Mending Scars

by Nikki Narvaez

  My leg shook nervously as I bit my nails. Just thinking about discussing Kaleb and my past made me sick.

  I can’t do this. I can’t do this.

  My phone chimed, interrupting my anxious thoughts, and I dug in my purse looking for it. When I swiped the screen, a text from Ryker popped up.

  Ryker: Proud of you :) don’t be nervous you’ll be fine I love you Warrior

  My stomach tightened for a different reason, and a small smile tugged at my lips. I glanced over at Kamden, who had his head leaned back against the wall. Bags laced his closed eyes, making them look sunken in. Stubble dusted the pale skin of his jaw, and I could tell that he’d lost some weight from his cheeks and neck.

  My heart clenched as I appraised him—still the familiar face of my brother, yet so different. Aged. Sadder. Dulled. The vibrancy that his smile normally brought was gone.

  Looking back at my phone, I took a deep breath and typed back my reply to Ryker.

  Me: Thank you I needed that :) I love you too <3

  The door next to the receptionist’s window opened, causing Kamden to abruptly sit up. The woman who had checked us in stood in the doorway, smiling politely at us. “Kamden Marlow?”

  We both got up and walked toward her. She led us to another room with a huge bookshelf, brown leather couch and matching armchair. More paintings of the harbor, boats, and seaside adorned the walls, continuing the ocean theme from the waiting room. Blue and tan pillows decorated the sofa, adding some color to the neutral decor of the office.

  “Dr. Lowell will be with you shortly,” the receptionist stated as she exited the room and shut the door.

  I rounded the couch and sat down. Kamden sat on my right side and picked up a magazine from the coffee table in front of us.

  He flipped through it aimlessly as I played a word scramble game on my phone, trying not to focus on where I was sitting at that very moment. I couldn’t let my anxiety consume me, not when Kam was depending on me.

  About five minutes passed when the psychiatrist walked in, but it felt like hours to me. I was ready to bust out of my skin—I hated therapists

  Dr. Lowell looked to be in her forties, with dirty blonde hair pulled back in a low bun. She wore a basic, black business suit with coordinating pumps. Carrying a large legal pad, she smiled as she approached us.

  We both stood as she stuck her hand out toward me. “Nice to meet you—you must be Kaiya. Kamden has told me so much about you,” she said warmly.

  Great.

  I looked at my brother out of the corner of my eye. I could have sworn I saw him smirk, but it vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

  Dr. Lowell turned her attention to Kam. “Good to see you again, Kamden. Please sit.” She gestured to the couch and waited for us to sit before she turned and sat in the armchair directly across from us. “How have you been?”

  I waited for my brother to answer, hoping he would be honest and tell the doctor how he’d been struggling. But I couldn’t blame him if he didn’t—it would be hard for me to address my issues, also.

  Kamden leaned forward and rubbed the back of his neck. He exhaled a heavy breath before speaking. “Some days are worse than others.”

  Dr. Lowell began writing on her note pad as she asked, “Could you elaborate on that?” “Honestly?” Kamden snorted and ran his hands over his dark, buzzed hair before slapping them down on his thighs. “I don’t want to.”

  He was internally shutting down. I did the same thing all the time so I recognized what he was doing. I needed to be stronger for him, for both of us—to help get through the mess we were in.

  I placed my hand over his and stroked over it with my thumb. “Kam,” I softly urged.

  He balled his hand into a fist under mine and sighed deeply. After a few seconds, he turned his palm over and linked our fingers together. Our eyes met, and I gave him an encouraging smile as I squeezed his hand.

  He looked away when he spoke. “For so long, I… I wanted to kill Kaleb for what he did to Ky. Guess I got what I wanted,” he said dejectedly as he hung his head.

  The room was soundless except for the scribbling of Dr. Lowell’s pen on the paper. The silence constricted my chest, making it hard to breathe as I struggled to hold it together. My eyes burned from tears I knew I wouldn’t be able to contain much longer. I hated that Kamden was experiencing all these horrible emotions because of me.

