Finding Never (6 page)

“
So
Mom's dating?” I ask, trying to fish for information, but
before India can answer, Jade walks in with the skankiest fucking
dress I have seen on a girl, myself included. It's zebra print and
oh so short with fishnet tights and a pair of leather high heeled
boots. My eyes immediately snap over to Ty which is so dumb because
really, would he check out my sister? He looks, but he doesn't think
she looks very good. I can see in his eyes that he actually feels
sorry for her. Did he feel sorry for me that first night he saw me
in my skintight, red dress? But no … His eyes swept me like
I was a midnight snack, and he did hit on me, until I refused to go
dancing with him. I wonder briefly what might've happened if I had.
Would things have worked out as well? Would they be the same? I
shake my head of what-ifs, and pull myself back to the present.

“
Um,
I'm glad you're here,” she says as she slowly lets her eyes
shift over to Ty's face, his body, his … I clear my throat
and she looks back up at me.

“
You're
not going out, are you?” Lettie asks, voice desperate. I can
tell from her panicked face that this is something that's happened
before. Jade shrugs and puts her hands on her lower back as she
tries not to look awkward in her too tall boots. “But Never's
home!” Lettie shouts, getting real angry, real fast. “You
can't go now!”

“
Go
where?” I ask, suddenly feeling protective of the little sister
I left behind.
The one that hates me,
my mind whispers. I
ignore it.

“
Just
to a club,” Jade says softly, voice barely a whisper. Maple
starts to cry, and India's forced to pick her up and bounce her
around on her hip. “I like to dance.”

“
Last
I left, the only club in town was the Naughty Bunny, Jade. That's a
fucking strip club.” Jade's nostrils flare with anger and her
eyes flash. I watch as her hands curl into fists and all of that
repressed anger and hatred, it all comes pouring out of her and
straight at me. I always knew, still know, that it's not all my
fault, but Jade has relegated me to her emotional punching bag.
Being gone didn't change that. She still hates me.

“
Like
you fucking care, Never. You ran out on us, so don't try and act
like a big sister now, babe. That time has come and gone.”
Jade starts to turn away, but Ty grabs her wrist with his ringed
hand. His bracelets tinkle merrily and everyone stops talking. Even
Maple stops crying. Jade freezes and a pale, pink blush colors her
cheeks. I can tell by the way her lip trembles and her eyes water
that she's not used to being touched by guys. Maybe she hangs out at
the strip club, maybe even dances, but she doesn't let men touch her
or she hasn't yet. Jade might look like a whore, but I can tell with
every instinct I have that she's a virgin.

“
Listen,”
Ty says in this no-nonsense sort of a voice. It's compelling enough
that even
I
kind of listen to it. Or maybe Ty just has a
way with women. Doesn't matter anyway. I can tell he senses that
Jade is on the same path that we've both traveled and barely
survived. He's trying to help my sister, not for me or even for his
conscious, he's trying to help my sister because deep down,
underneath the tattoos and the cigarettes and the sleeping around, Ty
is a good person. I suddenly feel jittery and my hands start to
shake. “I know you don't know me, and you probably want to
tell me to get my fucking hand off of you,” Ty begins, and all
I can think is,
Yeah, freaking right. Jade is practically eye
fucking you. It's annoying, but God, she's my little sister and I
don't care if she memorizes the curve of your ass, I just don't want
her to end up broken like me.
“But there are stupid
decisions and then there are fucking off the chart ridiculous ones.
Jade, right?” Ty asks, and my sister nods, unable to find her
tongue in the face of Ty's electrifying aura. “Don't make a
decision today that you'll regret tomorrow.” Ty drops her hand
and it falls to her side like a dead weight. He turns back towards
the table and smiles at Darla who won't eat any banana and reaches
out, takes a slice between his calloused fingers and eats it. Almost
immediately, the sister I didn't know I had until five minutes ago,
reaches out and eats one, too.

“
I
like bananas,” she tells him confidently and he grins, dimples
deep and dark in that perfect fucking face. A sigh escapes my throat
and I catch several curious looks from my sisters.

