Page 210 of Releasing 10
When we returned to our street and were shooed upstairs to Gibsie’s bedroom so the grown-ups could talk in private, I’d lost my shit and stormed downstairs.
Aside from blowing a head gasket when I heard Sadhbh talking about my girlfriend in a less-than-favorable light, I’d lunged for Mark the moment he returned from the Garda station with his father.
My momentary slip in sanity cost me a broken nose—courtesy of Mark—and a lifelong ban from number nine—courtesy of his father.
It was worth it, though, and I would gladly take a dozen broken bones if it meant that I got to hit that prick again.
Better still, Dad had taken leave of his senses when he saw the condition of my face and had beaten seven kinds of shite out of Mark for putting his hands on “his child.” I wasn’t too happy about being referred to as a child, but I couldn’t deny the solid my father had done for me. After all, Dad had been given a lifelong ban from number nine right along with me.
Everything had gone to hell on my street, and I knew I was taking a gamble cycling over here, but how the hell could I not?
I refused to abandon her.
No matter what.
“Why don’t ya go back to Avoca Greystones?” Mike continued to seethe, looking more broken than he had at his daughter’s funeral. “Hmm? Run on back to the Allens and defend their rapist, bastard son like your parents have decided to.”
“I’m not my parents,” I said calmly, steeling my resolve. “And I’m not that rapist bastard, either.”
My words seemed to throw Lizzie’s father and give him pause for thought. “What are you saying, Hugh?”
“I’m saying I believe my girlfriend,” I replied, pouncing on the temporary crack in his resolve. “Ibelieveyour daughter, Mike,” I told him, straightening my shoulders to make myself look as grown-up as I could. “And I came here to tell her exactly that.”
Mike blew out a breath and I watched as the tension slowly left his rigid shoulders. “Well then.” Stepping aside, he held the door open. “You best come inside, son.”
The first thing that greeted me when I reached the landing was the high-pitched, wailing noises coming from behind Caoimhe’s closed bedroom door.
Instantly, I recognized the disturbingly unnatural sobs as those of a grieving mother. Only once before had I heard keening like that, and it had come from Sadhbh Allen when Bethany died. The excruciating keening sound that came out of a bereaved mother when her child died was hauntingly distinctive and something I hoped like hell I would never have to endure for a third time.
Repressing a shudder, I moved straight for Lizzie’s room, trying to block out her mother’s pained cries. When I slipped inside, I didn’t bother to knock because I knew there was no point. My girlfriend was lifeless on her bed, dosed to the high heavens with God knows whatever the doctors had prescribed to numb the pain.
Moving straight for her, I kicked off my shoes and climbed under the covers next to her. “Hi, baby, it’s me,” I heard myself whisper and then quickly frowned when I realized the endearment that had escaped my lips. Whoa. I’d never called Lizthatbefore. Even stranger was the fact that it feltright. Like I was supposed to call her that.
“Hi,” Liz whispered, still staring lifelessly at the ceiling above her, as tears trickled down her cheeks. “I can’t turn my head.”
“That’s okay,” I replied, reaching for her. “I can do it for you.”
“They gave me an injection,” she croaked out when I rolled her onto her side to face me. “Another one.” Puffy blue eyes greeted me. “I can’t feel a thing.”
“Maybe that’s a good thing,” I offered, resting my hand on her cheek. “You’ve felt enough pain, Liz.”
“I want to feel you,” she whispered, eyes locked on mine. “And I can’t.”
“You can’t feel me now?” I asked, stroking her cheek.
“No,” she replied as another tear fell from her long lashes.
“That’s okay,” I replied gently. “I can feel you.”
“You can?”
“Yeah, I can, Liz.”
“How do I feel?”
“Honestly?”
“Always.”