  “At least I saved her from more abuse from him, right?” His eyes watered, and he swallowed deeply. “I wasn’t able to protect her before, but I took care of that. He won’t hurt her again.”

  “Kam.” His name sounded disjointed when I spoke as tears dripped down my face. I cleared my throat, hoping my voice would be steady. “Don’t blame yourself for what Kaleb did to me—it was never your fault.”

  He scoffed. “I was supposed to protect you, Ky—that’s what big brothers do. I’m a fucking failure. And a murderer.”

  Rage rushed through my veins at his self-accusation. I jerked his hand, making him look up at me. “You’re neither of those things. It wasn’t your responsibility to protect me from Kaleb—that was Mom and Dad’s job. They’re the fucking failures! And you’re not a murderer—you killed Kaleb in self-defense to protect us.”

  He held my gaze as a single tear fell from each eye down his cheeks. “Doesn’t matter—I killed my own brother.”

  He looked away again, hanging his head in shame. No matter what I said, he never believed me. He still blamed himself. I looked to Dr. Lowell, hoping she would chime in and agree with me.

  Setting her pen down, she clasped her hands together on top of the legal pad. “Kamden, you can’t keep blaming yourself for this. In order to move on, you have to make peace with yourself. You can’t dwell on the past.”

  Easier said than done, lady.

  Kamden abruptly wrenched his hand away from mine and threw his arms out in front of him. “How?” he screamed. His voice boomed and was riddled with emotion. “Can you teach me? Because I’ve been trying to do that, and the only way I get the pain to go away is to drown myself in alcohol.” His face was reddened with fury as more tears fell from his eyes. It ripped my heart apart to see him like that, to know I was one of the causes of his suffering. “What kind of person kills their own brother?”

  My heart thumped wildly as my own anger took over again. Shaking my head in disagreement, I interrupted his rant to start one of my own. “Stop it, Kam! You wanna know what kind of person you are?” I moved my face to meet his eyes, but he avoided me. I raised my voice to get his attention. “Look at me!”

  It took a few moments before he finally brought his gaze to mine. My hardened eyes relaxed some as I held his stare. “You’re the kind of person that holds his grown sister when she has a nightmare. You’re the kind of person who has held her hand through every bad time, who has never let her give up, who saved her from the hell she lived in. You’re the kind of person who has sacrificed everything for her. You—” I choked through a sob before taking a deep breath and softening my voice. “You’re the best kind of person there is.”

  Our eyes met, and his face reflected the emotions that were swarming me: hurt, fear, guilt, sorrow. All I wanted was for him to go back to the way he was before—to be my strong, stable big brother again. Even though I had Ryker, I still needed Kamden—more than he would ever understand.

  Kamden silently stared at me as if knowing I had more to say. I took a shaky breath and continued pouring my heart out to him, hoping my words would bring him back from the ledge he was teetering on. “There aren’t words to describe what you mean to me, Kam.” I gripped both his hands in mine. “I can never repay you for saving me—from Kaleb and myself. You were there every time I needed you, and I still need you. I need my brother back.”

  Kamden remained silent for several seconds, then spoke so low that I could barely hear him. “I don’t think I can be him again.”

  His words slammed into my heart, splintering some pieces of it. I squeezed Kamd
en’s hands tighter, hoping to hold on to him in more ways than one, to tether him to me. A steady stream of tears flowed down my face as my voice cracked. “Please try, Kam. Don’t give up.”

  He shook his head before looking up at me, scanning over my face. Pulling his hands from mine, he brought them up and wiped the tears from my cheeks with his thumbs. He gave me a small, forced smile. “I’ll try, sorella. For you.”

  My lips slowly spread in a full grin as I threw my arms around Kamden’s neck and hugged him tightly to me. My voice was soft but threaded with emotion. “We’ll get through this, Kam. Together.”

  He hugged me back. “I hope so.”

  I knew he didn’t completely believe my words, but I would prove them. I wouldn’t give up until I saved Kamden from the darkness that had plagued me for so long.

