Page 4 of Irons

I had an angel in my life. She was a part of it since I could remember. I almost lost her once when we were six, but she came back, and I remember being so excited. I didn’t understand what happened to her, all I knew was that I was happy to see her when she moved back into the house next door.

I watched her as she tried to help calm my grandmother. She was so pretty, with long hair and I wasn’t sure if it was light brown or blond, but it was pretty. She was tall and looked nothing like the girl I played with next door when we were little. It seemed like one day she was just a girl, and the next she started to get curves. I wasn’t the only one that noticed, all the guys at school wanted her. She had big doe eyes and a button nose. Her lips were full, and I still don’t think girls were supposed to look hot in their soccer uniform. She also looked hot when she played volleyball and ran track. Every single dayat school I got to hear the guys go on and on over how hot and fuckable Wrenly was and it always stirred up anger in me.

I looked one last time at Tony then felt sick. I made it to the bathroom before I threw up, then sat on the floor and rested my head on my arm. I felt like an old man that never really mattered to anyone. Just being born ruined everyone’s lives. I flushed the toilet, washed my hands then rinsed my mouth in the bathroom sink. When I walked out the funeral home was quiet. Everyone was gone and when I walked outside I saw my parents car driving away. Once again, I wasn’t a second thought. I sat on the step outside and waited for them to realize they forgot me for about an hour but nobody came back. My phone didn’t even ring. I guess everyone forgot who I was supposed to stay with that night. I wasn’t anything but a burden on everyone. Without Uncle Tony, I had nobody. I killed the only person that ever truly cared.

I didn’t bother calling anyone. I just stood up and started walking. I didn’t know where to go, and it wasn’t the first time something like that happened. My aunt would think I was supposed to be with Tony and not be home when I got off the school bus. Then I’d go to my parents forgetting my mom was out of town while my dad was at work. I tried to play football when I was in elementary school and would find a ride to practice, but nobody would show up to get me when it was over.

When my dad was home because mom was always gone, we would hang out, but in the spring and summers he was always called away to work. There would always be a storm or a reason for him to be needed on air. I remember staying home alone even at the age of eight because someone forgot to pick me up.

“Yo! Irons!”

I turned and saw Nate and Mika. They were juniors and pretty cool guys.

“What the hell are you doing? Where the fuck is your family?” Nate yelled out from his car at me.

“Home, I guess.” I walked to their car.

“Hop in, we’re headed to the point. Jones is having a party and from what I hear you could use a few cold ones.”

Fuck it, it’s not like anyone would miss me at home. “Cool, thanks!” I opened the door to the backseat and hopped in.

If I thought I fucked up the day Uncle Tony died, I hadn’t seen anything yet. I was about to make history.

Day By Day

Present Day

Wrenly

I jumped on the back of Spider’s bike, and he took off. I was his old lady, and he just took care of some club business that could have gotten us killed.

I loved riding at night. For some reason it was peaceful, even if my prior minutes were a bit tense. Ant and Boomer were behind us, but we split up. Spider turned down a country road and I began coming down from my adrenaline high. It was just us, the sound of an engine, and the road under a dark night sky.

Moments like those always reminded me of a certain boy from my past. One I would have died for, but he threw me away like yesterday’s news before he left town. He was the boy that always sent goosebumps chasing my other goosebumps across my skin. The only guy that made my heart race and still visited my dreams.

A boy I would never forget.

Fifteen years ago

My heart was broken as I looked over at the quiet and dark house next door. Just a few days ago I looked over and saw Travis walk out the front door with Tony. But an hour ago, I sawTony laying in a casket and I knew when I looked at Travis he was blaming himself.

My life may have started out rough, but when I learned the guy we lived with before my mom died was my real dad, my life improved. Travis’s life only got worse.

I was born in Montana, and my mom had a lot of boyfriends when I was little, but I didn’t know who my dad was until later.

One day, one of her boyfriends decided I was going to be his new toy. Mom caught him and he hurt her really bad before she put me in a car and said we were going to see a very special man. She said he was my Uncle Clint, and it felt like days of driving until we made it to Oklahoma. I remember showing up at his house and he wasn’t happy to see my mom, but then something happened, and he let us stay with him. They would whisper a lot and Uncle Clint didn’t seem to like my mom very much. It wasn’t like when we stayed with my mom’s boyfriends. He was nice to me and liked playing outside with me. He would sit down with me at night and help me sound out words and draw letters of the alphabet. One day they made me go to the doctor and have a test where they put a swab thing in my mouth. We all did it, but I didn’t know why at the time. Uncle Clint would talk about the test a lot, and my mom would start crying. He didn’t like it when mommy said I had to call him Uncle Clint because he wasn’t my uncle or my mommy’s boyfriend.

One day he found my mom’s medicine. Years later, I realized my mom’s medicine was heroin, but not until I was old enough to understand what happened to her that day in that bathroom.

They got into a fight and Uncle Clint wanted me to stay but not my mom. He wanted to take her away to a specialhospital to help her with her medicine. My mom called him a whole bunch of bad names and made me go with her when I really wished I could stay with him. He even tried to arrest her, but I was screaming for him to stop. I remember my mom grabbing my arm and throwing me in the car. We took off, but Clint started chasing us in his cop car. I remember looking back at the flashing lights as he chased us but then they disappeared. Later when we talked about it, he said he slowed down because he was scared my mom would crash with me in the car. He let the other cops know to watch and stop us down the road, but they didn’t find us.

I was told it was about six months later when my mom died of an overdose in the bathroom of an old diner in Texas. Uncle Clint was really my dad, and he was trying to find us the whole time. Eventually, I was brought back to my dad, and I never saw a man cry so hard than when he was holding me. He said the test came back and he was my dad, and I would live with him from that day on. He promised I wouldn’t ever have to sleep in a car again.

I had a good life while living with my dad, but that didn’t mean I didn’t have demons. I had horrible memories and had to talk to a therapist a lot. I struggled with some anxiety, anger issues, and sometimes would scream and cry through the night. She helped me a lot, but my memories always stayed with me. Not just the bad ones, but the good ones as well.

My dad was a cop, and his best friend was Tony, the next door neighbor. He was the Uncle of my first friend, Travis, and was also a cop. It was that boy who tore my heart to pieces. He never complained but I remember my dad and Tony talking about Travis. They said Tony wanted to make his home permanent for Travis, but his parents wouldn’t agree. They justkept saying over and over again it would be over soon, and they’d find Travis’s brother. I also remembered when Travis wasn’t there, we would go to Tony’s, and he had a room that looked like it should have been in a police station. My dad and Tony were trying to find Travis’s brother on their own time, but was always really quiet about it when Travis was visiting. My dad said it was because Travis already heard too much about it and needed a safe place away from all of it. My dad explained that the kidnapping was all Travis ever heard about at home. My dad and Tony said the person that took the little boy was likely a sexual predator. They didn’t shy away from talking about that stuff around me. They figured I was better off knowing the ugly things about the world. That I should never trust a stranger.

I was worried about Travis. We used to be so close, but then he made his own friends, and I made mine. We were both freshman and he always had girlfriends. I became just the girl next door that he made promises to, then would forget.

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