Page 6 of Wanted You More

I roll my eyes. “Idiot.”

“Not,” Noah cuts in, eyeing me with those annoying crystal blues, “that it was a good idea to begin with. In fact, it was fucking stupid. Why would Marybelle do that anyway?”

As if I’d tell him that. Reaching for my seat belt, I unbuckle and grab my phone from where it rests between us. “Thanks for the ride. And for not letting your friend bring me back in his squad car. I don’t know if Dad can handle seeing me getting escorted out of the back seat of a police cruiser again.”

Noah makes a face before gesturing toward the house with his chin. “Speaking of…”

Turning toward the front door, I groan when I see Dad walking out and over toward where we’re parked. Hunkering down into the seat, I close my eyes to avoid seeing whatever expression is on Dad’s face when Noah rolls down my window.

“Hi, Mr. Cole,” Noah greets in his usual friendly tone, as if he doesn’t have this man’s seventeen-year-old daughter beside him after rescuing her from a night out gone wrong.

“Noah,” Dad says. His brown gaze turns to me. “I thought you were supposed to be with Marybelle. Care to explain what she did this time that Noah and his father needed to help you out of? Or should I guess?”

Frowning, I let out an internal sigh, knowing this was coming. But before I can defend myself, Noah does it for me. “Actually, I’m just giving her a ride home. Wanted to make sure she got back safe. She’s not in any trouble.”

Eyes subtly moving back to the driver, I stare before finally turning to my father, who looks a little surprised himself. He stands taller, reaching for the door handle to open it for me. “Thank you then.”

“Not a problem.”

Once I’m out, Dad bends to look into the vehicle at Noah. “They’re calling again. One of them showed up here the other day. It took them about fifteen minutes to leave.”

Body locking, I pin Dad with a wide-eyed stare. He’s talking about the reporters. They periodically pop up from time to time, especially with the ten-year anniversary of the shooting coming up. People like us are a “where are they now” story in the making.

I hear Noah say, “I’ll talk to Dad about it and see what the station can do. If they’re ever trespassing, feel free to call one of us. We’ll get them off your property.”

One thing about the Kingsley family is that they’ve always been on our side, no matter the hesitancy or cold shoulder Dad gives them. If it’s not Ben using old connections, it’s Noah using what he’s learning in law school—which he’s nearly finished with—to protect us from reporters and media who constantly harass us for interviews. Usually, throwing out legal jargon I never quite follow, but that seems to do the trick when people are asking us to be a cover story.

Dad nods and straightens, his tone civil but distant when he says, “Have a good night. Tell your father we said hello.”

He closes the door and puts a hand on the back of my shoulder to turn me toward the house when Noah calls out, “He’d like to see you. You could tell him yourself. We’re having a retirement party for him next weekend.”

I don’t know if Noah sees the way Dad tenses, but I do. We both appreciate everything Noah’s father has done for us, but I know my father sees him in a different light than I do. He’s attached to memories that my dad wants to forget completely. Whenever we bump into him somewhere, Dad will always try getting away before they’re locked in conversation. Whenever that fails, it’s me who has to get us out as soon as I see how uncomfortable he is.

That night brought a lot of terrible memories for our entire family. But unlike me, my mother didn’t survive. That’s the one thing Dad equates to Benjamin Kingsley. He doesn’t blame him for not getting to her in time because he knows there were other victims they were trying to save while they took down the gunmen, but he can’t look Ben in the eye without remembering exactly what he lost that day.

It’s me who says, “We’ll let you know.”

The truth is, Dad will never go. He just won’t say that to Noah because he doesn’t want to be rude.

I follow Dad inside and ask, “Why didn’t you tell me about the reporters?”

Dad locks the front door after I walk in before kicking his shoes off by the door. “I don’t know, Austen. Maybe because the last time they came around it didn’t end very well. Or have you forgotten?”

That stings but I know it’s not unreasonable for him to bring it up. It was a year ago when two men came to our door saying they wanted me to tell my story along with the other victims to gain media attention for the rally they were putting together supporting tighter gun control legislation. They needed a mascot to make a point and wanted to use me and my trauma to get it across.

Dad always told Wolfe and me never to speak to reporters. “Keep your head down and steer clear,” he’d say of the vultures who lingered every few years whenever something relative popped up. It was a shitshow when the nineteen-year-old friends who opened fire in the park went to trial. Everybody wanted a reaction from the survivors but didn’t seem to care that most of us wanted to be left alone rather than give our opinion on the people who traumatized us, to begin with.

There were a lot of things I didn’t listen to Dad about, but I was sure to hear him out on speaking with certain people. I don’t use my social media that often because people would randomly message my accounts hoping to get an exclusive. As much as I wanted to bitch them out publicly, I’d heed my father’s warnings and kept quiet about their harassment.

The night he’s referring to wasn’t my best one. I’d snuck out and gotten drunk with Marybelle and her brother, smoked a little weed with Monty, the guy I periodically hook up with, then wandered off and accidentally tried getting into the wrong house at three in the morning. It was an honest mistake that any slightly intoxicated person who was also under the influence of mild drugs would make. The owners called the cops on me because they thought I was trying to break in. The officer that came was some sour woman I’d never seen before, and I may have been alittlemean when she tried getting my personal information.

Did I handle the situation wrong? Sure. It’s not completely unlike me to overact. But things could have been a lot worse, a point that I don’t think will matter if I use it right now.

“I already said I was sorry,” is what I say instead, careful with my words. “I have a right to know when they’re sniffing around, considering it’s me they’re trying to get to. Remember when they showed up at my school a couple years ago when the sentencing was happening? What if that happened and I wasn’t prepared?”

Dad walks into the kitchen with me hot on his heels. “You’re right. I should have said something. Believe it or not, Austen, I’m trying to do what I feel is best for you. You’ve done nothing but spiral since you stopped going to therapy last year, and I don’t have the energy to try forcing you there anymore.”

He gave me the choice to stop therapy when I turned sixteen. Apparently, he thought I’d be smart and still go. He was wrong.

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