Page 12 of Catch the Sun

“Orange or lemon?” I pull to a stand and start flitting around the small bedroom, tidying aimlessly, pretending to be a normal teenager preparing for a normal afternoon of post-school activities.

“Orange.”

“Aww, shucks, you know me so well.”

She pauses. “Do I?”

My feet slow to a stop and my hand stalls midreach for a book dangling precariously over my bookshelf ledge. There’s a fluttery feeling in my chest, but it feels more like an ache. A dull throbbing. I pan my gaze over to my cantaloupe-stained walls and the slew of posters and art pieces taped to the plaster.

Horses. Nature. Stevie Nicks.

An abstract canvas of a citrus tree that Jonah bought for me on my fourteenth birthday.

It was the year before everything changed. A precious memory trapped in time. Jonah had led me into my bedroom, his hands over my eyes like a makeshift blindfold as he muttered, “You needed a color pop in this room.”

It was true. At the time, my walls were stark white, making the gift he bought and hung on the far wall even more striking and vibrant.

“Happy birthday,” he said, uncovering my eyes.

I squealed with joy, my gaze aimed at the bright canvas, just as it is right now. “Oh, I love it! It’s like you plucked a slice of sunshine and hung it on my wall.”

“Can’t have you living in this drab, sterile room. That’s not you.”

I nudged him with my elbow. “It’s perfect. You always find a way of bringing a little color into my life.”

“That’s what big brothers are for. Besides, fruit trees are badass. They weather all those storms and still manage to produce the sweetest fruits.” He shot me a little smirk. “Hey, that’s not a terrible analogy for life.”

“Maintain the resilience of a citrus tree,” I said, bobbing my head up and down. “Noted.”

Jonah’s smile softened as he pulled me into a side hug. “Exactly.”

I rub at my chest with the heel of my palm to soothe the obnoxious pang, then pivot toward my mother, her question still teasing the silence. “You know me as well as I know myself,” I tell her. My voice is shaky. It seems the throbbing sensation has made its way from my heart to my words. “Undetermined.”

My mother’s eyes mist as she drinks in my pain. She sees it, feels it, hears it loud and clear. Inhaling a tapered breath, Mom straightens from the doorframe and folds both arms across her flowery blouse. “I’m trying,” she says. “I’m really trying to make a better life for you, Ella.”

I purse my lips and study my fingernails. They could use a fresh paint. “‘Better’ is subjective.”

“No, it’s not. Better is alwaysbetter.”

“Can you go back in time and change the past?” I whisper, still avoiding eye contact. “Can you take that gun out of his hand before he—”

“Don’t.” Her own voice cracks, and it’s more than an ache. More than a throbbing. It sounds like a massacre just took place inside of her. “Don’t you dare finish that sentence.”

It’s true that I wasn’t angry before.

But now I am.

I hate, I hate, Ihatethat I’m not allowed to talk about it. My brother is sitting on death row for murdering two people, and it’s real, and it happened, and it’s my goddamn reality, but I need to pretend that it was nothing more than a bad dream.

Mom still believes he’s innocent, and I’m envious of her. I wish I could believe that. I wish I could simmer in denial and imagine a version of my brother that wasn’t covered in the blood of two innocent people.

Bile burns my throat. Nausea churns in my gut.

I want to pound my fists against the wall until my knuckles crack and bleed. I want to scream until my throat is shredded, raw, and blistered. Until I can’t speak.

If I can’t speak, I can’t lie.

And if I can’t lie, I won’t have to live in this awful purgatory, caught between my mother’s nonacceptance and my own devastation.

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