my truck, I barely made it to Denny’s house. It was the only place I could think to go where people would leave me alone.
It’s been two weeks now, and Denny’s made it more than clear that I’ve overstayed my welcome.
Denny pushes my feet off the couch—my bed—and sits down in their place. He pulls some weed from my paid stash and starts chopping a bowl. “I thought your girl left,” he says.
“Mary?”
His eyes narrow. “Who the fuck is Mary? I meant Aubrey.”
“She did.”
“Huh.”
I sit up, start prepping the papers for him. “Why?”
“I saw her in town just now. She’s with her mom, I guess. They’re packing up her store. Boxes fucking everywhere.”
Don’t you dare, Logan, Mary warns, already knowing what I’m thinking. We’ve been through this. You don’t need her. You have me. And you’ve been doing so well.
For the first time in a long time, Mary is fucking wrong. I haven’t been doing well. Ever since we left the motel and have been staying here, Mary’s all I’ve had. She swears she’s all I need. But every fucking time I close my eyes, I see scarlet. I see her in her house. In her sunroom. I see her hair set ablaze by the sun. I see her in her shop. In my home. In the yard feeding Chicken his fucking birthday cake. I see her by the lake, riding the four-wheeler. I see her walking the shore, my baby brother’s hand in hers. I see her looking over her shoulder, smiling at me, and I die every time she smiles. Every damn time. And then Mary—she’s the one to bring me back to life. To my scarlet-less reality.
I grab my keys off the coffee table.
You’re nine years old, and the leather cracks—No, Logan! No! Don’t you dare leave me!
Aubrey
“Tell him to leave,” I tell my mom. “I don’t want to see him.”
“I can’t do that, sweetheart.”
“Why not?”
She sighs. “Because it’s a free country, and he’s not doing anything wrong.”
I look over my shoulder, out the window. Across the street, Logan’s standing by his truck, staring into the shop, a lit joint alternating between his lips, his fingers. “Call the cops, then. That’s not a cigarette he’s smoking.”
Mom follows my gaze. “If you want to call the cops, go ahead. I’m not doing that to him.”
I moved back home two weeks ago, and during those two weeks, I’ve spent almost every day trying to convince my mom to come here on her own and pack up my inventory to send back to suppliers. Laney, being a realtor, has found someone to take over my lease at the house. Now, we’re just waiting for someone to do the same for the shop. Until then, I’m paying the rent for a place I don’t use, in a town I don’t live in, in a past I want nothing more than to forget. Mom—she hasn’t made the forgetting part easy. “Maybe you should go out there and just talk to him, Aubrey. I know Logan, and what he—”
“No, Mom. You thought you knew Logan. We both did. And I don’t understand how you expect me to go out there and talk to him… as if the break-up was easy on me. You saw me. You know what that did to me.”
“They’re fresh wounds, Aubs,” she sighs out. “Besides, I don’t think he plans on leaving until you at least acknowledge he’s there.”
I turn around, give him the finger.
He drops his gaze.
I look back at Mom. “Happy?” I ask, but she’s shaking her head, her features sad. Her eyes—her eyes fight to hold back tears. “Why do you care so much about him, anyway? You didn’t care this much about Carter.”
“Carter was an entitled little shit. You were always too good for him.”
“And Logan’s a cheating motherfu—”
“You don’t know that for sure, Aubrey.”
“Yeah, because he was too high to know himself!” I yell, my emotions getting the best of me. For days after he got home from his bender, I dealt with sadness and regret. Most of all, I dealt with the hurt, the longing for what once was. Now, I’m beyond all that. Now I’m just pissed.
Mom sighs, swallows loudly. She looks over my shoulder toward The Boy Who Destroyed Me. “Please, Aubrey,” she begs. “He needs someone in his corner right now.”
“So, you go be that someone.”
“I can’t,” she says.
“Why not?”
“I just can’t.”
“Fine!” I turn on my heels, push open the door with the palm of my hand and march over to him. He stands taller when I approach, drops the joint by his foot and stomps it out with his heel. He keeps his head down.
I cross m
y arms. “What do you want?”
He shoves his hands in pockets, his shoulder lifting. He doesn’t speak.
