by Abby Brooks
She drops her head into her hands. “I’m so tired.”
“When was the last time you ate?”
She shakes her head without looking up. Silent.
She needs so many things at the same time, I don’t even know where to start. As much as I want to apologize, explain myself, tell her why I was in LA, I know she can’t handle any of that right now. Bailey is barely holding on. She needs me to hold her up, not put anything more on her shoulders.
I push off the wall and crouch down in front of her. Without a word, I take her hands. Help her to her feet. Support her weight when her knees buckle. Lead her to the bathroom and draw a bath. When I try to help her out of her shirt, she flinches.
“I can’t.” She won’t look at me, arms crossed over her stomach. “I can’t be more bare than I already am.”
“Trust me?” I lean down to meet her eyes, but she avoids them. “I don’t want anything from you. I just want to help.”
The nod is imperceptible, but it’s there. I drag the shirt over her head, dismayed at the bones of her chest and ribcage standing out from her pale skin.
“I’m here now.” I whisper because I don’t believe she can handle anything louder than that. “I’ve got you. And as much as nothing feels okay right now, I’m going to do everything in my power to make it better.” I help her out of her pants. “I’ll carry you when you can’t carry yourself.”
She stands there, looking frail and broken in her bra and underwear and finally looks me in the eyes. “I’m okay.”
I smile. “You are now.” I pull my shirt over my head and Bailey averts her eyes.
“Liam.” She shakes her head, her eyes communicating how she misunderstood my gesture. “I can’t…”
“And I don’t want you to. I just want to warm you up because you look so cold.” I kick off my shoes and step out of my pants and underwear. Climb into the warm tub and hold out my hand.
I half expect her to walk away from me and judging by the look on her face, she does too. But she doesn’t. After a few seconds of hesitation, she unhooks her bra and slides off her panties, takes my hand, and climbs into the tub with me.
Water sloshes up against the sides and she sighs as the warmth works its way into her body. I help her down so she’s sitting with her back to my front. I hold her. Run my hands through her hair until it’s wet and slicked back from her forehead. She sinks into me, her tiny body melting into mine. Before I know it, I’m humming, the song brought to my lips unbidden. The song my mom used to sing to me when I was a little boy, scared of the monster in my closet and the gremlins under my bed.
She’s crying again but I ignore it. The tiny little hitches and hiccups feel less like agony and more like acquiescence. She’s giving me her pain, leaning into me, letting me take care of her. I wash her body and her hair, careful strokes of my hands over her fire-eaten body. And through it all, I hum. My mom’s song. Our song. A new melody. She turns, leaning her ear into my chest and damn if my heart doesn’t crack in half. She’s listening to the music in my body the same way I used to when I was a boy.
“I love you Bailey,” I whisper.
She doesn’t reply. Just closes her eyes and sighs.
The next few days are hard. Between getting the house cleaned up, helping Bailey finalize the funeral arrangements, and putting my beautiful girl back together again, I have my hands full. The day of the funeral is the coldest of the week, dreary and snowy and perfectly appropriate for something this awful. Bailey gets dressed and then watches me as I tie my tie.
“I thought he didn’t know.” Her voice is stronger today than it has been. “I thought he didn’t know how sorry I was. How hard I tried and how much I knew I failed him. But he knew.” She smiles weakly.
“Of course he did.” I meet her eyes through the mirror.
She averts her eyes. “I wrote him all these letters. It was childish. My way of trying to get him to understand that I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. I’d leave them on his bed when he was out all night when he still lived here. And after he moved out, I even went so far as to drive to his apartment and slide them under the door.”
She meets my eyes through the mirror and I smile. I can’t help it. Even in her grief she’s the most beautiful thing I’ve seen.
