Swear on This Life

by Renee Carlino

  She nodded. “Okay, I think you should.”

  I nodded. A short while later, after Cara had turned in for the night, I made a pot of coffee and prepared myself to dive back into the past.

  From All the Roads Between

  On the fifth night at the Kellers’, I snuck down to the kitchen and grabbed the phone again to call Jax.

  “Hello?” He sounded groggy.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “It’s one a.m. I have to get up early tomorrow.”

  His dismissive tone bothered me, leaving me vulnerable. “Why?”

  “’Cause they just canceled the bus route down here.”

  “What? Really? What do you mean?”

  “It means I have to fucking walk, Em.”

  My stomach sank. “To where?”

  “To Carter’s. Cal Junior just started giving me a ride to the bus stop on Fifth.”

  I visualized the route in my head. Jax would have to walk two miles each way every day just to get to Carter’s, probably before it was even light out. And he had to hitch a ride with Cal Junior, the thirty-year-old son of Cal Carter, the owner of the egg ranch. Cal Junior was strange and creepy, and there was a story about how he had once exposed himself to two kids who had been riding their bikes past the ranch. We stayed away from him as much as possible.

  “Oh my god, Jax, I’m so sorry. What happened to Ms. Beels?”

  “They won’t let her come down this far for one kid.”

  It’s all my fault. “Why on earth are you getting a ride from Junior?”

  “Do I have a choice? My mom arranged it. I guess he was hanging around her work last night and she told him about our problem. He offered, and I caught a ride with him this morning.”

  “Did he talk to you?”

  “No, he just smoked cigarettes the whole way into town. I smelled like an ashtray by the time I got to school.”

  “Isn’t there any other way?”

  “I don’t know.” Jackson sounded empty, shattered, and distant.

  “You sound depressed.”

  “I’m fine. Listen, I’m tired. Can we talk later in the week?”

  “Sure. Okay, love you,” I said, feeling awful that we were getting off the phone without exchanging at least a few nice words.

  “Good night.”

  “I said I love you, Jackson.”

  “Love you too, Em.” After we hung up, I stared at the phone, wondering why Jackson seemed distant.

  Over the next few weeks, Jax answered only about half of the time, and each time he sounded more and more depressed. He would ask if I was okay and then he’d rush off the phone. Thankfully, I never got caught, and if Mr. and Mrs. Keller knew, they didn’t say anything.

  When Jax’s birthday arrived, I called him to see if he had gotten his driver’s license.

  “Hello?”

  “Happy birthday! So . . . did you get it?”

  “Yep.”

  “Congratulations, stud! Who took you to the DMV?”

  “Cal Junior.”

  “Really? Weird.”

  “Yeah, well, beggars can’t be choosers.”

  “Okay, so . . . now what?”

  “I guess I’m gonna work at the ranch every day until I have enough money to get a car.”

  “I’m proud of you, Jax. Even if you don’t get a car, I’ll be proud of you.”

  “Yeah?” He sounded down, even though he should have been celebrating.

  “Yeah. I miss you,” I added.

  “Thanks.”

  “I said I miss you.”

  “I miss you too,” he said quietly.

  “Will you come and see me?” My voice was shaking. His steely tone and short answers were making me feel sick. I was twirling my hair into a giant dreadlock at the side of my head out of sheer nervousness. I wondered if he was falling out of love with me, or if life was just getting worse and worse for him and he was afraid to burden me with his problems.

  “How am I supposed to do that?”

  “After school, I go to the library in town. Mrs. Keller doesn’t pick me up until four. I can skip my last class and meet you in the town if you can borrow Junior’s truck or your mom’s car.”

  “I don’t know, Em. That sounds impossible.”

  “I just want to see you. I want to put my arms around you and wish you a happy birthday in person . . . and give you a birthday kiss.”

  He laughed, but there was a hollow quality to it. “Yeah, that would be nice.”

  “What is it, Jackson? Are you seeing someone at school or something?”

