Page 61 of Rebel

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When we got to the hospital, we fast-walked to Richie’s room because it was the start of visiting hours. I was praying we’d find him awake and it turned out we were lucky.

He was watching television and frowned when he saw me walk in. “You shouldn’t be here, Lacey.”

“Oh yeah?” I asked. “Why is that?”

“Your parents said they were finished with me and didn’t want me to see you anymore.”

I pulled up a chair and sat down beside his bed, while Eric hung back on the other side of the room like my shadow. “Can you really blame them?”

He used his remote control to turn the television off. “I guess not,” he responded.

“We used to be close when we were little.”

“That was when we were like five,” he replied flatly.

“Yeah, I really loved spending time with you and then things went wrong. What happened Richie?”

He glanced away. “It doesn’t matter. I’m a bad seed. My stepdad said so and he’s probably right.” The tone of his voice held more than just a note of sadness. He sounded almost tragic.

I decided right then and there that I wasn’t going to stop digging until I got to the truth.

“I call bullshit on that. Your stepdad has always been an ass. You were fine right up until you were about ten or eleven years old. Something happened around that time, and I want to know what.”

His head snapped around to look at me. Something dark in his expression hit me, telling me to dig deeper. So, that’s what I did. “You used to trust me, Richie. Trust me now.”

He laughed. “What do you take me for, some kind of fool? I know the only reason you came to see me is because they found my prints in your parents’ home. You want me to confess, fine. I broke into your parents’ house and ransacked the place. Let them lock me up and throw away the key. I’m a bad apple that didn’t fall far from the tree, right?”

At some point during his confession, my hands began to grip the armrests of my chair. I leaned forward, trying to read his cagey expression. When I opened my mouth to speak, he cut in quietly, “Just leave it alone, Lacey. This is one can of worms you don’t want to open. Trust me on that, it totally fucked me up.”

I pushed myself up from the chair and sat on the bed beside him. “No, I don’t think I’m going to leave this alone.”

“I loved you like a sister back then, Lacey. That’s why I’m telling you to look away. You don’t want to know all the details of life. It’s an ugly story, best not told.”

I reached out to grab his arm. “You’re gonna tell me what happened all those years ago that put you on the wrong path or I’m gonna follow you wherever you go and keep asking until you tell me, damn it!” Giving his arm a shake, I asked, “Do you want me to make my friend leave the room? Is it something really personal?”

He began to tear up, so I pulled him into a hug. I should have hated him for what he’d done, but seeing him in the hospital bed, all I saw was my cousin —a scared young man. His father, my dad’s youngest brother, had died when he was five and his mom remarried. I had a horrible thought, he’d never gotten along with his stepfather, and I hoped there hadn’t been abuse, “It was something bad wasn’t it, Richie? Please just tell me.”

He whispered into my ear, “I had a sister, and they fucking took her away.”

This was the first I’d heard of him having a sister. I pulled back and looked him in the eyes, only to see a world of pain staring back at me. “What do you mean you had a sister? Who took her away? When did this happen?”

“My mother gave birth when I was seven. The baby had problems at birth, she was born without an arm and had a club foot. They said she wasn’t smart, and that doctors needed to take care of her in a special home.”

“No one has ever said anything about you having a sister.”

“It’s why they stopped bringing me to visit you. They were worried I’d tell you and they didn’t want anyone in the family to know they locked her up in a home.”

I gaped at him, trying to process the implications of this hidden family secret. “Were you upset because you never got to see her? Is that what made you start acting out? Or were you afraid they were going to send you away too?”

“No, it was none of that. For a few years we went to see her every Sunday after church. My parents spent their time there talking to her doctors and nurses, while I played with Debbie. His bottom lip quivered when he talking about his half-sister.

I grasped his hands in mine and gave them a reassuring squeeze. “What’s she like?”

A faint smile curved up the corners of his mouth and for an instant I had my childhood cousin back. “She’s really pretty.” Gesturing to his head, he continued, “She has long, pale blonde hair like my mom had, and gray-blue eyes like me.”

I smiled at him, “She sounds lovely.”

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