Chapter Three

JEROME

Lisa brought the bedsheets from the store and she helped me dress my bed. She was tucking the last piece of the sheet when I walked in.

I didn't come back with much stuff, just a small-sized duffel bag seeing as I was only going to be here until after Thanksgiving which was just tomorrow.

Knowing Mom, she would make me stay till after the weekend and I was going to object to it at first before I would say yes. That way, I'll be making her feel like her efforts mattered but in truth, I needed this break.

I had thought of it before boarding the plane home.

I needed to be here with my family and to be reminded that I was surrounded by so much love that sometimes it felt overwhelming.

They were my home and no matter what, there was no place and no people like them.

“You are taking the couch downstairs,” Lisa said when she faced me.

She gathered her hair and held it up.

The pink singlet she had on was one of my gifts to her when she turned fourteen. It was such an important year in her life because she was still young and innocent but very much on her path to transition into a woman.

It was also the year she got into Highschool.

A year later, I left home for a college job. Another year later, she was telling me about her friends and none of them seemed to ever stick until Stacy came along.

She may have changed through these four years but my kid sister was still the same person in her core; compassionate, passionate and sensitive.

“Go to your room, lis.”

She climbed into my bed not minding my words and pulled the blankets to her waist. “She needs space.”

“She needs an apology and an explanation.”

“She needs space,” Lisa said again. She reminded me of how stubborn she could get.

I sat down on the edge of the bed. She kept her eyes on the ceiling.

I could see that she was filled with a lot of emotions. There was anger, there was hurt and most of all, there was guilt, so much guilt that she was fighting the tears.

I recognized guilt anywhere and I knew how it could eat one up.

“This was all my fault.” I shifted the blame to myself.

Lis wasted no time in agreeing with me. “Yes, it was. What did you say to her?”

“Things I shouldn't have said.”

“So why did you say it?” She turned on her side and waited for an answer.

Nothing I would say would make it better. She was only going to feel better if she spoke to her best friend the same way I was only going to feel better if I apologized to Stacy.

“I was in the mood to share and blab about things.” For a second, I was back in that kitchen with Stacy.

When Lisa used to tell me about her, I imagined her to be a small, frail girl who wrapped herself inside out so people couldn't get to her and hurt her but the girl I met in the kitchen was different.

She was scared but accustomed to the fears, and she was hurt but a beautiful painting of cuts and bruises that pulled one in.

I could try to explain it but I would end up with no words that made sense. And it was bad enough that I had gone out of line to say things to her, I couldn't hold any inappropriate emotions for her.

I couldn't be attracted to my kid sister’s best friend for a sick reason like her pain.

I wasn't going to allow myself do that.

“Now she hates me.” Lisa cried and held her face.

“This is nothing but a little misunderstanding. I would go to your room to apologize to her but that would be me interfering in your friendship again so I'm leaving you to this. Go to her, apologize, explain the circumstances of how and why you told me. You weren't trying to bring her down or to gossip about her, you needed advice and you came to me. The way I spoke about it was wrong and unacceptable and I would make that clear but only after you've made your point clear to her.”

Lisa sniffed, that's how I knew she was crying.

She was fast enough to wipe the tears before they fell but her face had reddened just as much as her eyes.

She shifted towards me, curving her back as she did so.

“What if she doesn't get me? Did you see how mad she was?”

“She needed to be mad at something at that moment but she knows you mean love.”

A heavy sigh left Lis’s lips. “Alright.”

She stayed quiet for a while after that.

When she moved again, it was to drop her head on my leg. I drew a line from one end of her forehead to the other one.

She wasn't crying anymore. The quiet whimpers were slowing down until they weren't there.

“Why didn't you tell anyone you were coming?”

In that moment, I was glad that she couldn't see my face. I took a second to calm my breathing.

No one needed to know the shit I got myself in. No one needed to know that I had let them down once again.

“I wanted to surprise you all.” I easily lied.

Lisa punched my knee. “You suck at surprises.” She lifted her body onto her elbow and faced me, silently pleading before she even spoke. “Come back more often, please?”

“I promise to try.” I brushed ghost strands of hair back for her.

I meant what I was promising. I was going to try but trying didn't mean I had to be successful.

Trying could end in failure too, so I was going to try and offer my comfort for the days they had to be stuck with my failures.

I was going to try only.

***

I could turn around, head home and lie to Mom that I didn't see Elena. It was the easier option.

I wasn't ready to knock. I wasn't ready to see her again.

What if she was doing better and living a good life? What if my presence was only going to remind her of losing her daughter?

I lifted my hand but didn’t quite knock yet.

I held it up until my elbow and biceps began to sore. I still hadn't knocked.

I had picked out a clean, button down shirt for this occasion. I had brushed my side burns and beards, I had applied moisturizer to my hair and I had drenched myself in a light, ouid perfume.

I wished that was all I needed to do to make Elena happy, to make seeing her after three years easy.

The walls of chest began to tighten. It was all coming back.

The cry of shattering glass, the tearing of tires against asphalt road, the screaming, the blood, the still and helplessness of the dark.

I loosened my tie and stepped back from the porch.

It wasn't the tie that was building my discomfort. My discomfort existed because I was here.

I stood on the edge of the road and sighed, rocking back and forth on my heels and toes while staring at the house door as I tried to remember the days she was still alive.

A neigbor banged a door shut behind me. It didn't matter to me.

A figure marched past me, cursing under her breath. “Maybe if you keep the knives where they are, we wouldn't have to borrow everything from the fucking neighbors!” She stopped at Elena’s door and knocked.

It was crazy that she didn't see me but it was even crazier that it was her. Stacy.

Her curves were hidden in the overall, bunny themed pajamas and her chestnut, brown hair was braided down to her straight back.

Her feet tapped the floor impatiently and she knocked again to which Elena pulled the door open.

“Hi. I'm sorry I'm here again. Mom can't find our knives just like she couldn't find the blender and the lighter. I hate to disturb you—”

“Girl, one day your mom is going to send you here to ask for her life.”

I couldn't believe my eyes. Stacy lived across from Elena.

It was like watching the wildest possibility come to be.

In a flash, Stacy matched Elena’s dramatic vibe. “Didn’t she already do that when she sent me here to get painkillers?”

Elena burst out laughing and Stacy joined her too.

It wasn't the first time I was hearing Elena laugh. She had always been full of joy and jokes but Stacy’s laughter was a new tone for my ears. It was hoarse and real, fleshed out in a mellow, velvety trueness.

A snort even crept its way in.

They were happy at that moment and I wanted to let them be.

It was nice to watch them and not disrupt their moment, to have them exist outside of my interruption but I was here for a reason and the faster I got it done, the faster I could leave them to their laughter.

“Elena?”

Their smiles seized. Stacy stepped to the side, giving Elena space to see me.

To have Elena look at me again was surely going to crush me and render me speechless but now that Stacy was looking at me too, I wasn't sure I would be able to say a word even in my heart where no one could hear me.