“He kept them, Liam. Each and every one.” She gives me a tight-lipped smile, her eyes brimming with tears. “I found them in a box in his closet.” Bailey swallows. “I know it’s stupid, but it gave me peace, seeing them in that box. But,” she says and licks her lips. “I found a note from him in there, too. One he never gave me. He told me none of this was my fault. That he knows I did my best and he’s a better person because of me.” She takes a long shuddering breath. “And he said he loved me. Michael never said that to me.” She smiles, a sweet thing.
I turn. Cross the room and take her shoulders in my hands. “Your brother knew you loved him. He didn’t show it. At least not in ways that were easy to understand. But each and every stone in that patio is a testament to his love for you.” I lean down and kiss her forehead. “And mine. My love’s out there, too.”
Bailey threads her fingers in mine and stares down at our hands. “As if I didn’t love that thing enough already.”
The funeral is an exercise in cruelty. The entire town of Brookside filters into the funeral home for the viewing, gawking at me while they offer Bailey sympathy in between snide comments and whispered judgments. She stands tall through it all, her small hand gripping mine as if I am the only thing keeping her tethered to the ground.
“He looks so handsome,” says Lexi, a balled-up tissue in her fist. She touches his hand, just a finger on his cold skin, her face crumbling with the devastation of hopes and dreams gone too soon.
“You were beautiful together.” Bailey lifts her chin, her voice thick with emotion. “I think the end of his life was the best part, because of you.” She turns to me. “And you.”
My heart swells with pain and sorrow. “And you,” I say, squeezing her hand.
While the viewing overflowed with people, the service at the graveside is small. Just four of us. Lexi, Michelle, Bailey, and me. We cry as the pastor speaks. And when he’s done, Bailey takes three flowers from the arrangement on the casket.
“One for me,” she says. “And one for each of them.” She gestures towards a large headstone with the names Miranda and Samuel Schultz engraved in the marble. She puts a hand on the casket. “I love you, Michael.” She looks up towards the gray sky. “Wherever you are, I hope you’ve finally found peace.”
Lexi and Michelle say their goodbyes and pick their way back across the frozen ground to their cars, heads down, hands in pockets. Bailey crouches in front of her parents’ headstone. Brushes off a few dried leaves. Lays a rose down in front of each name.
“I don’t come here enough.” Her voice is raw. She straightens and takes my hands. “Mom, Dad? I’d like you to meet Liam.” She smiles up at me, embarrassed and unsure.
I nod, my throat too tight for words.
“He’s my everything,” she continues. “The way you guys were each other’s everything.” The wind blows her hair into her face and she brushes it away. “I’m stronger when he’s here. He makes me better than I should be.” She looks up at me and smiles weakly before looking down again. “Michael says he doesn’t blame me. I hope you guys don’t, either.” She finishes in the harshest whisper, a child speaking her darkest fear.
And then, out of nowhere, the sun pushes through the clouds. Warmth falls on our faces like the faintest brush of a hand on our cheek. The moment is brief. Just a few heartbeats of light before the clouds swallow the sun again.
Bailey smiles up at me, blinking away tears. “It’s like they know.”
“Of course they know.” I wrap an arm around her shoulders. “You’re the only one who ever blamed yourself for any of this. The rest of us,” I say, gesturing towards the sky with my chin. “We know how hard you tried to get it all right.”
&
nbsp; Bailey leans her head on my shoulder. I don’t say it out loud, because this is her family and not mine, but I send a thought out to Michael and their parents:
I love her. And I promise to protect her from this day forward. I want to be in her life for as long as she’ll have me, making her happy and keeping her safe each and every day. I’d do it right if I could. Ask you for her hand and all that good stuff. So, I guess this is it, here and now. When the time is right, I want to ask Bailey to marry me. To be my wife. And I will do everything I can to erase the wounds on her heart in the same way she’s done her best to erase mine. This is me, asking you for your permission to make your daughter happy for the rest of her life. I know you can’t answer, but I’ll be listening anyway.