  “No. I don’t have time for that. I don’t have a fucking life, Emerson, okay? Just stop fucking nagging me about this. I have no control over anything. I can’t just take my mom’s car when she has to work, and Junior’s a freak. I’m not asking to borrow his truck.”

  “Jesus! Okay. I’m sorry.” My voice broke, and tears fell from my eyes. “I just miss you.”

  “Don’t cry. Please don’t cry. I will fucking die, Emerson. Please just enjoy your three square meals a day and your warm bed. The only thing that’s keeping me going is knowing that you’re living in peace, finally.”

  But I wasn’t. I would have taken the whiskey monster, the violent rages, and the empty refrigerator just to be able to spend time with Jax. I couldn’t be selfish, though; I had to let him think there was hope so he could believe it for himself too.

  “Thank you. You’re the best person I know, Jackson Fisher.”

  He laughed again, a sarcastic huff that made my stomach flip in a bad way. “Okay, Em, I gotta go.”

  We hung up without saying good night. I put the phone back in the kitchen and cried myself to sleep.

  What felt like five minutes later, I opened my puffy eyes to find Sophia leaning over my bed. “What’s wrong with your face?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Were you crying last night?” she asked. She had a look of sympathy in her eyes. “Did Jackson break up with you?”

  “No, I just miss him.”

  “You’ll see each other again soon.”

  I rolled out of bed and patted the top of her blonde mop. “Little optimist, aren’t you?”

  She smiled back at me. “It’s called faith, Emmy.”

  LATER, AS I was walking out of fifth period toward my last class, I turned the corner and my eyes immediately shot to a stunning figure leaning against a tree just off the path.

  “Jax!” I screamed. I ran toward him, jumped into his arms, and straddled his waist. His lips were on mine in a second. He held me to his chest as he kissed me deeply before burying his face in my neck. He sighed, a deep rumbling sound from his chest that gave me goose bumps. I shivered, but my skin was burning like I had a fever. His nose was cold against my cheek.

  “Fuck, I missed you. You smell so fucking good.”

  He set me down. We took each other in. I could have sworn he had gotten taller. “What are you doing here?”

  “Junior let me borrow his truck. I parked it on the road. There’s a fence up there we can climb to get out of here so you don’t have to walk out the front gate.”

  “Okay. But, shit, they’ll mark me absent in sixth period. I want to go with you so badly, but I don’t want the Kellers to find out . . .”

  He crossed his arms over his chest and looked down at the ground, defeated. “I don’t want to get you in trouble, Em. I just needed to see you.”

  Jackson could slay my heart with just a look. “I’m coming with you. I don’t care what happens.”

  He gave me a huge smile and grabbed my hand. “C’mon.”

  He helped me over the short fence and before long we were coasting down the road in the cab of Cal Junior’s cigarette-stale, beat-up Chevy.

  “Where should we go?” He glanced over at me, but I couldn’t speak. I was in awe of him, driving along like he had done it all his life, with confidence and grace. “What is it, Em?”

  “Nothing. You just seem so grown-up . . . different.”

&
nbsp; “It’s still me.”

  “I know, I know. I just . . . I don’t know. God . . . I don’t know what to say.”

  He laughed. “I might be able to do this, like, once a week. Then it won’t feel so strange.”

  “Really?” Those words changed everything. Now I had something to look forward to besides chores and homework.

  “Yeah, maybe. How about here?” He pointed straight ahead to a parking lot wrapped around New Clayton’s fishing pond.

  “Perfect.” It was a warm day and less humid than usual for late spring. We found a spot on a picnic bench and sat side by side, facing the water. I studied Jackson’s jean-clad legs, spread with confidence. He put his hand on my thigh and rubbed it up and down like it was so natural for us to touch each other that way.

  “You didn’t go to school today, I take it. It takes at least an hour to get here.”

  “I planned to. On the way into town this morning, I told Junior you were crying last night, and, well . . . he said I could take his truck to come see you.” He fixed his gaze on the road behind me.

