Page 57 of Wreck Me

“So where do we go from here, Isla?” Caleb asked, pulling me from my thoughts.

We were two broken, poor, almost college graduates who’d hit rock bottom, yet somehow found each other through the rubble. Things wouldn’t be easy for us for a while. I had no doubts we’d have to fight every day for our relationship and for the life we dreamed of having, but I also knew that once you hit the bottom, there was only one way you could go from there. My mind floated back to a similar conversation we had what seemed like a lifetime ago, and a smile touched my lips.

“Up, Caleb. We go up.”

Lacing his fingers through mine, he added, “Together.”

CHAPTERTHIRTY-ONE

My foot bounced rapidly as I sat listening to the Chief of Police as he gave a congratulatory speech, telling friends and family how proud he was of this round of graduating officers. Small, but mighty, he had called us with a deep chuckle, drawing out laughter from the rest of the room.

What started as a class of sixteen ended as a class of twelve, but only four were starting at Ridgewood Police Department. The rest had accepted positions in neighboring cities, and would start their positions as soon as they were sworn in.

It had been an excruciatingly long ten months, but I had made it. I was finally going to start my career and had already had a promising conversation with the Chief about eventually working with forensics.

Wearing my uniform, I sat in the row of folding chairs with my hands placed on my lap. There was a buzz surrounding me and the rest of the graduating officers as we waited for our signal to stand. Next to me, an officer named Noah, who I had become friends with throughout our time at the academy, had a scowl on his face, per usual. He was a few years younger than me and had applied to the academy after being given an ultimatum by his parents to either enlist in the military or apply to a trade school. This seemed like the best of both worlds and seemed to suit him. Noah was a good dude, but you could tell he was going through some shit.

I knew a thing or two about going through some shit.

For the last six months, I’d been working with a therapist once a week to work through some of the nightmares that continued to haunt me. Isla had encouraged me to go this route and I fought her on it for several weeks before finally giving into her requests. Through the help of my therapist, I finally realized why forensics had always appealed to me.

The death of my mother.

My brain had repressed most of my memories of her leaving, but flashbacks still snuck through from time to time. With my therapist’s guidance, we determined I had likely formed a fascination with forensics because of what happened to my mom. My therapist gave me the option of trying to retrieve the memories and explained the various methods on how we would do that, but I chose not to. The memories I have of my mom were few, but happy memories. Tainting them as an effort to get more answers I didn’t really need seemed like it’d do more harm than good. I had learned enough about her death through my dad’s confession.

With Isla by my side, I spoke with Ridgewood P.D. extensively, recounting what little details I knew about the day my mom had left, and giving them my statements from the night my dad smashed a bottle over Isla’s head. She gave her statement as well, and because of her explicit detailing of my dad’s confession to her and the way he reacted to her, thinking she was my mom, they immediately went to speak to him.

I was told when the police arrived at my old house a couple hours later, my father was sitting in a puddle of his own piss exactly where I had left him, crying and repeating the same sentence over and over—'she was dead’.

Chief Collier called me as soon as my dad was brought down to the station and placed in an interrogation room, offering me the chance to be there as they questioned him. I showed up fifteen minutes later.

Isla offered to come into the station with me, but I knew this was something I needed to do on my own. I’ll admit, I also couldn’t stand the thought of her being in such close proximity to him, even if he had no idea we were there. Kissing her goodbye, I promised to call her when I was ready to leave the station, agreeing for her to come get me instead of catching the bus.

Once inside, Chief Collier greeted me and walked me back to where they were holding him. We entered the room next to the one he was in, so I could sit and observe through the one-way glass.

“State your name for the video,” an older looking officer demanded as he walked into the room, closing the door roughly behind him. He stared at my dad as though he was dog shit on the bottom of his shoe while he awaited his response.

“Seth Maxwell Hart,” my dad grumbled, leaning his head into his hands, his fingertips pushing into his messy hair. He was sitting in one of four metal chairs surrounding a basic wooden table. The fluorescent lights bounced off his skin, which was sheeted with a layer of sweat. There were pit stains on his white t-shirt. He looked disgusting—dark circles lined his eyes, his skin pale.

“You’ve already been read your rights, one of which is the right to an attorney. Would you like to call one or have one of ours appointed to you at this time?”

“No.”

“Do you know why you’re here, Mr. Hart?”

“I don’t. Well, I think I do, but you’re wrong,” he stammered, fumbling over his words.

A lump formed in my throat. My eyes narrowed, focused on my dad and his words. His reactions.

“We have a police report from a young woman whom you assaulted last night. She claims you attacked her by smashing a bottle of liquor above her head, screaming–and I quote–‘How the fuck are you here, Lucy? I killed you. I fucking buried you.’Is there any truth to her allegations, Mr. Hart?”

“No.”

“So you’re denying that you smashed a bottle of liquor above a young woman’s head? Or did you not say ‘How the fuck are you here, Lucy? I killed you. I fucking buried you.’?”

My dad said nothing, swallowing thickly as his eyes pulled down to the table. Every fiber of my being wanted to slam my hands against the one-way glass and scream for him to just talk to the officer and admit what he had, or hadn’t done.

The officer walked slowly to the other side of the room so my dad’s back was to him. He flipped through the paperwork attached to the clipboard he held.

---