as fast as they could toward the apartment building. My attention veered to Cardo’s apartment door, just like it had every time I’d been outside since I met him, but he wasn’t there. It was almost as if he had vanished into thin air.
My stomach rolled as I wondered if something had happened to him, and I made a mental note to give it another couple of days before making a ploy to knock on the door to check on him. I didn’t know why I was compelled, but something deep down told me to. There was a kindred spirit in him that called to me, and there was only so long that I could ignore it.
I let out a breath as I walked toward the stairs, hesitating. Maybe I should have checked on him there and then instead of leaving it another few days. What if something was wrong and he was waiting for someone to come and save him?
Shaking my head, I rolled my eyes at myself. I was thinking too much into it. I’d only had one conversation with him, and already I was pushing my problems onto him. He was fine, and I was overthinking.
So, I took the steps to the outside stairs two at a time, my stomach floating with butterflies the closer I got to my apartment door. I didn’t know what made me pause to catch my breath when I was a couple of feet away, but a force overtook me, one that was holding me back. And I knew right then…I knew something had changed.
My bad feeling about Cardo wasn’t about him after all. It was about me.
I took in several breaths, trying to calm down my racing thoughts. I hadn’t even stepped into the apartment and I was already scared of what I would find. My hands started to shake, but I propelled myself forward, not shying away from whatever was behind the closed door.
I opened it slowly, the smell of smoke smacking me in the face, and that was closely followed by the pumping music coming from the living room. The last time they’d played music was back in our old, decrepit apartment. My chest felt heavy and my breaths were turning to gasps. My body was warning me against going any farther in, but I didn’t have a choice.
The door creaked as I closed it, and with a push back of my shoulders, I headed into the living room. The hope I’d had disintegrated into ash because right there, on the sofa, was my mom, sprawled out with her eyes half closed. It wasn’t that that was the problem though.
No.
It was the needle in her arm that caused my heart to crack for what felt like the thousandth time.
She was high.
Again.
And I realized…it was a pipedream. She’d never stay clean. I just didn’t have the heart to believe it. I wished and prayed every day that my parents were like everyone else’s. But they weren’t. They never would be. And it was time I understood that.
Mom opened one of her eyes, moaning and reaching her hand out to me. Any other time I would have gone to her. Any other time I would have turned down the music and cleared up the mess she’d made.
Not today.
We’d come here for a clean start, and she’d lasted all of two weeks. Two weeks living in a sober house. Two weeks without strangers coming over. Two weeks without the sweet scent of her drugs.
I’d made a mistake coming here with them, but now it was too late. I had to deal with it whether I liked it or not, but that didn’t mean I had to be part of it. So I walked away. I acted like I hadn’t seen her there in yesterday's stained clothes. I acted like I’d come home to an empty apartment, because pretending everything was how it had been was easier than acknowledging the fact that nothing would ever change.
MATEO
My eyes never stayed in the same position for long. I was hyperaware of every single thing around us. I knew that the car directly behind had been on the same path we were for the last two blocks, but I also knew that the old woman behind the wheel wasn’t a threat. At least, I hoped she wasn’t.
I knew that the car two behind hers had followed us from the time we left the mansion. The fact that they were law enforcement wasn’t something easily detected, but