I zip my lips. “Your secret is safe with me.”
He appraises me silently. “Are all my secrets safe with you?”
“Yes.” I nod reassuringly. “They are.”
He studies me, gauging the truth to my words.
“I promise,” I say, squeezing his hand in encouragement.
He draws in a deep breath. Then he blows it out. Then he takes another drink. Then he looks anywhere but at me. “I’m the reason Danny is the way he is.”
I narrow my eyebrows in confusion. “I … I don’t understand.”
He still won’t look at me as he continues to explain. “Being around my dad, fighting was all I knew. I got suspended three times for fighting in middle school. And in high school, it happened so often, they threatened to kick me off the baseball team. Anyone else would have been. But I was their star player and the coach was always able to convince them to give me another chance.
“Danny wasn’t always the way he is now. He was a baseball player, too. A teammate of mine.”
He glances at me briefly to see how shocked I am. I’m stunned. Danny doesn’t seem like he could have ever played organized sports.
“We were hanging out at a place on the coast called Silver Sands. There was a boardwalk there that ran from the beach to the state park. It was a drinking place for local high school students, but it was new enough that the cops hadn’t caught on yet.
“Danny and I, we …” He looks back into the house, choking on his words. “We had a disagreement about what happened in the game we had played earlier that night. He played second base and I played short. We lost the game because a hit made it past both of us, going right between where we were standing. Each of us claimed it was the other’s ball.
“Danny and I weren’t such great friends to begin with. We were always butting heads over something. But we hung out with a lot of the same people and always ended up at the same place somehow. And once we started drinking that night, our argument got worse. And in true Sawyer Mills fashion, we got into a fight.”
His eyes close. He pulls his hand away from mine. “We got into a fight and that’s why he is the way he is.”
My heart sinks for him. For Lucy. For Danny. I don’t even know what to say.
“And to make matters even worse, he was right all along. It was my fucking ball.”
I can’t imagine what he must be going through carrying that burden all this time. But I still don’t understand what that has to do with me and why he can’t have a relationship.
“Can I talk now?” I ask.
He nods.
“I know you must feel incredibly guilty over that. And I realize that maybe you think you should have done something to save your mom, too, even though you were only ten and you couldn’t have. But, Sawyer, what does that have to do with us? I know it’s an incredibly selfish question considering what you just told me, but I need to know.”
He gets up off the swing and paces around the porch. “What does it have to do with us? It has everything to do with us. I hit people, Aspen. It’s what I do. It’s how I grew up. It’s all I know. I’ve told you since day one that I’d hurt you. And now you know why.” He motions to the house. “If that isn’t evidence enough for you, I don’t know what is.”
“Do you love me?” I ask.
He stops walking and stares at me.
“Do you love me, Sawyer?” I ask again.
“That’s irrelevant,” he says.
“Irrelevant? It’s the most relevant thing there is. You do. I can tell you do. You were even going to say it earlier. It’s why you ran away. You love me, Sawyer. You won’t hit me.”
“Ha!” he belts out, with a painful laugh. “Were you not listening to me? My dad loved my mom, Aspen. He loved her to death.”
“But you’re not him.”
“I’d hurt you,” he says. “Not a lot at first. Maybe just a strong hold on your elbow as I drag you behind me, or a swift push to get you to go where I want you to go. But eventually, those holds and pushes would turn into more. They would turn into slaps, and then punches, and then” —his voice breaks— “pushes down a flight of stairs.”
“That won’t happen,” I say. “I won’t let it.”
“Neither will I,” he says, with distant eyes.
My heart starts to break for the umpteenth time.
“I already hurt you once,” he says.
“What are you talking about?”
“The elbow to your face that night on the couch.”
“That wasn’t you hurting me, Sawyer. That was an accident.”
“See – that’s what they all say. Is that what you’ll tell the doctor when I take my fist to your face?”
I shake my head at him in confusion. I’ve known this man for four months and I’ve never seen him raise a hand to anyone. I’ve seen him get mad, infuriated even, but never once has he hit anything but a wooden door. And I’ve done hours of research on him. Never was there a mention of a violent past. Surely if he still got into fights, it would hit the news.
“So you’d rather throw this all away than take a chance on us?”
He nods. “If it keeps you safe. Yes.”
“When is the last time you hit anyone?” I ask.
Sawyer nods to the house. “Danny was the last person I hit.”
The sliding glass door opens behind me. “That’s a lie,” Lucy says.
“Stay out of it, Lucy,” Sawyer warns her.
“And what, sit here and watch you throw away a perfectly good relationship because you have a distorted view of what really happened? I won’t let you do that. My walls are thin, Sawyer, I could hear everything you said. You have to get over this, son. It’s eating you alive.”
“You weren’t there,” he says.
“No, I wasn’t. But a dozen other people were. And their stories to the police were all the same. Are you saying they all lied?”
“It’s my fault, Lucy.”
“It’s not,” she says. “In fact, from what everyone else said, it was Daniel’s. He took a swing at you. He hit you. Even the police records show you with a black eye.”
“I took a swing at him, too,” Sawyer says, his face filled with excruciating pain.
