by J. J. McAvoy
“This is a bad idea,” Bethan said in a panic, as Tristan held her back from taking their daughter out of Thea’s arms.
“What if she wakes up at night and she doesn’t see me?”
“She will cry, go back to sleep, and see you again in the morning,” Tristan sighed, placing Bellamy’s bags on the floor. “She has everything she could possibly need. It’s just one night, she’ll be okay sweetheart,” he reassured Bethan.
She shook her head, and took Bellamy back into her arms. Tristan groaned, shaking his head at her. “I’ll be in the car.”
I understood his frustration. Since Bellamy’s birth, Bethan had never let her out of her sight for more than a few hours. She had kind of put everyone else on the back burner. But I also understood Bethan’s reasons; they had tried for years to have a child of their own and had suffered numerous miscarriages. While pregnant, she didn’t want to get her hopes up and she had often complained or ignored the life growing inside her because she was worried about losing it. Now that she had a healthy little girl right in front of her, being apart was almost more than she could bear.
“Bethan,” I said, but I wasn’t sure what to say to her.
“Bethan,” Thea said softly, moving closer to them both, “I basically raised my baby sister. I never went anywhere without her. I went to a high school right across the street from her elementary school. I get it, and I promise to send you pictures during the night. But I think you both need a break before you crack.”
She sighed, kissing Bellamy’s head before handing her over to Thea.
“Thank you.”
“No problem, she’s so quiet, we’ll be fine,” Thea said as she rocked her.
“I’ll be here as well, so go before Tristan writes a big speech in the car,” I said, taking her hand and leading her to the door.
“Okay, if you—”
“We got it, we’ll be fine. Goodbye,” I cut her off, as I ushered her though the front door.
Tristan mouthed thank you, as he held open the passenger side door for her. Waving at them, I closed the door before leaning back against it. Inside, Thea sat on the floor, and placed Bellamy in her bright pink princess bouncy chair.
“You always know what to say,” I said to her, as I crouched down beside them.
She smiled, still staring at Bellamy, “Most moms— good moms— just want to know that their kids are safe. It makes me happy to see how much Bethan loves her. After we were born, my mother kind of just left us in the care of our father. He was writer, so he stayed at home while she was out making a name for herself… sorry, that was depressing—”
“Don’t be, you can talk to me about anything.” I kissed the side of her head and stood back up again. “What do you want to eat?”
“I’m fine right now. I need to study anyway, but thank you,” she said, grabbing a few books out of her bag and dropping onto the couch. I noticed that she didn’t look at me once.
“Oh, right, you have other classes. How are they?”
I’m so lame. I’m trying to start conversation with my girlfriend, because I said the damn “L” word.
“Compared to yours? Not nearly as stressful.”
Still no eye contact.
“Even Professor Noland? She gives out papers like Christmas gifts.”
She shrugged. “Yeah, but honestly if you regurgitate everything she says in class in your paper, you’ll be fine. It’s like she doesn’t even notice it’s her own words.”
I wanted to shake the living daylights out of her. I could accept the fact that she wasn’t ready. What I couldn’t accept was the wall she was rebuilding right before my eyes. Bellamy threw her toy across the floor, and only then did I see her face as she handed it back to her.
“I thought you wanted to eat?” she asked, flipping through her book again.
“Yeah, I’m going to.”
Walking into the kitchen, I dialed the one person in the world who I knew would understand this.
“Selene?” I said softly.
“What’s up Levi, how’s my sister?”
“I think I broke her,” I half joked, pulling the jar of jelly out from the fridge.
“Eww…”
“Not like that! I told her I loved her last night.”
“No. No. No,” she repeated.
“Yes. Yes. Yes. And now I can’t even get her to look me in the eyes.”
“There are only three people in this world who have ever said that to her… actually two since I don’t know about the first one; but still… only our grandmother and me. And in all these years, she’s never said it back to either of us. The best I’ve ever gotten was a ‘me too.’ ”
Well at least it wasn’t just me.
“So basically, I’m screwed?”
“Pretty much. But I’m glad you said it. Just give her a while, she’ll reset herself. And it will be like it never happened .oh crap. I have to go Levi, I’m grounded, and if my grandmother sees me on the phone…”
“What did you do?” I asked as I cut my sandwich in half and turned around to wash out a plate.
“I snuck out to see my boyfriend. Don’t tell Thea! Promise me you won’t, you owe me for all the free sister advice.”
“Fine, I won’t tell her—”
Turning around, I found Thea standing in the kitchen with Bellamy on her hip hiccupping as she rubbed her back.
“Okay, bye,” Selene said before the line went dead.
I said bye back, even though the line was dead.
“She has a bottle of gripe water in her bag, can you hand it to me. It’s the clear one,” she pointed.
Nodding, I dug through it for a moment before turning around and handing it back to her.
“How do you know how to do all of this? Most twenty-three year olds would hate spending their weekends like this.”