As I help Bailey pick her way through the frozen grass towards her truck the clouds dissipate and the sun shines down on us. Once was a coincidence, but twice? I look up at the sky and smile, imagining Michael shaking his head in dismay as I wrap an arm around his sister’s shoulders and pull her tight.
BAILEY
“When are you leaving?” I heave a box filled with Michael’s stuff onto the back of the truck and glare at Liam. “I’m still mad at you for disappearing in the first place, you know. Don’t think you’re getting out of here without having that particular conversation. Besides, I need to apologize and you have no idea how rare that is.” I wipe my hands and fold my arms over my chest to hide how much they’re trembling at the thought of having to confront what happened while he was in Los Angeles, and then, after that, figure out how to tell him goodbye.
He slides a box onto the tailgate and purses his eyebrows. “This is a big conversation, Bay.”
“Yeah, well, I can’t keep sleeping next to you each night when I know it’s all coming to an end sooner rather than later.”
Liam laughs and it makes me want to kick him in the balls.
“Really? You’re going to laugh at me about this?” I shake my head. “Obviously, you have zero idea about how to be a decent human being.” I grin at him and purse my lips, eyebrows raised.
“Ouch,” he says, still laughing.
“Yeah, well, you deserve it.”
“So the whole time I’ve been here, holding your hand and keeping you upright over the last couple weeks, that’s not something a decent human being would do?” Liam sucks in his lips, still looking like he’s fighting laughter.
“That’s beside the point. I don’t need a knight in shining armor. I need…” I hold out my hands and roll my eyes, looking for the right word. “A fortress. I don’t want you to save me, I want you to stand by my side while I save myself. And I sure as hell don’t want you popping in and out of my life whenever it suits you.”
“Bailey…”
“I’m just saying, Liam. It was a douchey move, leaving me after one fight, only to swoop back in when it made you look good.” I huff, my breath frosting in front of my face.
“Bay…”
“And you know what? I swear to God, if you don’t stop laughing at me, I’m going to end you right here and now.”
“Can I talk now?” Liam smiles and it blinds me. Every ounce of my being reaches out for him while I stand here, as stoic as I can possibly manage. If he’s leaving, I need to be careful about how much of myself I give back to him so I can keep on healing once he’s gone.
“Sure. By all means.” I lift my chin and my eyebrows at the same time.
“I was wrong to leave without a solid explanation and I was even more wrong to go so long without letting you know what I was doing. I apologize for both things, but I do not, under any circumstances, apologize for leaving in the first place.” Liam licks his lips, staring at me with so much love in his eyes, I start to wonder what I’m missing. “I had to go. If I had stayed, things you don’t even understand would have blown up right here in your front yard. You have no idea what it’s like, fighting through a sea of paparazzi and crazed fans just to get through the normal parts of your day. You’ve already talked about hating how the town pays too much attention to you. There was no part of me that thought you were ready to handle the shit-storm that was brewing.”
I shake my head. “I call bullshit on that. You wanted to protect me and the best way to do that was to just leave?”
“Yep.” The bastard has the audacity to look smug. “I had to go put out the fire.”
“And just what does that mean, exactly?”
“By leaving, I was protecting you—”
“But I wasn’t protected at all. You left me alone and my life blew up.”
Liam takes me into his arms. “And I’d take all that back in a heartbeat. I really would.” He puts his hands on my shoulders and pushes me away so he can look in my eyes. “I spent the last couple weeks in meetings with my agent. My manager. The PR team. The studio. My mother.” Liam shudders a little, and I don’t think it was for effect. “I needed a solid plan, a bulletproof exit strategy. One that would let me out of the spotlight, out of the public eye, without all kinds of people going crazy and swarming your house.”
“So why didn’t you tell me what was going on? Why let me sit here and think I was losing you?”
Liam shoves his hands in his pockets and looks down. “That’s where I messed up.” He meets my eyes. “It was a good idea…” He shakes his head. “No, an idealistic idea, gone bad. That was me making plans that were based on too many movies filled with dramatic moments and not enough common sense.”