“Of course you did. You had just been hit,” she says. “And the fact that he stepped out of the way and then tripped because he was drunk, was not your fault.” Lucy turns to me. “They were on the end of the boardwalk at a place where there are a lot of rocks in the sand. Daniel tripped and fell head-first into a rock. He was too drunk to have good reflexes so he didn’t brace himself. The rock ripped through his skull causing a traumatic brain injury. He damaged the frontal cortex of the brain where the higher learning and thought centers are. So now he has a mental handicap, a cognitive deficit, and he will always have the mental capacity of a six-year-old.” She walks over to Sawyer and places a hand on his arm. “And it is not your fault. So quit blaming yourself.”
Sawyer shakes his head over and over.
Lucy sits down next to me as we watch Sawyer pace around the yard. “At first, I think he came around to punish himself. He visited Daniel in the hospital every single day. And after Daniel’s release, Sawyer came to dinner every Sunday. It was hard, seeing my strong and vibrant son revert to such a low level of learning. Even Daniel’s father couldn’t handle it and we divorced a year later. But Sawyer stuck around, visiting him often. Eventually, they became more like brothers.” She nods at Sawyer. “That man has been a Godsend. He’s the light of Daniel’s life. He could have walked away. Most other seventeen-year-olds would have.”
“Do you know about his mom?” I ask.
“I do. In the early days of Sawyer’s coming around, he told me. He told me he was just like his father and that’s why Daniel got hurt. It wasn’t true, of course. He’s nothing like his father.”
“He thinks he’ll hurt me,” I say. “I used to think what he meant was that he would leave me. But he literally thinks he will hurt me. He thinks he�
�ll hit me like his dad hit his mom.”
“He won’t. I’m sure of it. And even if he had the inclination, I think knowing what happened to his mom and to Daniel would keep him from ever doing it.” She puts her hand on mine. “If I had a daughter, I’d give her my blessing to be with him. That’s how much I trust him.”
“But he doesn’t trust himself,” I say.
“Are you two done talking about me?” Sawyer says, coming up to join us. “Because I need to get back. I have an early flight tomorrow.”
Lucy gives me her phone number and tells me to call her any time. Somehow, I have a feeling this won’t be the last time we talk.
In Sawyer’s car on the way home, I think about everything I found out tonight. Sawyer probably believes it made me think less of him. That couldn’t be further from the truth. If it’s possible, I love him even more.
I look down at my hand and remember the fake proposal from earlier. “We could always tell people the ring had to be sized.”
“What?”
“You know, to explain why I’m not wearing one.”
He cracks a smile. “My fiancée is one smart cookie.”
“Please don’t call me that when it’s just the two of us,” I say, looking out the window, once again being reminded of what can never be.
“Fair enough,” he says.
I stare at the streetlights as they go by, knowing he’s wrong. There’s nothing fair about it.
Chapter Thirty-three
Sawyer
I hide in my closet. Not because I think he will come for me. He never comes for me. But it’s quieter in here, and I bring my Gameboy with me so I don’t hear him yelling. So I don’t hear her crying.
She never cries in front of me. She just smiles. She smiles even though she has a bruise on her arm or a cut on her face. I don’t get it. When I fall off my bike, or rip my pants when I’m sliding in baseball, it hurts. No way would I smile. But she smiles. And she bakes. Usually, after my dad yells and throws things around the house, I get to eat cake. Or cookies. Or brownies.
I hate cake and cookies and brownies.
I hear a crash. Something hits the wall. Probably something my mom loves. Like a vase or a framed photo. He likes to break things she loves. He likes to break her. He loves her. Why does he like to break things he loves?
“I’m sorry,” she cries.
I wonder what she’s sorry for. She does everything he wants. She even makes steak for dinner. She hates steak. But she makes it because she loves him. She loves him so much. She tells me that all the time. She tells me he loves her too. And me. She says he loves me.
But all he ever does is complain that he has to spend money on baseball. Last week, my coach said my bat was getting too small for me and Daddy got mad that he had to buy me a new one. I think he spent fifteen dollars at the second-hand store to get me a bat that was all scratched up. I’m not sure why he got mad at Mommy for that, but he did. And the next day, we ate chocolate cake.
Finally, I hear Daddy’s car start and pull out of the driveway. That’s when I know it’s safe to go out.
“Mommy?” I ask, from outside their bedroom door.
“I’ll be right out,” she sings from inside.
I go wait on the couch. It takes her a long time to join me. When she does, I can tell she’s been crying. And I know what she was doing in her bedroom. She was using that brown stuff on her face. The stuff she usually puts on when we go out somewhere. It makes her look prettier than she already is. She always puts it on after she fights with Daddy.
“Okay,” she says, walking into the room. “What shall we do for the rest of the evening?”
I shrug. “Can you toss me some baseballs out back?”
She smiles at me. “Of course.”
I run to my room and get my glove. But as soon as we’re out back, I feel bad, because I notice she’s trying to throw balls to me with her left hand because her right hand is hurt.
I put my glove down. “I don’t want to throw balls anymore,” I say. “Let’s do something else.”
“Want to help me bake something?” she asks.