  “That was nice of him.”

  He huffed. “Yeah, I guess.”

  I touched my hand to his cheek. “Look at me.”

  He turned, his eyes full of pain and longing. I leaned in and we kissed each other slowly. I didn’t know what Jax was going through, but everything slipped away when we were together. He was far away but close enough to touch.

  “Can you just be here with me and forget about everything else for a little while?”

  He glanced at my mouth and then up to my eyes. His chest started to pump in and out and then he looked at my mouth again. There was so much heat and tension between us that I could practically hear it pulsing with currents of electricity. He swallowed and then the restraint was gone as he crushed his mouth to mine. He was more frantic than ever before, stronger, holding my body to his, our tongues teasing each other until his mouth was on my neck, then my ear, and then he was pulling me effortlessly onto his lap. I never resisted him because it was perfectly familiar, like home, to be against his big body that way. He was breathing hard and kissing hard. I took his hand, which was gripping the back of my leg, and I pulled it up to cup my breast through my sweater. He was timid at first, but then he groaned and whispered near my ear, “What are you doing to me, Em?”

  “I want you, Jackson . . . all of you.” Big words for a fifteen-year-old, but I meant every one of them.

  He set me down and pulled away, then turned toward the pond, braced his elbows on his knees, and let his head fall into his hands. “What can we do? I mean, we can’t be together—we have nowhere to go.” His voice got higher. “There’s nothing we can do, Em.”

  I rubbed my hand up and down his back. “It’s okay. I just meant I want all of you someday.”

  “Someday,” he echoed. “Hopefully sooner than later. It seems like everyone is always trying to screw things up for us.”

  “Everyone who? What are you talking about? My dad is going to jail. Your mom is busy with her men, and the Kellers will be fine, as long as I don’t get caught. This is enough for me, Jackson. Just being near you is enough for me for now.”

  He looked up and there were tears in his eyes. “I know, I’m sorry, I’m being such a grump. It’s just that I’m sixteen, you know?” He laughed finally, and I laughed too as a few tears fell from my eyes. I knew what he meant. We were lovesick. We wanted to connect as deeply as we could. For us, the physical part was innocent. We would’ve done it out of our love for each other, not out of lust or peer pressure. We were more committed and genuinely in love than most married people—at least the ones we knew. We’d had years to develop our love and respect for each other. Fifteen might have been young for sex for other kids, but for us, it just felt right.

  “I get it,” I said. “I feel the same way.”

  “I want you so bad, it’s all I think about.”

  “Just focus on the future. Remember when we used to dream about growing up? You said you wanted to be a ninja and I could be your sidekick, except you wouldn’t let me use the samurai sword because you thought I was too clumsy.”

  “I don’t think about ninjas anymore, and I don’t think you’re clumsy either. I think you’re perfect. You’re going to stick with me, right?” His tone was serious.

  “Yes. Of course I am. Always, Jax.”

  “I can’t live without you. It’s such fucking hell living with Leila at the end of that dirt road, all alone, with no one else to turn to. She’s getting worse. She doesn’t even buy food anymore. I’ve been living on Taco Bell and cereal.”

  “I’m so sorry, Jax. I wish I could help.”

  He looked away like he was too embarrassed to look me in the eye. “When I think about you, about us as kids, it’s like some fucking movie. When it was just us, everything was fine.” He started to get choked up, but he was trying to be tough. He was fighting it.

  “I know—it’s the same for me.”

  “Now you’re gone and everything is so real and so fucking brutal. She’s disgusting. Leila is awful; she’s losing her mind. There’s a different guy at our house every night now, and I can hear her with them. I want to fucking die every time.”

  “Don’t say that, please. Go to my dad’s. There’s no one there. You can sleep there.”

  He looked up, shocked. “They condemned it, Em. The county is tearing it down.”

  “What? What about my stuff? My clothes, my books, my mom’s stuff?”

  “It’s all gone.”