“Look, my mom—she made me come out here and talk to you because she doesn’t think you’ll leave until I do. The thing is, I don’t know what to say to you, Logan. I’m so mad at you,” I say, my voice wavering. Because as mad as I am, as strong as I try to be, standing in front of him brings on a new wave of memories I’d tried hard to forget. Physically, the boy standing in front of me is not the Logan I know, the Logan I fell in love with. He’s… less. So much less. Skin and bones and pale flesh, he’s nothing but a ghost of who he once was. But I’m still drawn to him, in the worst possible ways, because he looks like the boy who’s just woken up in the middle of the night gasping for air. The boy who doesn’t want to be touched. The boy who blinks and blinks and blinks and tries to push away whatever it is the nightmares are made of. I want to rush to the kitchen and make him a bowl of cereal and hold him in my arms and sing him a stupid song until he falls back asleep with his head on my chest and his arms and legs around me. I want to be that girl for him. I would’ve been that girl for him. But he didn’t come to me. And there’s only so many times he can find comfort in something else, or someone else, before it becomes too late.
He clears his throat but refuses to meet my eyes. “Does Lachlan know you’re here?”
Lachlan. Our common ground. “It’s better if he doesn’t.”
Logan nods, as if he’s agreeing with me. “Have you spoken to him?”
“I need to go, Logan.” I’m weakening. I can feel it in my bones, in my blood, in every heartbeat. “Take care of yourself, okay?” I start to leave, but he says my name, and I pause, my back to him.
“I have one question. Just one. And then I’ll leave.”
My mom’s outside the door, her eyes on us, listening to every word we say.
Logan asks, “Did you know who I was before you moved here?”
I turn back to him, my eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”
Logan’s gaze lifts, his focus somewhere behind me. Footsteps sound, closer, closer. Mom steps in front of me, as if she’s a shield. As if I need one. “What are you talking about, Logan?” I repeat.
Logan switches his gaze from me to my mom. His eyes on hers, he pulls out a fresh joint, sparks it right in front of her. He inhales long, hard, and exhales with a shake that takes over his entire body. In front of me, my mother is still. Logan jerks his head at her. “Did you know?” he asks, and there are tears in his eyes, but no cry to accompany it.
“Logan,” she whispers.
And then Logan shouts, pointing at her, “Did you fucking know?!”
“Mom!” I cry out. My heart thumps against my ribs, and I tug on her arm, try to get her attention. “What is he talking about?!”
Mom wipes at her face, exhales a puff of cold air into the stillness of the night. “Not while it was happening,” she cries out. “I swear to you, Logan. I had no idea…”
Logan nods, his jaw set.
“What the hell is going on?” I shout, stepping between them, my gaze switching from one to other.
Logan pulls on the end of the joint, once, twice, and he doesn’t stop. Not until the entire thing is gone. Then he flicks it to the ground, his stare on my mother’s the entire time. “Fuck you,” he says to her. Then looks right at me. “Fuck you both!” And then he’s in his car, the engine revving.
My pulse beats wild in my eardrums, and I run to him, reach into his open window, and try to take the keys from the ignition. He shouldn’t be driving. Not like this. “You’re going to kill yourself, Logan! Don’t!”
“Get the fuck out of my way, Aubrey.”
“No!” My hands are on the keys. His hands are on my wrist. “Mom! Help me!”
Logan tears my hand away from his keys, holds it roughly in his grasp. Desperation clings to my lungs, to every cell. “Please, Logan,” I cry. “Don’t drive away. Please!” Tears fall from my eyes, heated and heavy. “Stay. Talk to me! Tell me!”
“Tell you what?” he shouts. “That you’re the cause of all my fucking nightmares?!”
“She doesn’t know, Logan!” Mom yells. “She doesn’t know about any of it!”
My gaze snaps to my mother. “What the hell are you talking about?!”
Logan pushes me away so hard I fall back a step. And then he presses down on the accelerator, his tires screeching, burning. Smoke fills the air before the truck jolts forward. He swerves, left, right, and I watch in horror as he sideswipes a parked car. “Get in the car, Aubrey!” Mom yells, already opening her car door. I rush to the passenger’s seat, buckle in, and hold on to the dash as my mother speeds through the streets, following Logan’s taillights. My mind is racing, my pulse erratic, and my heart—my heart is behind the wheel of a speeding car, out of his mind, gripping to his death wish.