  As I was about to leave the psychiatrist’s office, I called Nori, wanting to talk to her about the text message and everything going on with Kam. With traffic, I’d have anywhere from thirty to forty minutes until I would get home, so I had time to talk to her.

  Nori’s cheery voice greeted me, “Hey, girlie.”

  “Hey. Are you busy?” I chewed my lower lip as I sat in my car in the parking garage.

  “Nah, just got home. What’s up?”

  I sighed and started driving. “I just got done with my first therapy session with Kamden.”

  Her tone peaked with curiosity and excitement. “How did that go?”

  “Better than I’d expected, but we didn’t talk about Kaleb much so that’s probably why.”

  “What did you talk about then?”

  Pulling out of the garage, I merged into traffic. “Kamden’s issues. He blames himself for everything. He thinks he’s a terrible person for killing Kaleb. He called himself a failure and a murderer.”

  “What?” Her voice raised with anger. “How can he think that? It was in self-defense!”

  “That’s what I said. But he refuses to listen—he’s so stubborn,” I said in irritation.

  “Coming from the queen of stubbornness herself,” Nori joked.

  “Ha ha, very funny.”

  Traffic slowed to a crawl.

  Ugh, it’s going to take me forever to get home.

  “There’s something else I wanted to talk to you about.”

  “Oh, really? I hope it’s about sex with that hot man of yours.”

  I laughed. “Sorry to burst your bubble but no. I got this weird text from an unknown number today.”

  “Weird how?”

  “Hold on, I’ll forward it to you real quick.”

  Traffic was stopped at a light, so I was able to pull up the message and send it to Nori. I put the phone back to my ear. “Just sent it.”

  “Okay, lemme check.” She paused for a few seconds. “Creepy. Did you tell Ryker?”

  I blew out a frustrated breath. “No—I don’t want him to overreact. It’s probably nothing, right?”

  Nori didn’t reply for several seconds. “Yeah, it’s probably some punk teenagers or something.”

  “You don’t sound so sure.” I said as the cars in front of me moved past the intersection.

  “I was just thinking about who would send something like that to you. But I think it was a onetime thing, maybe even a wrong number.”

  I hope so.

  “Yeah, you’re probably right. I just wanted to talk to someone about it.”

  “Well, you picked the right person. If you get another one, let me know, okay? I’m here for you.”

  “I know. Thank you.”

  We chatted for a little longer, then made plans for lunch later that week, making the drive a little bearable for a while. As I continued to fight traffic on the way home, I thought about the events of the day, hoping that everything would turn out all right.

  Kaiya felt lifeless in my arms.

  Please, God no.

  I slumped to my knees, cradling her to me as the warmth of her blood soaked through my shirt and coated my arms. My fingers smeared blood over her fair skin as I framed her face in my hands. “Open your eyes, Warrior! Damn it, open your eyes!”

  My entire world crumbled down on me as my life lay, dying in my arms, slowly slipping away from me. “Kaiya! Don’t do this to me, baby! Come back to me!” My voice was hoarse and full of desperation—desperation I’d never experienced before.

  Nothing. No movement, no sound. Was my heart even beating anymore? How could it when it was lying dead in my arms?

  The hollow pain inside me seeped into the depths of my soul, searing me with its agony. I buried my face in Kaiya’s neck and sobbed. “No! Not her! Take me instead!”

  “Kaiya!” I yelled as I sat up in bed. I was covered in sweat as I fought to regain my breath. My heart pounded furiously as I turned my head and glanced over at a sleeping Kaiya.

  Just another dream. Thank God.

  Laying back down, I propped myself on my elbow and watched Kaiya sleep. Her cheek was on her bicep as she slept facing me. Some hair had fallen into her face, and her lips were slightly parted. My beautiful Warrior.

  Watching her sleep helped calm me down when I had nightmares. I needed to see her chest rise with breath, see that her heart was beating. Just like hers, my nightmares felt so real; too real.

  I brushed the hair back out of Kaiya’s face and kissed her forehead softly. She mumbled a sound of contentment and stirred slightly, but didn’t wake up. I watched her for a few more minutes before getting out of bed.