Luckily,
Ty is too busy making faces at Maple who's laughing and pointing at
his lip ring and saying, “Jewel, jewel.”

“
Beth's
home!” Lorri shouts, peeping out the lacy curtains with a grin.
Jade crosses her arms over her chest and looks embarrassed. When
Beth sees her in it, she's going to get trashed. That is, if my
sister hasn't changed a whole lot since I left. “Yay! Yay!
Beth's going to be so happy, Never! She said you were the only line
on her bucket list.” The smile falls from my face, and I
suddenly can't catch my breath. Memories flash like lightning before
my eyes as I crouch over and try not to throw up.

Beth
cracks me hard across the cheek. “Don't be selfish, Never,”
she snarls, pretty face not so pretty anymore. “Grow up.
Don't you want Mom to be happy? Dad is dead, and he's never coming
back, so get over it.”

“
Get
her, get her,” Lettie is saying to Lorri, pushing her forward
as the two of them scramble to get out of the kitchen. My head spins
and my stomach knots in a hundred places. My heart feels so fragile
in that moment that I'm afraid it could shatter like glass, get stuck
in my soul and bleed me to death. And then I hear Ty's voice, feel
his hands sliding across the small of my back. My chair slides
closer to his.

“
It's
okay, Nev,” he whispers as he presses a gentle kiss to my
cheek. In that moment, Ty really, truly falls head over fucking
heels for me. Maybe it's the crying or the raw emotions or finally
having a light shown on my fucking past, but Ty McCabe really, truly
gets himself in so deep there that he can't ever get back out again.
Nobody kisses like that if they're not in love. I know that somehow,
but I don't. Maybe I don't want to, not yet. Not until I know for
certain what's going to happen in this little town, in this little
piece of nowhere, this nothing that means everything.

I
hear Beth before I see her.

“
This
better not be a joke, Lorri, because it isn't funny.”
Footsteps, heels I think, move from the front door and pause at the
entry to the kitchen. Ty turns around first and stands up.

“
Hi
there,” he says, voice casual but firm.
He's afraid she's
going to hurt you again. He wants to protect you. Ty wants to
protect you, Never.
“My name is Ty McCabe, and I'm here
with Never.” He doesn't specify our relationship, doesn't
define it. I like that about him. He doesn't want to corner me into
a position, a title, Ty just wants me to be me. He always has. “You
must be Beth.” I hear his bracelets jingle, and I assume
they're shaking hands, but I don't turn around, not yet. I have to
get some oxygen in my lungs before I pass out.

“
Never.”
Beth's voice is like a whisper on the wind, a tiny slice of air, a
cluster of syllables. “Never.” Harder this time, more
emotion. “Never, I'm so sorry.” And then Beth is
sobbing and my chair is flying out from under me. I spin around,
step past Lettie and Lorri and find myself in my big sister's arms.
Her hand strokes back my hair while she rocks us back and forth like
she used to do when I was little. She's wearing a pretty cream
colored sweater dress and her hair is short and cut into a cute,
little bob. I remain the only Regali to have dyed my hair. Beth
pulls back and looks at me with big, round eyes jiggling with tears.
Her lipstick is smeared across her teeth from biting at her lips
nervously. She dashes her arm across her face.

“
You
had a baby,” is the only thing I can say as I cry. Again.
It's getting old and my eyes hurt, but I'm not through yet. This has
to happen, I have to bleed this pain from my body or else it will
poison me. Whoever says that crying is weak is obviously just a
fucked up individual. It takes all of my strength to stand here and
cry, to admit to myself that yes, I am sad, and yes, that is
o-fucking-kay.

“
I
did!” Beth says, but that's all she can say because she's so
busy squeezing the life out of me. “And I took a thousand
pictures so you could follow every painful step.” I laugh as
Beth takes my face between her hands and looks me in the eyes. “I
knew you'd come back,” she whispers. “And I am sorry. I
am so, so sorry.” I take a huge breath, pull Beth's perfume
into my lungs and say the words I have to say, the ones that have
been sitting inside of me all along, the ones that were so angry to
be there that they convinced me to do things I shouldn't do. I let
the little monsters out, and I am more than happy to be rid of them.