Finally, she looked to me and smiled. “My grandmother says I was born at forty and by the time I was ten, I could play bridge with the best of them.”
“So that would make you the cougar in this relationship?”
“Is that what I am now?” she asked, holding up Bellamy’s bottle, “I can work with it. But can you really keep your body looking young at fit with all of that?”
Her eyes glanced at the chips, beer and sandwich combo I had going on my plate.
“Don’t even go there.”
She laughed, causing Bellamy to wave her tiny hands in excitement. Shaking her hand, Thea looked up at me.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
THEA
BUZZ
BUZZ
“Thea, your phone,” Levi muttered beside me as he rolled over.
“I’m too tired to move,” I groaned.
Bellamy had just went down for the night after refusing to eat. It had taken her a good two hours to realize that her parents weren’t around her anymore, and once she did, she lost it and began screaming as loud as her little lungs would let her, for as long as they would let her. I just wanted to sleep, but my phone wouldn’t stop vibrating against the bedside table.
BUZZ
BUZZ
“Thea…”
“I’m getting it…” I grumbled, as I sat up and reached for it. The time was 1:53am, which meant it was too late for anyone to be calling for anything.
“What?”
There was silence.
“Selene?” I looked at the caller ID.
“Turn on the news.”
“Selene it’s two in the morning why are—”
“Thea! Turn on the damn news!”
What the hell is wrong with her?
“Okay, hold on.” I got up out of bed, trying not to wake up Bellamy who slept in a makeshift crib next to us.
When I turned on the television I didn’t see anything.
“Selene are you sure this isn't local news for you? I don’t see anything—”
“They aren’t talking about it, but look at the bottom banner, under the Twitter feed.”
&n
bsp; I searched, watching as the sentence rolled by, still not seeing it anything…
“Selene…” I stopped, and so did every other part of me. I couldn’t breathe and soon even standing was too hard. I collapsed onto the ground.
“Thea?” Levi called out to me.
“Thea?”
I heard him, but I didn’t see him until he was right in front of my face.
“What’s wrong?”
Everything.
“My father tried to commit suicide.” I said the words, but I found myself unable to believe them.
My mind was spinning, and all I could think about was getting him out before it was too late.
“I need to get him out. Levi, please, help me get him out.”
Collapsing into his lap, I cried, I sobbed, I begged him… and part of me knew that this was going to destroy us. This was the other shoe that had been waiting to drop. And as it fell, it landed on the back of my neck.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
LEVI
I wasn’t sure how to have this conversation, but I needed to tell her the truth. She looked like her entire world had just crumbled all around her… how could I add to her pain.
But if I said nothing…
“I need to tell you something,” I began.
When she looked up at me, her face was full of trust, of hope, and I wanted to stop speaking. I didn't want to say it, but I had to.
“Savannah Van Allen was my mother’s friend, and she was also my ex-wife’s mother.”
There it was, the trust disappeared right in front of my eyes, and all I could see instead was rage.
“Thea…” I reached for her, but she smacked my hand away and stood up.
“Why… why didn’t you say anything? I told you months ago! Why didn't you say anything?”
“I wasn’t sure what to say—”
“How about ‘Thea for years I thought your father murdered my wife’s mother’!” she screamed at me. “Why am I using past tense? You probably never believed in me from the beginning.”
“That’s not true!”
“Why else wouldn’t you speak up? Why else would you never bring it up, when I talked about him all the time? You never really believed that I could get him out. He was just going to die in prison, and I never would have needed to know.”
“I didn’t tell you because it doesn’t matter to me! I love you, I want you to stay, and I didn’t want you to use this as an excuse to run away.”
“You loved me and didn’t want me to run? Or is it that you weren’t sure what to say? Which is the truth? Or do you just say pretty things without thinking about what they actually mean?!”
“I’m telling you because I will help you. I want to help you.”
“Don’t bother. Anyone who hides the truth from me in order to keep me at their side isn’t someone I want to be with.”
She moved to the door but I grabbed on to her.
“Thea—”
“Let go of me!” she screamed, and wriggled out of my grasp.
I couldn’t.
“Don’t do this, please. I was wrong not to tell you, I know that. But we aren’t running away from each other anyone—”
“There is no we. Getting involved with you was a bad idea, I knew it then and I should have trusted myself. I can’t trust you, so let go of me Levi, or I will scream until someone calls the police.”
She ripped her arm from my grip, not even bothering to grab her coat before slamming the door on her way out. A moment later Bellamy’s screams echoed through the house, mirroring my own internal grief and frustrations.
“I hate you,” Tristan said, dressed in sweatpants and Red Sox hoodie.
I ignored him and handed Bellamy back to Bethan.
“Where’s Thea?” she asked, looking around.
“She left me.”
Her eyes widened as she rubbed Bellamy’s back. “I’ll put her down in the guest room.”
Nodding, I let her go, before leading Tristan into my living room, stepping over all of the boxes.
“What’s all this?” he said, with a lot less edge to his voice.
