Page 9 of Wild Love
“I’m sorry for your loss.” God, that sounds so fucking lame. This kid’s dad died, and I turn into a clichéd Hallmark card.
But she doesn’t seem to care. In fact, she shrugs again. Apparently, it’s her signature move. “He was sick for a really long time. He had ALS, so we knew it was coming, ya know? Not like it was some big surprise.”
I swallow roughly, deciding to let her talk rather than insert myself into what clearly isn’t my story.
“My mom…” She sighs, her entire torso rising and falling with the heavy exhale. “My mom isn’t coping well without him. They were high school sweethearts but had me later in life. Trouble conceiving and all that. And we don’t have anyone to help us.”
Pressure crushes hard and heavy against my chest. It feels like someone’s booted foot is holding me down and they’re putting more and more of their body weight onto my lungs. I struggle to keep my breathing even, but Cora doesn’t seem to notice.
“I think she needs to go live somewhere with… some support.” Now her head wobbles, and I can see her weighing her next words carefully. “Been doing some research, and I’m pretty sure she’s clinically depressed. Like… bad. So I started searching up different places for her, ya know? Maybe an inpatient center. There are a few around. Talked a bit to the counselor at my school about it too. But with me being a minor, she said I’d probably get moved into the foster system unless we could arrange a kinship placement. She’s doing me a solid right now by not calling social services already.”
Now it’s my turn to drop my head and trace the toes of my boots, so I have something to do with my hands. I wonder how we must look right now, sitting side by side, mimicking one another’s movements.
“Turns out you might be my only living family. Well, besides my mom.”
Fuck.
“No aunts or uncles or grandparents? Someone you might know better than me?”
She sniffs and I give her the courtesy of not looking her way. I don’t know the kid, but she seems like the type of person who wouldn’t want me staring at her while she cries.
I know I wouldn’t. Maybe it’s hereditary.
“Nah. Both parents were only children. Grandparents are dead.”
“Okay.” I nod, still staring at our shoes. “Okay.”
“Okay, what?”
“Okay, let’s take you home. Maybe talk to your mom.”
From the corner of my eye, I see her turn to stare at me. “Just like that?”
I straighten and lean back against the rickety steps behind me. Internally, I’m freaking out. I’m not equipped for this shit. I don’t even know what kinship placement means. What it looks like. What’s required. But if I’m the only thing standing between this girl and the foster system, then fuck, how would I sleep at night if I said no? Deep down I’m too damn soft for this shit.
“Yeah. Just like that.”
She’s twelve. She doesn’t need to worry about the details. That’s what the adults will do. My lawyer. My lawyer, Belinda, who is going tokillme for this.
I can practically hear her now. Her voice sounds like she smokes a pack a day. She’ll probably berate me for always being such a raging asshole and then choosing the most inopportune times to have the biggest bleeding heart.
She won’t be wrong.
Then I’m up, locking the front door to the “dump” and jogging toward my Mercedes G-Wagon. “Let’s go, kid,” I call back as I wave a hand over my shoulder. “Need a bathroom? A snack? We can grab a burger on the drive.” I need to move. Get going. I need to push myself far enough down this path that I don’t think too hard about it and come up with more reasons I shouldn’t.
Because in my heart, I know this is the right thing to do. No matter how fucking insane it seems. I’m trusting my gut.
Cora isn’t far behind me. She slides into the passenger seat, and I can feel her staring at me. Probably confused by how Iwent from comparing her to Wednesday Addams to whatever the hell I’m about to do now. “I would never say no to a burger.”
As I check my pockets for my wallet, I ask, “Are you tall enough to sit in the front seat?”
“I’m twelve.”
I sigh and press the start button, the hum of my SUV filling the otherwise quiet cab. “It seems like kids these days stay in car seats until they can legally drink, so just trying to be safe or whatever.”
She snorts and clicks her belt into the latch. I catch myself staring at her profile, trying to pick pieces of myself out in her. The snarky one-liners are mine for sure. Possibly the great taste in music. The black laces. Maybe even her heavy brows that make her look like she’s scowling.
We travel off my property in silence, and it’s not until I hit the end of the long, tree-lined driveway that I realize I don’t know where I’m going. “Wait. Where do you live?”