  I felt a lump forming in my throat. “What will my dad do?”

  “He’s going to prison, and then he’ll probably go to a halfway house or something. This is it, Em. Everything is changing.”

  My chest was heaving. “I better get to the library to meet Sophia.”

  “Yeah.” He grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the truck. But before opening the passenger door, he pushed me against it and rubbed his nose along my jawline. Jackson was only sixteen, but he was a man: strong, athletic, and masculine. “I just want to remember the way you taste and smell.” He kissed me hard, almost biting down on my lip. The pain felt good.

  I stopped him and pulled away, breathing hard. “Don’t say ‘remember.’ You don’t need to remember. We’ll see each other again soon, right?”

  He pulled away, panting. “We have to.”

  “We will.” I touched my hand to his face. We looked at each other for several silent moments, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. “We were so young once. Remember us on that bus with stupid Mikey and . . . who was that other kid?”

  “Alex Duncan.”

  “Yeah, Alex. Remember you guys were so mean to me?”

  “We were mean to each other, Em. We were just kids.”

  “Look at us now.” I laughed. “Would you ever have thought we’d be like this? Grown-up and wanting nothing more than to be with each other every second of the day?”

  “I always knew.”

  I laughed. “You’re lying.”

  He was impassive. “No. I did. I swear to you. I always knew we would be like this one day. I think you always knew too.”

  “Maybe.” My voice shook, and my eyes started to tear up.

  He pulled me to his chest and held me.

  “Jackson?” I asked.

  “Yeah?”

  “What’s going to happen?”

  I could feel his heart beating fast against my chest. “Nobody knows.”

  “I hate that,” I said.

  “I know, I hate it too, but I guess it’s like reading a good book. The kind where you don’t want to skip pages to see what happens at the end. Each moment is a story in itself.”

  “Would you say every moment is good? What about my father and your mom?” I sniffled, wiping tears from my eyes.

  “Our story is great. Maybe not all the other shit, but the story of us is perfect, Em.”

  “Yeah, I like that. You have a way with words, Jackson Fisher.”

  His che
st rumbled. “A regular wordsmith, huh?”

  “You better keep writing. You’re an awesome writer, and if you stop, I will personally kick your ass.”

  “All five foot four of you. I’m so scared.”

  I pulled out of his arms. “Still teasing me?”

  “Flirting—it was always flirting. Come on.” He opened my door and helped me in.

  We didn’t speak as he drove through town. At the library, Sophia was already sitting on the steps when we drove up. I watched her eyes grow wide as we approached. From fifteen feet away, I could see her blushing. I looked back at Jackson walking behind me from the parking lot. I smiled. He looked past me to Sophia and smirked his cocky, teenage man-boy smirk. Sophia jumped up and held her hand out to him.

  “Sophia Lyle. Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

  He shook her hand. “Jackson Fisher. It’s nice to meet you as well.”

  “What a great name. So, um, did you pick Emerson up from school?”

  “I did.”

  “Cool.” Sophia was nodding nervously.

  “Jax has to get going,” I said.

  “Okay, well, Jax—you don’t mind if I call you that, right?”

  “Of course not, Sophie.”

  I thought she was literally going to faint.

  “Okay, well, um, any time you want to see Emerson, I can totally cover for you guys.”

  “No, Soph,” I said. “I’m not going to let you get in trouble with the Kellers.”

  “Well, I just mean, I won’t tell,” she said.

  “Okay,” I told her.

  Jackson leaned down and pecked me on the lips. “’Bye, Em.”

  I grabbed his face and leaned in close to his ear. “Love you.”

  I’ll always have trouble remembering the first time we said, I love you, because by the time we said it freely, we had been feeling it for years. It was as natural as saying, See you later.

  “Love you,” he said, before turning and leaving a captivated Sophia and a longing Emerson behind on the library steps.

  “Oh my god, he’s such a dreamboat.”

  I laughed. “People don’t use that expression anymore, Sophie. That was, like, way before your time.”