I shake my head. “I don’t like it when you bake.”
“You don’t? Well, that’s silly. Who doesn’t like cookies and cakes?”
I shrug.
“Well, what would you like me to make you then?”
“Nothing,” I say. Because I know whatever she would make would become something I hate, too.
“How about we go inside and play Scrabble?”
I nod. “Okay, Mommy. But don’t let me win. I don’t like it when you let me win.”
She studies me, probably reading more in my eyes than she ever has before. I’m almost ten. I’m growing up. I see things. I get things. And maybe she’s beginning to understand that.
“We’ll be okay, Sawyer,” she says. “Everything will be okay.”
“Nothing will be okay!” I yell at her. “Nothing will ever be okay!”
“Sawyer, don’t yell at me.”
I look at Mommy, but it’s not Mommy. It’s Aspen. And she’s beautiful. Just like a butterfly. I brush a hair from her face and notice my hands are big. Big like a man’s. I’m a man.
Then someone else walks into the room. “Penny is mine,” Bass says. “She’s always been mine and she’ll always be mine.”
I step across the room and punch him. “She’s mine!” I yell, as he falls to the floor.
“Sawyer, stop it!” Aspen shouts, running over to help Bass.
“You love him, don’t you?” I ask. “You lied. You said you loved me, but you really love him. You’re a liar. Just like my mom was when she said she loved my dad.”
Then Aspen hits the floor, falling on top of Bass, blood trickling from her mouth. She looks up at me and smiles. “I told you you were just like your father.”
I look at her swelling face and then at my hands.
I look at myself in the mirror and then I fall to my knees, knowing she’s right. I’m not only just like him – I am him. And I know for sure I can never, ever have her.
“Sawyer!” someone shouts.
I feel a hand on my shoulder.
I wake up and look around my dark bedroom. I let out a sigh. “What is it?”
“I think you were having a nightmare,” Aspen says.
I try to shake off the dream. The vision of her on the floor, swollen and bleeding from my fist. I close my eyes, willing myself to speak without my voice cracking. “I guess I should start sleeping with my door shut.”
“No. It’s okay. You didn’t bother me. I’m sure all our talking earlier brought a lot of stuff to the surface.”
“I’m fine. You can go back to bed.”
She climbs into bed with me, sitting up against the headboard. “I’d rather stay in here.”
“Suit yourself,” I say, turning away from her and lying back on my pillow.
“Is that really how you’re going to play this? I’m not her, Sawyer. You’re not him.”
“I can’t risk it.”
“Risk what? Hitting me? Or loving me?”
“He killed her, Aspen. He killed her and she never admitted it, not even on her death bed.”
“I wouldn’t let anything happen. And I don’t think you would either. You didn’t do that to Danny. So you got in fights back in school. A lot of boys did. That doesn’t mean they will grow up to abuse their girlfriends.”
“Do you know what the statistics say? Have you even bothered to look? Kids who grow up in an abusive home are three times more likely to be abusive in an adult relationship. Three times.”
“But you’ve proven you’re not like that. Have you ever hit a girl? Have you even been in a fight since high school?”
“That’s not the point. There is no way to know if I’ll hurt a woman until I do. I’m not willing to let that happen. Not to anyone, but especially not to you.”
“Why especially not to me?”
I jump out of bed and pull on a pair of s
weats. “I’m going to the basement.”
“To get away from me?” she asks.
“Nobody’s keeping you from going down there.”
“But you know I won’t.”
“I guess that’s your choice, then, isn’t it?”
I walk down the stairs, grab a bottle of water and head down to my workshop. A few minutes later, I hear Aspen playing the piano. I stop what I’m doing and listen. I always listen. I love to hear her play. It’s the only time my mind is truly at ease.
After a while, I look down at the template I’ve drawn. And for the first time, it’s not a butterfly. I realize what I’ve been drawing is Aspen’s hands on a set of piano keys.
Chapter Thirty-four
Aspen
“What the hell are they thinking?” I shriek into the phone.
I rarely call Sawyer when he’s on the road. We text sometimes to make plans. We email. But we never call. And I realize that even though he’s laughing at me right now, I like it. I like hearing his voice when he’s been away for a while.
“It’s been a week,” I cry. “One week. That’s not even enough time to pick wedding invitations let alone mail them. Did they go home that night and plan the entire thing in ten minutes? And two weeks from now. Are they crazy? Who has a three-week engagement?”
“Maybe she’s pregnant,” he says.
“She’s not. I asked.”
“You talked to him already?”
“Of course I talked to him. Why do you think my voice is so hoarse?”
He laughs. I’m sure he’s imagining me tearing into Bass. He thinks I’m stubborn. And a meddler. He thinks I’m a stubborn meddler. “Well, did he say why they’re doing it so quickly?” he asks.
“He claims it’s because of her parents. The ones who didn’t even come to Brooke’s Juilliard graduation. They will be in town for the next three weeks before they go cruising around the world on some multi-millionaire’s yacht for five months. So they insisted it happen before they leave.”
“What kind of father insists that his daughter have a short engagement just to fit into his schedule?”
Stealing Sawyer Page 27