  Needing air, I went out on the balcony and leaned against the railing. I took a deep breath, enjoying the feel of the crisp, fall air against my heated skin. Images of the nightmare played in my head, and I couldn’t believe how much fear a dream could make me feel.

  I shook the thoughts from my head, not wanting to think about Kaiya dying. I tried to focus on something else, and my mind veered to Ethan, yet another thing tormenting me.

  Normally, I would get pissed off that I even thought of him, but after seeing Kaiya trying to help Kamden over the past few months, I wondered if I should try to make amends with my own brother. Technically, he was the only family I had left.

  Before our parents had died, Ethan and I had been close. He was two years older than me, and we both had been on the football, lacrosse, and wrestling teams together throughout junior high and high school.

  After the accident, everything had changed. Ethan and I had trouble coping with the loss of Mom and Dad, and when Ethan had turned eighteen a few months after, he left for college and all but disappeared.

  I thought I reminded him too much of what he lost. I resembled my dad, who had been our role model since we were little. He would do anything and everything to help us succeed, and had always been there when we’d needed him. Both of our parents had been. Their death left a hole neither of us knew how to fill.

  I thought that had changed when I’d left for college. I’d followed Ethan to Boston University, where we both had received scholarships for lacrosse. Our parents’ life insurance had helped with the rest of the costs, and Ethan and I were able to get an apartment off campus. Everything seemed to be going back to the way things had been between us, but I’d been wrong.

  I had met Molly in my Biology class. She had blonde hair and green eyes, and half the male population at our school was after her. So naturally, I’d wanted her. I’d made it my mission to make her mine.

  It had only taken a few weeks before I succeeded—she hadn’t given me a challenge like Kaiya had when I pursued her. Looking back, I doubted that she was ever mine to begin with. She wouldn’t have cheated with my brother if she had been.

  I’d been stupid for not seeing it. Maybe I’d wanted so badly to fill the void from my parents that I’d ignored the signs—the way they snuck glances at each other, how I’d come home sometimes and Molly was already there, how I wasn’t able to get a hold of them at times. Plus, I never thought that Ethan would do something like that to me.

  After their betrayal, I’d sworn that I’d never let
another person in. But Kaiya changed that—she made me feel things I’d never felt before, and showed me what love really was. But deep down, I sometimes wondered— if my own brother was able to hurt me like that, would Kaiya do the same one day?

  The sound of the sliding glass door interrupted my thoughts. I looked over my shoulder to see Kaiya, half-asleep trudging toward me. She had her arms wrapped around herself and rubbed her hands up and down her skin. “What are you doing out here, baby?” she mumbled. I turned to face her. Even with her hair all messy from sleeping and no makeup, she was the most gorgeous thing I’d ever seen. I smiled warmly and leaned back against the railing as she pressed against me.

  Laying her head on my chest, she wound her arms around me and exhaled.

  I pushed a strand of hair behind her ear and kissed the top of her head. Inhaling the sweet smell of her hair, I closed my eyes. “Just needed some air—had a nightmare.”

  “You should’ve woken me up. You’re always there for me with mine. I wanna be there for yours, too.” She propped her chin on my chest to look up at me.

  “Okay, Warrior, next time I’ll wake you.” I chuckled as I looked down at her. I loved holding her, feeling her body warmth with life, not cold with death like in my nightmare.

  “Is something else bothering you? You seemed to be deep in thought when I came outside.”

  I debated for a few seconds before sighing. “I was thinking about Ethan.”

  Kaiya lifted her head off my chest and pulled back to look at me better. Her face became lined with concern. “What about? Did he call again?”

  I shook my head. “No, he didn’t call. I was just thinking about you and Kamden, and that maybe I should try to make things right with Ethan.”

  “Is that what you want?”

  “I don’t know.” I shrugged. “He’s the only family I have left, but I’m not sure if I can forgive him for what he did. Even though I have you, and don’t care about Molly anymore, he still betrayed me.”