“Case files on State of Connecticut vs. Ben Walton on the kidnapping, rape and murder of Savannah Van Allen,” I said as I sat back down on the couch and rubbed my eyes.
It was already seven in the morning, and I didn’t see myself sleeping anytime soon.
“You’re going to need to connect the dots for me here Levi.”
“It’s one fucked up story,” I laughed bitterly. “According to the state of Connecticut, my ex-wife’s mother was murdered by my now ex-girlfriend’s father.”
“Holy shit,” Bethan gasped, already back downstairs.
I lifted my empty glass up and tipped it in her direction before finally pouring myself a shot of brandy.
“How many of those have you had?”
“Don’t worry,” I drank again, “this is my first one. I’ve been waiting for you guys to come back, and now that you’re here, I think I’m just going to go ahead and get drunk… because I’m fucked.”
“You’re trying to get him out?” Tristan asked, looking at my notes. “Levi, have you lost your damned mind?”
“He didn’t do it,” I replied, as I finished off my glass and poured another one.
“Levi, I understand you like her—” Bethan began.
“Love. I love her. We’re telling all truths today,” I cut her off.
She sighed, starting again. “Okay. I get that you love her. But she’s his daughter. Of course she thinks her father is innocent, but that doesn’t make it so.”
“That was the very first thing I thought until I started to find out more about Margaret The Shark Cunning. Spoiler Alert; she’s the devil, and believe me, if I could criminally prosecute her, I would a thousand times over.”
“Levi, tell me this isn't just because you love her, and I will back you up one hundred percent. You know I will. So tell me, what do you know that we don’t?”
“Ben Walton and Savannah Van Allen were having an affair. When Margaret found out, she, from what I can gather, tampered with evidence and left him out to hang. She confessed to this eight months ago before dying of stage four-lung cancer. That’s why Thea’s in law school.”
They didn’t say anything for a moment. Bethan slowly sank onto the couch.
“Is there any proof of this?” Tristan asked, as he reached for my notes.
“Only God knows at this point. Thea has been combing over these files for months. I haven’t touched them, because I knew the minute I did, I would have to tell her.”
“So you told her?” Bethan questioned.
“Yes, and she walked out.”
“And you’re still looking into this?” she whispered. “This is Pandora’s Box, Levi. The moment you open it, bad shit is going to coming flying out at you from every direction. Mom… Oh my God, Mom will just lose it. Not to mention Odile.”
As she sat there staring at me, Tristan spoke up, “But if the man is really innocent, I can’t imagine not doing anything just because we will piss a few people off. They should know the truth, and the right people should be jailed for their crimes. That’s the point of the justice system.” Tristan looked to me. “I’ve spent my career with you, helping people stay out of prison. Sometimes rightfully so and other times not. I’ll support you on this, but there’s a great chance we will lose, and lose badly.”
“I’m prepared for it.”
“You might not get her back either,” he added.
That I wasn’t as prepared for.
“I’ll deal with that.”
“Can I just play devil’s advocate for one second?” Bethan frowned looking at us both. I just nodded for her to go on. “Aren’t you being a little too trusting? Levi, babe, these are your careers, careers you’ve both spent years, and hundreds of thousands of dollars crafting. I’ve been here from the beginning. I’ve seen the shit you’ve both put yourselves through just to get this far.
“I
like Thea, she seems like a really sweet girl, but do any of us really know her? For all we know she could have been planning this for months. She comes into my bar, and just happens to meet and go home with the best criminal attorney in the country? Then, she somehow turns out to be your student, and from what Tristan’s told me, she’s not afraid of playing the blackmail card. And on top of all this, she drops this bomb and tells you about her father? I know this sucks to hear, I know you really do love her, but what if she’s using you? I mean consider the timing of all this... what if—”
“Stop,” I whispered, not wanting to hear anymore.
“Levi—”
“No. She isn’t that person.”
I knew her.
Tristan frowned. “She did blackmail me once just to get what she wanted—”
“No!” I snapped at them both, and they just looked at each other. “Fine, let’s say what you’re saying is true. Let’s say that for months she’s been jerking me around, and she’s that good of an actress that I fell for it. Nothing changes for me. Even if she admitted it right now, I would be hurt, and so fucking pissed off, but I would still be right here looking through all these files. I would still want to help her even if she betrayed me like that. Thank you for worrying about me Beth, but I’ve made up my mind.”
Tristan sighed, got up, and headed to the kitchen. Before long, he was back with two more glasses and he poured us all a drink.
“Where you go, I go. And when this is done, I am taking the longest fucking vacation of my life,” he said, as he handed me my glass.
“Thank you.”
THEA
I was half frozen by the time I got to Atticus’ place. I couldn’t feel my toes, and my fingers felt like they could be snapped off one by one. When he saw me, he didn’t crack any jokes and he didn’t say anything stupid. Instead, he stepped aside, and held the door open, allowing me to enter his tiny, one bedroom apartment, and crawl up onto his couch.
