Page 46 of Chasing Fireflies

“What’s he planning on doing here?” Guzman asks.

“I don’t have a good feeling about this. Her mom called me, said he showed up over at their house with a gun. Said he’d shoot her right there if she didn’t come with him. He broke their front door.” Drew walks over to his truck, and I shake my head.

“Jesus,” I say under my breath.

The chief gets on his microphone. “Lucas, son. Just come on out here. We just wanna talk about this.” He turns to Guzman and me. “Williams, you go around back. Stay low. Guzman, you get to the side of the front porch.”

I watch Guzman head to the side of the house, and once he is there, he creeps his way to the side of the porch. I quietly make my way around. I look at the chief before I disappear to the back, putting a hand over my gun.

“Lucas, this is the chief. Now come on out here, boy. Let Maci go and let’s talk about this.”

“I don’t want to fucking talk. There is nothing to talk about!” Lucas yells from inside the house. “You boys just go on home now.”

I move through overgrown grass until I reach the back door.

“Let Maci and me be. We’re just going to pack up some things and head on out of here. You won’t see us again.”

As softly as I can, I turn the doorknob, and the door clicks open. From my memory of the house, it’s not directly out of the living room, so they shouldn’t hear me. I take a peek inside and hear Maci talking. “Lucas, please. What have you done? What happened to you?” she asks, and I know we need to hurry and get her out of this situation. I open the door more until I can slide inside, and I hear the chief again.

“Lucas, we don’t want anyone to get hurt. Please, son, let Maci go and come on out of the house.”

I look to my left and then to the right as I hear his footsteps going back and forth against the carpet. I tilt my head forward, trying to look into the living room. Maci comes into view and sees me. Her eyes go wide, and I put my finger over my lips. Her reaction goes unnoticed by Lucas, and I walk to the end of the hallway until I’m right at the edge. He paces back and forth with the gun in his hand. From here I can tell he is soaked with sweat and at least a bottle in. He puts the side of the gun to his forehead and taps it. The chief continues to talk, and Lucas pulls at his hair before he walks to the kitchen.

Adrenaline pushes through my veins, and as Lucas turns his back on me, I run as fast as I can, knocking his gun out of his hand first and then slamming him face forward to the floor. He struggles, but he’s drunk and sloppy. His sharp elbow slams into my stomach, and I wince before my fist connects hard with his ribs. He hollers, and I smell the alcohol on him. I get one hand cuffed and then the other before I jump up and then yank him up, too. Maci cries, and I call out to the boys.

“Why, Lucas?” Maci continues to sob. He shakes his head with a look of pure understanding. He knows he’s going away for a while. He knows he messed up.

“I’m lost,” he says quietly. His face sobers, and he hangs his head as the chief and Guzman walk in.

“I’ve got him,” Rogers says as he grabs him from the back and walks him out the door. I look over at Maci. Her face is in her hands, and she sniffs as she rubs her palms down, dropping her hands onto her lap. She looks up at me.

“Are you okay?” I ask her.

Her lips go straight, and she takes a shaky breath. “My other half just changed both of our lives without any regard of me. He turned into a person I’ve never met before. He pushed me around, spoke to me as though I was worthless. Not like his wife, not like the woman he has loved for years. Not like heismy other half. So, no, Cash, I’m not okay. I’m not going to be okay for a while.” She looks past me at the wall and stands. I watch her go into the kitchen, and I don’t blame her as she grabs the liquor bottle. She tosses it back and takes two big gulps without even a wince. She shakes her head. “One day I will be again, though. I will be okay again,” she says it as if she is trying to convince herself.

When I walk out of the house, I’m more than positive, Maci will be okay. It may take a long time, but one day she’ll be able to breathe a little better than before. She’ll feel lighter, and the world won’t seem so shitty. One day.

*

Sara

When I was no taller than a dog on four legs, my daddy taught me how to ride a bike. I remember this time so clearly, even though I was just five. He ran alongside me, helping me balance and making sure I didn’t fall. He said it would get easier the more I did it.

“That’s with everything in life, Sara. The more you do it, the easier it will be.”

I did learn to ride that bike, and every time I did it, the easier it got. I got a bigger bike, and eventually, I spread my arms out wide. Sometimes I’d even get brave and close my eyes. The breeze swept over my skin, tickling my tiny arm hairs and running its fingers through my wild dirty blonde curls. I’d laugh and pretend I was no longer on a bike, but a feather, traveling to some place only the wind knew.

Unfortunately, though, my daddy was wrong. Not everything applies to that saying. Grief doesn’t get easier, nor do heartache and sickness. I’m sure there are plenty of other things that are also just as hard as the first time you do them. Take my illness, for example. The more it appears, the harder the lines on my husband’s face show. It never gets easier to handle. None of it.

*

You know that perfect moment right before darkness takes over the sky? There’s no sun in sight, but the sky is still lightly lit, a sweet blue. I place my feet up on the edge of the porch rail and lean my head back. Taking my first sip of the icy cold beer in my hand, I lick my lips when the taste of lime hits my tongue. The clouds roll in front of the moon, getting shifted along from the wind. The leaves in the big tree ruffle from the light breeze that moves in from the field, running over my body and giving me chills that make the hair on the back of my neck stand up. My thoughts are my own. No one is here to judge me. No one even knows I sit on my front porch but the fireflies that dance in our front yard. This is what life is about. Simple moments. Quiet pieces within an hour of the twenty-four. I wish I could put this moment in a bottle, and every time things get to be too much, I can open that bottle and once again feel like I do now. Content and simply happy.

Chapter Fourteen

Cash

The bathroom floor is covered in plastic sheets that already have tiny speckles of pale yellow paint on them. Music plays from the record player in the hallway, and with her paintbrush, Sara sings and laughs. She’s happy today. She’s been happy for a few days now. Her hair is growing out, and I’m glad. I miss her pretty long curls. I run my paintbrush along the crown molding and am careful not to get any white paint on her yellow.

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