Logan crashes through the iron gates of his family home, and the metal flies behind him, smashing into our windshield. He’s going a million miles an hour, and we’re struggling to keep up. Mom maneuvers the car with both hands on the wheel, and I cry into my phone the second Tom answers. “He’s at your house, and he’s driving and there’s something wrong with him and I don’t know…” I drop the phone when Mom takes a hard turn, and I don’t bother trying to reach for it again. I grip the dash with one hand, press down on the button for the window with the other. I call out after him, beg him to stop. He’s doing donuts on the lawn, smoke rising from his tires, and then he’s off again, gaining speed, and Mom’s cursing and she’s crying and I try to speak through my sobs, but nothing forms on my tongue. Logan drives through the property, toward Cameron and Lucy’s house, the path surrounded by trees. Terror builds in my gut as the trees become thicker, thicker, and this is how my dad died.
Head-on with a tree.
He’d been drinking.
Who knows what the hell Logan’s been doing.
We get jostled in our seats, and Mom hangs on to the steering wheel with one hand, dries her tears with the other. Lights appear behind us, more than one car, and then the trees disappear and it’s the wide-open space of the lake. The lake. I scream, and Mom hits the brakes, but Logan… Logan speeds up, up, up until he’s driving on the dock, but the dock is too narrow, and then the truck is on its side and then it’s down, down, down…
46
Logan
I am eight years old, and my mother is holding my hand. We’re walking on the shore of the lake. Her belly is big, but not as big as it was with the twins. She says she’s going to name the baby Lachlan. I tell her I think it’s a silly name, and she giggles, bends down to my level and says, “It can’t be any worse than Garray.” I laugh so hard my belly aches. We walk back to the dock, where my brothers and sister are jumping off the edge. Lucy dives. Lucas cannon balls. Leo belly flops. The twins swim circles around each other. I grip my mother’s hand tighter, because I know what she’s about to tell me. “The water can’t hurt you, Logan,” she says, squatting down in front of me. She holds her stomach in her hand as if the baby will fall out of it before it’s fully baked. “See, the twins are littler than you, and they’re okay.”
I look down and pout. “But… I’m scared,” I say quietly.
She lifts my chin with her finger so my eyes are on hers. She smiles. “What are you scared of, sweetheart?”
I wipe the sweat off my brow and scrunch my nose. “Drowning and dying.”
“Hmm…” She taps her chin. “What if we get you private swimming lessons.”
I shake my head. “The others,” I say, pointing at my siblings. “They’ll make fun of me.”
“What if… what if we say that you’re doing something else, and they won’t ever know about it.”
“What will you tell them?”
She grins from ear-to-ear. “What about… if I tell them that you’ve been selected by Tony Stark to be the next Marvel superhero?”
My eyes go wide, my smile wider. “Yes!”
/> “Yeah?” she asks.
I nod.
And then I’m in her arms, and she’s so warm, so… so… dripping wet…
“Logan!”
“Logan!”
“Oh, my God, Mom! Do something!” Aubrey screams.
“Come on, son!” Dad shouts. “Please!”
Pressure builds in my chest, in my lungs.
“You have to save him, Mom!”
My mother pulls away from the embrace, holds a penny up between us. “Look how lucky you are, Logan…”
47
Aubrey
Four separate cars followed the ambulance to the hospital. Tom rode with Logan. We haven’t seen either of them since.
My mother is offered scrubs to change into from her cold, wet clothes. She was the first to jump into the lake to get Logan out of his truck. He’d left the windows open, but the doors locked. By the time Lucas found a crowbar and jumped in there with her, Logan had already been submerged for over two minutes. It was four minutes by the time Mom and Tom pulled him out of the water. Her military training provided her with the CPR knowledge she needed to bring him back to life.
Lucas is still drenched.
Lachlan hasn’t stopped crying. Neither has Lucy. Neither have I.
The difference? My cries are silent and formed with guilt.
Lucas is pacing, his bare feet squeaking on the worn linoleum.
The twins sit side by side, Liam with his head in his hands, Lincoln with his arms crossed, his knees bouncing. “This is bullshit,” Lincoln murmurs.
“We’re not giving up on him,” Lucas snaps.
“How much more are we expected to take?”
“That’s enough, Lincoln,” Tom booms, entering the waiting room. Still in his damp clothing, he looks around at all the waiting faces. “He’ll be okay. The doctors are running some tests, checking to see if he needs…” he trails off when his gaze catches my mother. “Melissa, I can’t thank you enough…”