“
I
forgive you.”

I
feel
Ty smile behind me, don't ask how. I just know that he's
standing there and that he's proud. I step back and feel like I
should say something to Beth about him, like it's weird if I don't.
She sees me step back and her eyes move to Ty's face. She looks at
him and I can see what she's thinking.
This man is no good for my
sister. This is the kind of guy that lies, that cheats on you when
your back is turned, that's hot as hell in the bedroom, that's like
fire to your ice, but who will melt you the first chance he gets.
I
forgive her her judgments because I used to have them, too, but I
know – or at least I think – that Ty isn't that way
anymore. He's changed me, and I've changed him.

“
Beth,”
I begin just as I hear tires on the driveway. It's my other demon.
My big one. “This is … ” I hold out my hand to
indicate Ty in all his dark, twisted glory. “This is my …
this is my Ty.” Beth smiles.

“
Nice
to meet you, Ty,” she finally says as Lettie grabs my arm and
drags me back into the kitchen talking about rolls she made with
India and how fluffy they are. Lorri is talking, too, and Darla is
yelling, and there's just chaos everywhere. I'm not used to it, not
anymore. There was once upon a time where I couldn't sleep without
this noise all around me, this wild chaos, this mix of souls brushing
against one another for the briefest of moments, but then I moved
away and all I knew was loneliness. I knew how to connect my body
with somebody else's, but I forgot about the rest of it. Slowly, oh
so slowly, I start to remember.

“
Help
me through this?” I whisper to Ty, not realizing how much I
need him in that moment. He presses the warm heat of his body
against my back and bites my ear, just a quick nip before my sisters
see, just a touch that paralyzes my whole being and gives me goose
bumps.

“
You've
got me as long as you need me.”

9

Beth
herds me and Ty into the kitchen and sits us down, afraid of my
mother's reaction. Because she's so emotional, because she's so
happy to see me, Beth thinks that my mother will be, too. She highly
overestimates the woman.

My
mother walks in with a pair of grocery bags in either hand. She
doesn't see me at first. There are so many people in the kitchen
that I can't really blame her. A sea of familiar faces surrounds me,
girls and women with the same small, pointy noses, curved
lips, and hazel eyes. We've all come from her, were born from her
womb, and yet, we mean less to her than she means to herself. I
don't think that's the way the world's supposed to work. How are you
supposed to put yourself out there when there's nobody standing
behind you? I thought the purpose of having parents was so that
there was always someone there that loved you for you. Guess I was
wrong.

“
Sorry,
I'm late,” she says as my sister, Beth, takes the bags from her
hands with a sloppy smile and eyes full of tears. My mother pauses
and looks her in the face for a long moment. She's wearing a halter
top without a bra, a full, Gypsy skirt, and a pair of dangling
earrings that swing like purple pendulums when she turns her head to
face me. Time ceases to flow for a moment, breaks around us like
waves around rocks. Her copper curls are scooped up like ice cream
on her head, still just as pretty and shimmery as they were when I
left, but her face is lined with pain and worry. This gives me hope
for a brief moment, makes me think that something will change between
us, that she'll be the mother I always wanted but never had. My
heart starts to pump and I have to reach under the table and grab
Ty's hand with an iron grip. It's slick and sweaty, almost as wet as
mine with worry and fear.

“
Mom.”
It's one, simple word, one that gets Beth sobbing again and makes
India smile. Jade remains emotionless, and the younger girls, too
wound up to keep this tense silent, start to talk all at once. I
don't hear any of them. I keep my gaze locked on my mother's and I
smile through the tears that just won't stop.
I'm home, Mom,
I
think at her.
I'm finally home.
I feel my heart healing,
just a bit, just a tiny scab that covers some of the pain. And then
she speaks, and it all goes to hell.