acceptance. “Yeah? There’s a lot you don’t know about me too. That’s why it’s caled dating. So we can spend every possible moment together on the phone or pining away for each other.”
He knew how to make her feel special. “Stop joking.” She sobered, ready to open up for the first time.
“Talk to me, Lib.”
The honesty on his face nearly broke her heart. “Peter, I’m not the person you think.” The weight of her confession grew heavier.
“I’m listening.” His large brown eyes focused on her.
“I think I better say this al at once, and I’l tel you when I’m done. Is that okay?”
“Lay it on me,” he said with levity.
Libby took a deep breath and blew it out. “I don’t live with my Mom.” She watched him for a reaction and only saw mild confusion. “I live with my aunt. And I’m not from Wisconsin, I’m from Michigan.”
His gaze became more focused as her words muddied the waters of what he knew. She took another deep bracing breath.
“I have a dad, but I haven’t seen him in over a year. He’s kind of a mess right now because he lost his job and then our house.” She checked Peter again for his reaction; he seemed more confused.
“But he only lost the house because of the accident. Actualy it was way after the accident, after we lost my Mom and sister. Did I tel you I had a sister?” She paused and looked into his eyes. He shook his head, his eyes wide and body stil. Her pain pierced like a stab to the heart. “Wel she died with my Mom in the accident. I guess I never realy told you about that.” She spoke faster to get the toxic words out. She tugged on her pendant, as Peter listened.
“Wel, there was this car accident. My dad was driving and this semi puled out, and the driver was tired and anyway, he forced us off the road and our car flipped over and hit the pilars of an overpass.”
She peeked up at his shocked expression. His eyes flashed dark with emotion.
“There was glass everywhere and the car was al twisted. It took a while for my dad to help me out of the back where I was stuck. Then he and the truck driver worked on getting my little sister Sarah out while I tried to reach my mom.”
Libby felt transported back in time to that terrifying summer night on the side of a highway. The night her life changed forever.
“The car was roled onto the passenger side and was crunched in realy bad. My dad was too big to crawl around the twisted metal, so I did.”
She remembered the thick metal crumpled like tin foil. It cut and scratched her arms and legs as she fought to get through. She recaled the desperate need to get to her mom who lay limp, stil fastened in her seat, the remnants of the deployed airbag draped around her.
“Chunks of broken glass were everywhere and I kept trying to pul it away.” The taste of panic returned as she recaled the glass spread over her mother like a sheet of deadly ice crystals. Libby opened her scarred hands to Peter in testament. “But it didn’t work.”
Peter held her hands in his, as if to keep her from harm. It felt good.
“Anyway, it was horrible and I don’t live in Michigan anymore, cause Dad couldn’t take the pain after Mom and Sarah died. He was so depressed he needed to leave.” Libby couldn’t slow herself down. The dam opened and the flow of painful secrets could no longer be held back.
“That’s when he left me at Aunt Marge’s, but she’s realy screwed up and smokes pot al day. And I don’t know why, but my dad is gone and I don’t know how to find him, so I’m just trying to finish high school so I can figure out what to do. But you need to know this because you have an amazing life and you have a real family with a mom and a dad and brothers.”
Peter sat silent, his eyes warm and caring. He took it al in as she babbled.
“So I just thought you should know I’m not like you, and that’s okay, and you can go do your thing and I’m al right with it.” She nodded her head with finality. “I’m al right.” She’d said it al and now she didn’t know what to do. She glanced al around,