Page 77 of Brazen Deceits

I wish I could reach over and hug him. He shoots me a sad smile, wiping a tear from my cheek. “It was a long time ago, Clara-girl. But you’re right. You can’t always tell what’s rotten from the outside. Sometimes you can only find out by being in the middle of the stench. But you find a center that holds? One that doesn’t cut you down, but builds you up? That’s nothing but good, Clara. You hold on to that as tight as you can. That’s a safe place to grow, to change, to heal.”

The silence in the car is thick as we whip into the driveway. I look over at my dad, a little grayer, a little more stooped than he is in my memory, and I realize how little I know about him, about my mom. How even in the middle of this family, I can’t tell good from bad, not really. “Thanks, Dad. For sharing.”

He clears his throat, nodding, before getting out of the car, a long moment passing before he pulls my stuff from the backseat. I give him some space, fiddling with my purse until he makes it into the house.

A place that builds me up, that doesn’t cut me down? A place built by four criminals, circling around me in their own ways, at their own pace, but circling, protecting, giving me room to grow. To heal. To change.

To become.

Chapter 34

Clara

The drive to my uncle’s house is so brittle a cough could snap my mom and me in half.Polite, Clara, be polite, but not a doormat. Don’t let her stomp all over you. “So are Jessa and Clark going to be there today?”

My mom clicks her tongue at me. “Of course your cousins are going to be there. I hear they’re both bringing their partners, too. It’s a pity Bryce couldn’t be here with us.”

I tried to fix things with my mom yesterday, but she was having none of it. According to her, I “messed up a good thing with a boy who was going to be a doctor. Couldn’t I be just a little more flexible? Must I always get my own way?”

Her words ring in my ears, and all I want to do is to tell them the truth: that Bryce was a pedophile, a stalker, and an abuser. But I know my mom won’t believe me. I’d just be looking for attention, for sympathy, when really, we all know I’m the problem.

I could tell my dad. But then I’d be pitting them against each other, and without me in the house to run interference, it would get bad for my dad quickly. I think mom having a target for her frustrations that isn’t physically in the house with her is good for their relationship.

So I’m protecting him by not telling them the complete story. He loves her, and sometimes I think she loves him too, but I never want what they have. Never.

I stare out the window, the houses getting bigger and nicer the farther we get from home. God. I want to be anywhere but here.

Mom’s potatoes, salad, and buns share the seat with me. My job is to keep them from sliding off every time my dad takes a turn at high speed. I have my mittens to protect me from the potatoes’ 400-degree heat, while a cutting board protects the seat.

My phone buzzes in my purse. I pull it out, my heart lifting when I see a text from Jansen.

Happy Thanksgiving, beautiful! I hope you’re eating all the best turkey!

I grin. He hasn’t forgotten me. He’s just busy. I need to keep repeating that to myself until I believe it. I don’t like being left out of the loop—it’s bringing out all the weird clingy bits of myself that I thought were created by Bryce’s manipulations. Now, I’m not sure if he created them or just fostered them.

Either way, I’m getting needy. And achingly lonely. And the only solution Iwantis apparently a lifetime commitment to a group of guys who like to rob people.

Happy Thanksgiving! Do you do the tofurkey thing at your house?

We swing around a corner, and I barely keep the potatoes from flying. My mom huffs in the front seat. My dad chuckles. “Whoops. I should have let you know that was coming, mija. My bad.”

“All good, Dad. The potatoes are safe.”

My phone buzzes again.

Nope. We’re a roasted-mushrooms-and-garbanzo-bean kind of family.

He sends along a picture of himself with a girl with the same green eyes and blond hair, a spoon in her hand as she tries to whack Jansen over the head with it. They’re both obviously laughing, and I start to tear up. What would it be like to have a sibling? To not have to go to these things alone?

“Last turn, Clara-girl,” my dad calls, and I brace the potatoes once more as we whip into the drive of my cousins’ stunning brick colonial.

The hustle and bustle of family moves me through the house to the kitchen, the potatoes finding a spot beside a bowl of sweet potatoes and a green bean casserole. My aunt, uncle, and cousins all hug me, the way you hug astranger you’re supposed to know, and I get introduced to the two recent additions. A glass of wine is pushed into my hand, as it’s a “special occasion” and I’m the only one in the house not old enough to drink.

The sunroom is reserved for football, so the pre-dinner conversation is in the living room. I wish I were still young enough to disappear into the basement and play video games by myself. Not that I’m any good, but it was nice to not have to socialize.

I’m not following the conversation, just smiling where appropriate, nodding, wishing I were anywhere else, when I overhear my mom holding court on the other side of the room. “Oh, how lovely, Jessa, that you found yourself a lawyer. Clara, you know, is dating a med school student, if you’d believe it. It’s a little on the rocks right now. You know how holidays are tough on relationships, but I’m sure it will work itself out soon.”

I get up, moving toward their group. My aunt cuts in. “Oh, a doctor. And in med school? Are you sure he wasn’t just pre-med? I don’t feel like graduate students usually have much to do with undergrads, especially at the U of M. Maybe at a private university, like my Jessa at Northwestern, but there? It’s much too big.”

---