Page 117 of Fade into You

“What?” I breathe.

“Yes, that’s right. He’s been living in Boston with another man all this time, Birdie.”

“Well… s-s-so what?” I shout. “Would it be different if he was with a woman? Would you have let him exist if he had left you for a woman instead? What gave you the right to just… just, just erase him from—”

“I was trying to protect you!” she interrupts.

I laugh, even though I’m starting to cry, even though I’m more angry and hurt right now than I’ve ever been in my entire life. “That’s a terrible excuse, you know that?”

I grab my bag and coat off the rack and open the door. Mom snatches my coat from my hands. “Stop it, Birdie. We need to talk!”

“You had ten years to talk—you never talked! You never said a word. And I’m not going to sit here and listen to you try to justify keeping him away from his own kids.”

She’s shaking her head. “You’remykids—I’d never let someone like that aroundmychildren.”

“We’re his children too!”

“He has AIDS, Birdie,” my mom blurts out, in a pathetic attempt to stop me in my tracks. It has to be a lie, I know that, but still. My heart. Just. Stops. “So, yes, I wasprotectingyou. And your brother,” she shouts at me. “I’ve always been protecting you.”

“You’re lying!”

“She’s not lying,” Daniel says, quieter.

Now my heart pumps double time, fluttering yet so unbelievably heavy inside my chest, because I don’t think Daniel would participate in this kind of deranged story, even for my mom.

“I can’t,” I’m saying. “I c-can’t even… I need to go. I need to get of here.” I yank my coat from her grasp and I’m out the door.

I need Jessa.

I start walking in the direction of her house, and I’m crying so hard now I can barely see two feet in front of me. If it’s true—it can’t be true, but if it is—I have to stop to catch my breath. Ifhe’s sick, there’s no time to wait and wonder and waste. I make it three blocks before I realize I’m still holding the envelope. I wipe my eyes and look at it before I carefully tuck it inside my notebook. I know what I need to do. But I’m terrified I’ve found my courage too late.

The headlights blind me and I get ready for round two with Mom, but then I realize it’s Jessa calling my name. It’s Jessa running toward me. It’s Jessa, here when I need her the most.

We hug and kiss and I can’t really understand what she’s saying. I think we’re both trying to apologize over each other.

And then I see the blood.

JESSA

We are back on theroad, Bird driving now, insisting on it after she wrapped my hand up. Once we got off the sidewalk, she opened the passenger-side door, helped me in, and then quietly drove us to an Eckerd’s.

“Don’t leave,” she told me, a serious look on her face. I’m going nowhere.

When she comes back with peroxide, antibiotic cream, gauze, a roll of medical tape, and, somewhat inexplicably, a road atlas, I just sit in the car with the door open, feet on the crumbling asphalt, slick with melted snow, her outside the car bending toward my palm, pulling away the now very red and sticky towel. I look, almost vomit, and have to look away.

“Shit, Jessa, this is kind of deep, I think.”

“Can we just patch it up for now?” I’m still crying, thin rivulets of tears sliding down my face. She looks up at me with concern, and my heart trips a happy beat before reality comes back in and pain and grief all show up for the party.

“This is gonna hurt,” she says, and pours the peroxide overmy hand. The pain is fiery, and I feel lightheaded for a second as the whole palm foams up. I stomp my foot, not allowing myself to vocalize this. She quickly swipes the blood from around the wound with gauze pads, then gently cradles the hand as she grabs another stack, already primed with antibiotic cream, and lays them on top of the angry thick slice in my palm.

She grabs the gauze and starts wrapping it tightly, but not so much it makes my fingers numb. Then she tapes it down, gently kisses the bandage, and helps me back in the car, then buckles my seat belt for me. Closes the door and sits in the driver’s seat.

“Now, I need to know why you’re hurt and who in the fuck did this to you so I can kill them.”

I open my mouth to say something, but the crying just starts again. I manage to choke out the word “Mack” and she nods, understanding, putting her hand on my okay left one, squeezing tight.

“Is she all right? I mean, is she safe?”