“Go on.”
“I wanted to have all the answers before I called you. I wanted to be able to swoop back in like the damn knight in shining armor you say you don’t need with the solution to our problem. I wanted to show you that I really am capable of taking care of you. That I’m worthy of you. That I’m not the spoiled pop star everyone says I am. That I’m a man who can take charge and solve problems.”
“Do you have any idea how I suffered?” I step forward. “The biggest wound on my heart is caused by people leaving without me being able to say goodbye, leaving me to live a life that doesn’t make sense without them, and you thought the best way to prove that you aren’t a spoiled child was to leave me without an explanation? Just so you could swoop back in with everything all solved?”
Liam’s face crumbles. “I can see now just how wrong I was.”
“You were so wrong it bordered on cruelty.” I chew on my bottom lip, watching him watch me. “I waited for you to reach out. To prove that what we had was stronger than one disagreement. I wanted a chance to apologize for blowing up. For being such a bitch. And day after day passed and nothing. You gave me nothing. I…”
Liam steps forward. Takes my hand. “But now I want to give you everything. I’m not a perfect man. Far from it. But with you? I’m as close to it as I’m ever gonna get. I don’t ever want to be without you. I never, ever want to leave you ever again. I didn’t want to say goodbye because it wasn’t an ending.” I start to protest and he holds up a hand. “I can see how it seemed like it to you. I really can and I’m sorry. But to me, I was working on our beginning. Our fresh start.”
His nose is red from the cold, high points of color stand out on his cheeks, but his eyes are warmer than the brightest summer day. “So what does our fresh start look like?” I ask.
“I severed my contract with the studio.” Liam’s face is expressionless, waiting for my reaction. “The PR team has already started putting out press releases, spinning the bus accident into something far worse than it was so my fans don’t feel like they need to come hunt me down—”
“Won’t that make them even more frantic to find you?”
Liam laughs. “Shows how little you understand the power of the right kind of publicity. I’ve been here for two weeks now. Been out with you in public. How many crazed fans have come up to bother us?”
He has a point. “I just assumed that was out of respect for me and Michael.” I flinch. It still hurts to say his name.
Liam shakes his head. “I’d love to be able to give pe
ople that much credit, but experience has taught me they don’t deserve it. The privacy we got? That’s all courtesy of my team in LA.” He laughs. “Although they’re not really my team now. They’re the studio’s team, putting out the fire that started the first moment I laid eyes on you.” He runs his thumb along my cheek.
“What are you saying, Liam?”
“I’m saying that I’m here to stay. If you’ll have me.” He drops a wink at me, a very Liam McGuire wink. “And I’m really hoping you’ll have me because I don’t have anywhere else to go.”
I stare up at him, counting my breaths, fighting the urge to lean into his hand. Then I purse my lips and draw my eyebrows together. “And just what’s in it for me?” I ask, as if I’m actually weighing my options.
Liam grins. “Me. You get me. An imperfect man who loves you perfectly. And we’ll fuck like bunnies and make music and fill that house with so much love and laughter that all the angry ghosts and memories have no choice but to smile.”
Damn it. I’m so tired of crying, but here we go again. “I love you, Liam,” I whisper.
“I love you, too, hot lips.” And then he kisses me and I fall into him and for the first time in a long time, I feel like maybe everything’s going to be okay.
BAILEY
“And these are the countertops he wants to put in.” I slide my new iPad across the table to show Lexi and Michelle the pictures.
“Holy shit. Those are gorgeous.” Lexi smiles, but it doesn’t reach her eyes even though she tries like hell to force the happiness into them.
“They’re really very pretty.” Michelle uses her fingers to zoom in on the image.
I sip my beer. “You can swipe through if you want. That whole album is ideas he has for this place.”
Lexi flips through the pictures, shaking her head. “This house isn’t even going to look the same when he’s done,” she says, and then pauses. “Is this a recording studio?” She looks at me with wide eyes.
