Page 14 of Tulips and Lost Time

“I’ve been driving since I was a teen.” I snag a smashed potato between my fingers and bring it up to my lips. “I’ve slammed through that set of traffic lights a million times in the ambulance. Red lights and all. And I’ve never been hit.”

“It was horrible luck,” she whispers, sniffling as she strokes Billy’s chubby cheek. “We can’t explain it. We can’t understand it. It’s…” She sighs. “Sometimes, the world likes to hurt us for no reason at all.”

“I can’t accept that.” Rage burns in my veins, turning my aching stomach to something much darker. Meaner. “I can’t accept that there’s no reason for this kind of bullshit. There has to be a lesson, right? Or a higher purpose. There has to be something better than ‘just because’.”

“Maybe it was a lesson for the rest of us,” she tearfully whispers. “A reminder to love our families. To appreciate what we have because a happily ever after isn’t always guaranteed.”

“I don’t want to be the fucking guinea pig in everyone else’s lesson!” I drag my hand up and clutch at my hair. Still a little too shaggy for a grown man. A little long, considering I grew up from that stupid Luc’s Classic bullshit into the man I am today. I’m a professional, educated, responsible adult now. But I’m not so evolved that the universe didn’t pick me and my family up and toss us into a blender for the fun of it. “I don’t want my daughter to be everyone else’s reason to appreciate what they’ve got,” I groan. “That’s not fair.”

“I know.” Jess swallows, an audible, visible movement. “Life is rarely fair. And the universe hardly ever punishes those who truly deserve it.”

The universe is a faulty, broken-down machine everyone else considers their fucking be-all and end-all goddess. Ironic, considering nine times out of ten justice comes when a man takes things into his own hands.

“Did I ever tell you what happened to that Maybel chick from school?”

“Maybel?” Confused, curious, Jess’s mind spins and swirls back two decades in search of context. A clue. “From school?”

“Yeah. The one Sassy St James was picking on.”

“No, she…” She shakes her head. “Jesus. I don’t think I’ve had even a single thought about her since middle school. She got really dark there for a while, right? Sassy was being a bitch, and Kari was sticking up for her for a while.” She stops and draws a heaped breath when dots connect in her mind. “Oh geez. She got really dark way back around… like, seventh grade, right?”

“Yeah. Kari was always defending her. Practically throwing hands in the school halls when Marc wasn’t watching.”

Jess scoffs, soft and tear filled. “She’s always had way more spine than he ever gave her credit for. But only when it came to standing up for someone else. Kari would take shit all day long and bottle it up to keep her company. She never said a damn thing in school to assert herself when people were picking on her. But the second anyone was throwing shade on someone else, she had her gloves on.”

“Get out of my way, you ugly bitch.”

I hear her first. Maybel Thompson’s nasally, nasty, mean girl voice. But then the echo of the school lockers as a body slams against them comes right after. Setting my temper alight and my pulse scrambling in my throat.

I stop at the corner of the hall, just fifteen feet from the locker I know will now bear a dent the size and shape of Kari Macchio. But I stick to the shadows, narrowing my eyes when I catch sight of Maybel’s fist slamming against the steel beside Kari’s face.

My temper burns hot, sizzling in my veins and forcing my fists to close in preparation. But Maybel is a girl, and I can’t very well go around the school hitting chicks. Not even to defend my best friend’s baby sister.

“Why don’t you just stay out of my fucking way?” she snarls. “Stay out of my halls.”

“I was just putting my books away.” Kari’s voice shakes. Her breath falters. I know the sound of every inhalation she makes, because I’ve grown accustomed to listening every time she and Marcus are near.

Which, lucky for me, has been every damn day since I was twelve years old.

“You and I don’t need to cross paths,” Kari continues. “I never get in your way on purpose.”

“Your existence is in my fucking way!” She grabs a handful of Kari’s curly brown locks and holds on just tight enough to tilt her head to the side. “The fact you came to this school is in my way.”

“Let me go.” Kari reaches up to grab the girl’s wrist. “Mayb?—”

“You know what could make all this better?” The bitch leans closer, her braced teeth glittering under shitty fluorescent lights and her straw-like hair, lightened because of the glare off the lockers. “Ya know how my school life could improve, since everyone around here thinks they get to comment about me ever since you inserted yourself in my business?” She yanks Kari forward, then slams her back again until the back of her skull raps against the locker. “Is if you killed yourself.” She leans closer. Intimate. “Go back in time, stand in front of the gun that killed your mother, and do everyone a favor.”

I shove away from the wall and slap my feet against the ground to make it sound like I’m running. Distracted. Not paying complete fucking attention to the bitch whose hand whips away from Kari’s hair like she’s suddenly grabbed an electrical current. I lope around the corner with a wide smile plastered across my face, almost maniacal considering the rage burning in my blood.

Instantly, Maybel scoots away and loops her hands behind her back, all innocent and sweet like she wasn’t just threatening a girl who has never, in her whole life, hurt anyone else.

Marc’s at work today, saving cash for his doomsday stash just in case. And Ang is putting in a little time at the garage, working with his hands and avoiding home as much as humanly possible. Sam is hanging with his girlfriend, now that he found the love of his life—this month’s, anyway—which means Kari-duty is all mine.

And I’m not allowed to hit girls.

So…

“Hey, Care Bear.” I stride into their space and bend to snag her discarded backpack from the floor. I swing it onto my arm and ignore the tears welling in her eyes. The pulse I see pounding in her throat. I don’t even smack Maybel upside her ugly fucking face, though it would feel good to get it out of my system.

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