Page 73 of Free Fall

I pulled into the driveway of my parents’ house two hours after leaving home, eyeing up the front - so familiar but at odds in my memories now. It was weird to be home, a place I avoided like it was plague ridden because it brought up so many memories. How Mom and Dad had managed to stay was beyond me, with reminders of life before I destroyed it in every corner. Dad was a stubborn man, though, and we hadn’t talked about it past my mother shaking her head at me when I tried to raise anything even resembling a suggestion of that time.

I looked over the porch, the front yard, and saw the reminders of my childhood, of my teen years, my early adulthood, and Luca moving into a new place in my life. I wasn’t romanticizing it. Memories of a good childhood, his responsibility, his family, warred with the touch of his hands on my body, of those first push and pull moments between us.

I gave in to him within these walls. It was a war of emotions to take it all in.

It was all the same, but the fresh lens of him in my life again made it almost eerie. Surreal.

Mom came out of the house as I was climbing from the car, her eyes drifting to the back door, for her grandson to come flying out. But he wasn’t here, of course he wasn’t. This was going to suck. Leo was with Luca and his big brothers for the day, something he loved with the fierceness only a toddler could. He hadn’t even looked back at me when they’d picked him up, just grabbed Cole and Jesse’s hands and chattered about lions. They were heading to the zoo. I’d have paid good money for paparazzi style photos of those three grumpy men at a busy zoo with an excitable toddler, but Jesse had promised to send me pictures, so his camera phone skills would have to do.

“What’s up?” Mom asked, her brow dropping. “Where’s Leo?”

Bite the bullet, Zel.“With his dad.” I winced.

Mom’s features scrunched up, the sunlight glaring down on her face as the words failed to process in her head. “A-Avery? I didn’t know you guys were…”

I shook my head. Ah, this was already so damn hard. “Is Dad home?”

“Yeah. Come on,” she sighed. “I think you’re only going to be able to say this once.”

Walking through that house was the same as the outside. Creepy in how familiar it was, but the differences weren’t vast enough. It was uncanny. The same pictures lined the walls, the same furniture in a different configuration, but it wasn’t home anymore. I’d brought Leo here plenty of times, but this felt final in a way I didn’t like.

“Henry,” Mom called, finding Dad in his favorite chair with a book on his lap. “Zel’s here.”

He glanced up from his page with a frown that was wiped away with a grin when he saw me. He stood, pulling me in for a hug. “And where’s the little one?” he queried, and I didn’t even roll my eyes at how they’d both looked for their grandson. Not that they weren’t happy to see me, but more that I’d never visited without him since he’d been born. It was unusual.

“W-with…” Mom tried to say, but failed.

“Uh, shall we sit down somewhere and talk?” I asked, trying hard not to cringe. This was worse than I thought it would be, and I wanted to turn inside out with the discomfort of it all.

Mom gossiped with me about Jules while we moved to the kitchen, attempting to keep the peace she knew I was about to break. She pottered around making coffees while Dad and I sank onto the small table they had thrust against the window. It was almost like a little breakfast nook, with bright lights flooding through. Something new to focus on. It didn’t make what was about to happen any prettier. And as Mom handed us our mugs and settled beside Dad, I couldn’t help the lump in my throat.

They were about to hate me.

“Right, no beating about it,” I said, cupping my drink and letting it heat my palms to the point of discomfort. “Luca is back in my life. In Leo’s. We’re together.”

A beat. Then Dad slammed his drink down and Mom made a hiccupping sob, throwing her hand to her mouth. I looked between them, the fury and rage and pain and disappointment. It was worse than when they found out Leo was on his way.

“I’m going to kill him,” Dad growled, his demeanor switching so fucking fast.

“No, you aren’t,” I spat back, a growing protectiveness bubbling in me. “He’s your grandson’s father.” I glared at my dad, keeping my eyes firm on his, both begging him to stop and daring him to push me.

“I don’t fucking care, Zel, he ruined you. Us. This. Our lives.” Dad stood up, looming over me. I absorbed it though, didn’t let my fear show. No running. He needed to explode on me. In all this time, he never had. He placed every lick of blame on the older man, not on the younger girl. We’d been fraught ever since, always on the precipice of confrontation, but never taking that leap over. “I trusted him to take care of you, to love you like a niece. I put you in his line of fire and he fucking stole you.

“He took everything, and you… you let him. And you’re letting him in now? After years of distance? Why the fuck would you do that, Zel?” He flopped back into the chair, steaming with rage and letting my mother wrap herself around him in comfort. She was holding herself back. I could see the tension in her jaw, but she kept herself reined, whispering words in his ear not meant for me. But they did something to placate him. He slumped, nodded.

“Dad?” I said, anxious for his next words to get the horror show over with.

“Henry,” Mom muttered. “Think. Things aren’t so different.”

I sucked in a breath, determined to see this through when Dad just kept staring at me, his expression indecipherable. “I love him. He loves me. I know it seems insane to you, seems so wrong, and yeah, it is, but it’s also ours. Leo is ours.” I kept my voice calm, but it still cracked a little. This was overwhelming me, and I knew the second I was alone, I’d be sobbing. The drive here this morning had been hard enough, but I’d have to do it again soon, the other way, with this behind me rather than in front. I couldn’t decide what sounded worse. Watching my parents shatter and being the cause of it broke my heart. But I was trying to be brave, to not hide and sneak around.

“You and Leo are ours, too. What happens now? You gonna choose? Make us see that fucker so we can see you two?”

I gasped, and the tears came. “No! Never.” My eyes were hot as I tried to fight off the emotions spilling over. “You are both so important, all of you are. We’ll… we’ll work it out. For Leo, at least. Please don’t push us away.”

Dad’s jaw looked so tight it feathered with muscle. His gaze was distant, cold and stony, refusing to meet mine. There would be no more getting through to him in this state. I opened my mouth to speak anyway, my lips flapping about for the words as I locked eyes with Mom.

“I think you should go, Zelly,” Mom interjected softly, wrapping her hand over Dad’s fist. He seemed poised to explode in fury. At me. “You’ve said your peace. Now we need time to find ours.”

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