Page 59 of Forgotten Pieces

I came home to her drinking wine and smoking. I have no idea where she found the smokes and that pisses me off even more.

“Don’t walk away from me!”

That makes her stop in her tracks. She turns around and faces me, a rage in her eyes. “Or what? You gonna take it out on me like your father?”

I halt at her words.

“You will be just like him one day. Mark my words.” She walks to her room after that and I don’t follow. Too broken over those words to do anything.

I sit at the kitchen table and stare off into the distance, something I have been doing a lot lately. I don’t know if it’s because I am bored with nothing to do here or if being so close to where I grew up is making too many thoughts swirl back into my brain.

I need to get out of here. I pick up my phone and text Tacoma, knowing I really shouldn’t.

Ryder: Seven for a secret.

I wait impatiently for her text. My leg jostles restlessly under the table. After an hour of waiting for a response, I say fuck it and drive off to the lake. If she won’t meet me, at least I can get drunk in peace out there.

* * *

Tacoma

I rush out of the high school, running to my car.

Ryder texted me over two hours ago and I didn’t respond. I had cheerleading practice run late today. The only other time Ryder has texted me those words was when his mom had a terrible day, needing to be rushed to the hospital. I know something must be bad if he is texting me.

I finally text him back but he doesn’t respond. I could text Mac and ask if Ryder is at home but that may cause too many suspicions. Instead, I head to the lake hoping he is there.

We’ve met here a handful of times over the last two weeks, mostly all instigated by me. I don’t know why he wants to meet with me, all I do is complain about Ashton and my need to get away from this place. But he never tells me no, never declines my need to talk to someone. He brings me a sense of comfort I haven’t felt in years, not since my parents died. I would be lying to myself if I said I saw him only as a parent figure, someone to give me advice when I need it. But that’s not true. I see him in an entirely different way. We have this connection I have never felt before. Like our souls speak to each other. Which is stupid. We are seven years apart. There is no way that could be true.

But oh my god is he hot. Boys my age just don’t do it for me after meeting Ryder. I’ve been asked out three times since that day he walked into the ice cream parlor and I have turned down every single one of those boys. None of them look like Ryder. With his massive shoulders, his large biceps, his sinewy forearms that do all sorts of things to me. But what draws me to him the most are those eyes of his. The deepest chocolate brown they are almost black. You would think you couldn’t see anything in those eyes but I see him, the turmoil he tries to hide, the hope he longs for.

I pull into the parking lot near the lake and breathe a sigh of relief when I see his truck. I follow it with a deep breath. I cannot let him affect me the way he does, ever since he told me I was beautiful. I need to face the fact we are friends and it’s all we will ever be.

I find him sitting on the rock by the lake, bottle of whiskey in hand. I pull my jacket tighter around me as a cool March breeze blows through the air.

I sit down next to him and pull my giant blanket out of my bag and wrap it around the both of us. I grab two glasses out next and set them down. I lift the whiskey out of his hand and pour some for each of us before handing him a glass. “Classier to drink with a glass, you know?”

He finally looks at me and my heart nearly breaks at the sullen look in his eyes.

“What’s wrong?”

He sips his whiskey before speaking. “I don’t think my mom wants to get better. I think she is looking for an easy way to die.”

“What?” I nearly shout.

Ryder goes back to his whiskey and doesn’t answer me. I wait impatiently for a response and just when I think I won’t get one he finally tells me what happened to him earlier. About finding his mom being self-destructive. My heart breaks at his words. I know he wants nothing more than for his mom to be okay.

“The worst part about this whole thing is all I want is for my family to be healed, be together. Yet I think it’s the last thing she wants. She doesn’t want to be my mother and she will drive me as far away as possible.” He shakes his head and laughs. “She told me my worst fear today. That I was turning out to be just like my father.”

Ryder told me about how his biological father was just as bad as his stepdad, if not worse. An abusive asshole who left his family and never looked back when he was only seven, his brother only two.

“You aren’t your father, Ryder or your stepdad. You are a good man.” I place my hand over his heart. “I can feel it right here, Ry. I know it.”

The sadness in his eyes breaks my heart but I need him to understand he isn’t like his father nor will he ever be. I have seen him be nothing but a good man since the day I met him.

“I want to believe you. I do, T. But it’s hard. The only father figures I have had in my life have been abusive and I am scared that one day I will fall down that path.” He sighs and then continues, “I want nothing more than to have a family one day. A happy one. With a real house and a yard my kids can play in, not a broken down trailer with no heat. I want there to be food on the table, them never having to worry if they will go starving. And I want to love someone unconditionally so we can share that love with our children. But if I end up like my father, I will never have that.”

I squeeze his hand. I know there isn’t much I can say. His fear runs deep, like it’s been growing there since he was a little boy.

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