the shutdown personally. Too personally. Viewed the situation past blinders that were like solid oak doors, likening myself to nothing but his “fuck friend” and “booty call.” Though I now see everything about the situation more clearly—obviously, we both let our fears do the talking—I have been reluctant about reentering that space again.
Reluctant? Try terrified.
But what in my life, in the two months since I first clasped hands with Cassian Court, has not been terrifying?
And what, among all those fears, has not been worth pushing past?
Suck it up, buttercup.
“Cassian mentioned him once.” I add a soft smile to the revelation. “He was relaying a story about a trip you three took to the coast. Something about a hotel with thin walls and loud neighbors…”
Mallory laughs then sighs, staring toward the river again. “Oh, yes. That one.”
“Indeed.” I tap a finger on the air. “And he was good about remembering the arm farts too.”
“Dear God.” She drops her head into her hands. “How could anyone forget the arm farts?” A new laugh—that dissolves into a sob. “Oh, God. That was so long ago.” Pulls a knee up, settling her pain-lined face atop it. “Yet it was just yesterday, wasn’t it?”
Heavy sigh. I let her hear it, hoping she feels my empathy in it too. Not the sympathy—like her son, Mallory Court is a person who will suffer the pity of no one—but as my offering of understanding for the yesterday she pleads for. Those days in which the waters she gazed at were the Atlantic Ocean, and she held both her boys in her arms…
“Mallory.” I wait through the moment in which her face contorts harder, like a woman facing a firing squad. “What happened to him? To Damon?”
Finger by finger, she extricates her hand from mine. Slides it beneath the other, between her chin and her knee. The trajectory of her gaze does not change, extending toward the river’s far shore…though I sense the intent of it does. Her eyes, clear and dry as blown green glass, reflect it. She can revisit the pain, but not relive it.
“He was always my dreamer,” she murmurs at last. “Cassian was the doer…like me. Impatient, impertinent, impossibly stubborn. Didn’t want to ‘talk’ about his shit. Just wanted to punch through it.”
I slide a wry smirk. “What a revelation.”
After a conspiratorial wink, she returns to the thoughtful repose. “But my Damon…I worried about him a lot, especially after his father left. Which, just for the record, was a damn good thing.” Her lips compress. “Larry Court could charm the wings off an angel, about his only talent outside of counting cards. When he finally decided he liked being big man in Atlantic City more than being big man for his kids, he was gone—and frankly, I couldn’t shut the door hard enough on his worthless ass.”
“Though it was hard for a bit?” I discern it from the fresh tension in her jaw.
“For more than a bit.” Her head lifts a little with the pull of her inhalation. As she resettles it, her shoulders hunch. “Cassian was too young to remember or care—just five years old and reveling in kindergarten—but Damon was seven, nearly eight. He took it hard. Blamed himself for a few years. When he got old enough to realize it wasn’t him, he started blaming me. And once puberty hit…”
She whooshes out breath with slow but rough emphasis.
“Oh dear,” I mutter.
“About says it all.” Her fingers wrap harder around the tops of her knees. “Though ‘oh shit’ fits too.”
I hum in agreement. All too clearly, I remember what a different creature Saynt became when his tempestuous teenage hormones kicked in. Seemingly overnight, my sweet little brother turned into a textbook Heathcliff, minus the moors.
“What happened at that point?” I ask quietly.
A heavy moment passes.
Another, even heavier.
Mallory surges to her feet. Like Cassian, she must deal with the force of her tension by doing something; anything. “Like all clichéd stories of teenage boy angst—”
“It was about a girl.”
She halts, providing an instant yes. “At first,” she confirms. “But when said girl decided she was no longer into him, a buddy helped him deal with the breakup by getting him high.”
My hands coil in my lap. “Oh…shit.”
“You are a fast learner.”
“Did he get addicted to it?”
“The pot?” She bursts with a sharp laugh. “Oh God, Ella. If he’d stopped at the pot, I would have been happy. Not thrilled, but happy.”
My jaw drops with slow-motion heartbreak. “He—he tried other things?”
She wraps her arms around