Page 52 of Edge of Unbroken

“How long have you two been together?”

“Just over seven months, but a lot of that time I’ve… not really been there,” I say, acutely aware of how much I miss Cat.

“When did your family move back to Montana?” Miranda asks, her entire body turned toward me, her left elbow resting on the steering wheel while her right leg is hitched onto the leather bench seat.

“Just me,” I say. “A little over two months ago.”

“So, it’s true,” she says, a crease on her brow as she takes me in. “I’ve been hearing things about your mom… How bad did it get?”

I once again wonder who she’s been hearing these things from, who’s even talking about this stuff. I don’t think my grandparents are out and about telling everyone who’s willing to listen about the abuse I’ve endured. It’s a small town, though, and I’m not sure my aunt isn’t sharing some things with a close friend or two who might be eager to spread some juicy gossip, even if sworn to secrecy. People in small communities tend to latch on to drama, especially if it isn’t theirs.

I don’t answer right away, feeling Miranda’s gaze bore into my head. She’s the only one who knew, and I meanreallyknew, what my life was like with my mom.

“Bad,” I say after a few seconds of heavy silence.

“How bad, Rony?” She shifts her body forward, closing the distance between us as she looks intently into my eyes.

I tense, my walls going up like they do each time anyone tries to get me to open up about what my mom has done to me, how painful—literally and figuratively—my life has been until only recently. “Randi, I… I don’t—”

“It’s okay,” she says quickly, readjusting in her seat. “I know you. I know you don’t want to talk about it.”

“How about you?” I ask into the quiet of the truck. “How are things with you? I thought you had left town?”

“Your grandma told you that, huh?”

I nod sheepishly.

“She never liked me much,” Miranda says ruefully. “But yeah, I left a few months after you moved back to New York, right after my eighteenth birthday. I couldn’t stand it here anymore. You were gone and my dad was still a dick, so I just up and left. Packed my bags and hit the road.”

“What have you been doing?”

I admit, I’m envious that Miranda got away from her abusive, alcoholic asshole of a father. I don’t think he ever hit her like my mother did me, but that doesn’t mean Miranda didn’t suffer just as much as I did.

Miranda’s dad was the pastor of my grandparents’ church, until his parish got wind of his alcoholism and gently forced him out before replacing him with a younger, “cleaner” pastor.

Miranda’s dad started drinking heavily when she was only twelve and her mother died of an aggressive form of cancer. Things only got worse for Miranda from then on. Being the daughter of a pastor came with certain expectations for Miranda, who had always bucked authority. It didn’t help that, in order to enforce his beliefs and way of thinking, Miranda’s dad would emotionally abuse her—calling her names, telling her that, at the rate she was going, she’d get pregnant out of wedlock, that she was no good, and pretty much all the things I heard on a daily basis from my own mother.

The real difference between Miranda and me, though, is that her father’s abuse made her more rebellious, whereas I tried harder and harder to be the perfect son. Neither approach worked.

“Oh, you know, a little bit of this, a little bit of that,” she says, and bumps her knee against mine. “I’ve just been driving, hooking up with random bands to sing, doing open mics, auditioning whenever I get the chance. Still trying to break into music.”

“How do you survive, though?” I ask. “Hooking up with bands and playing open mics can’t make you that much.”

She shrugs. “Odd jobs here and there.” She forces a smile when I look at her doubtfully. “Don’t ask, Rony. You don’t want to know.”

A big part of me doesn’t want to let it go. Miranda has always been a pretty girl, and I worry about what exactly it is she does to earn enough money to get by. But the look on her face tells me not to push it, so I don’t.

“And now you’re back,” I say.

“For now. You know, just here to save you from yourself.”

“Uh-huh, sure.”

She laughs at me. “I got back to Montana right before Christmas. Just checking in on my dad to see how he’s doing.”

“And how’s he doing?” I ask, already guessing her answer.

“The same. I can tell he’s drinking heavily again, even though he says he’s not. I’m going to see if I can get him to go to AA or maybe rehab. I don’t know.” She shakes her head, her shoulders heavy.

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