Page 50

LOGAN

A few weeks before the Gala, the news broke. We never stood a chance once Charles was arrested—those reporters moved fast. The statement we wrote to deliver at Friday's game was sitting on Silas’s desk in his office.

I sighed. We were screwed.

In the short time of living at Dansby I had never seen them close the gates to the driveway but as Jensen and Arlo pushed the large, black doors together and locked it I realized that everything had gone to shit.

Reporters weren’t just harassing the players at the stadium anymore—they’d climbed the hill to the Hornets' sanctuary, desperate for any scrap they could find. The cameras flashed at all hours, and the yelling never stopped even as the sun went down.

Silas pulled up the morning after on his bike, he had been staying at his mother’s place in the city more and more. He looked exhausted with dark circles heavy under his concerned grey eyes, and his jaw set tightly at all times. He stood in the driveway with Jensen and Arlo, the three of them watching the gate as they spoke.

“That can’t be good,” Cael muttered, leaning against the wall beside me as we watched from the upstairs hallway window. “They didn’t even close those after the accident…” he said.

“Yeah, Cody, I know,” I huffed, and he put his hand out to stop me as I started to walk away. I didn’t have the emotional bandwidth to deal with Boy Wonder. The issue at hand was bigger than just some drugged-up baseball player crashing a car, I wanted to say, but kept my mouth shut. He didn’t deserve that. He was just trying to be nice.

“How are you doing?” he asked me, crossing his arms over his chest when I stopped and squared up with him. If Cael was good at anything, it was getting under my skin at the exact wrong time.

“I’m fine,” I said. Everyone seemed to want the answer to that question. Silas, Coach, Dean… Riona and her annoying nephew.

“Mmm, no,” Cael hummed and shook his head. "Try again.”

“I’ll throw you down the stairs if you don’t get out of my way,” I threatened him.

“Empty threat when it would mean having Dougie as backup for the rest of the season,” Cael called my bluff.

“Would feel really fucking good right about now though.” I narrowed my eyes on him.

“Answer me honestly and I’ll let you go.” he smiled at me and I wanted to knock all the teeth out of his mouth.

“I’m stressed out, tired, overwhelmed and right now, really fucking pissed off,” I snapped at him.

“Is it ‘ need a meeting’ overwhelmed?” He asked me, finally getting to his concern.

“No,” I snapped. “Are you finished?”

“You love him, don’t you?” Cael asked. It should have felt blurted out, rushed—spontaneous. But nothing Cael did was without thought. No matter how much people liked to believe him to be chaotic. It was just him, brutally honest to a fault and never one to cut corners.

“It’s none of your business, Cody,” I said, clenching my jaw. It was such a heavy question, one that if I answered it wrong, everything I was building towards would come crashing down around me. And with everything else going on, I couldn’t afford for the one safe place I had left to become hostile territory.

“It is my business,” he said, his tone dropping.

“It’s really not,” I argued. "If he wanted to talk to you about it, he would.”

“I’m asking you.” Cael stepped forward, that possessive little shit head reared his ugly head and I couldn’t help but laugh in his face.

“You walked away from him, remember that,” I snapped. I watched him wince, his jaw ticking in anger before he shoved it aside and nodded.

“Do you love him?” He asked again, but I couldn’t figure out why he was pushing so hard. It was a hilarious notion, and I couldn’t tell if he was jealous or just genuinely concerned about the whole thing.

“If this is a pissing contest over Tucker, you better be prepared to lose ,” I warned him and a stupid smile formed on his lips. “What the fuck are you smiling about?” I asked, my voice breaking into a snarl.

“You just answered my question.” Cael looked me up and down as he backed away, his vague statement set me on edge as I started down the stairs to meet Silas as they entered through the front door. “And Josh,” Cael leaned over the banister. "I’m not competition, I’m just the guard dog,” he added, lifting his hands in surrender.

“What’s he whining about now?” Arlo threw his hat on the table in the hallway and tried to catch a glimpse of Cael.

“Nothing, he’s just being a brat.” I stepped down from the last step. “You guys locked up?” I asked as Jensen tossed his keys away and excused himself into the house.

“We caught two more of them trying to come up here, I don’t want them on the lawn. Harassing us from the street is bad enough.” Arlo shook his head. "It’s on an automatic lock, I’ll have Dean get you an opener for your car…”

“Don’t bother,” I said, and Arlo scowled. “I’m always with him anyway. Honestly, my car might be better off sold for parts.” I laughed awkwardly. Arlo just glared. I was trying to be personable, but the joke fell flat, and a tense silence fell over us.

“Yeah… I’m going to go find Blondie.” Arlo looked between Silas and me before disappearing, leaving us to suffer in silence alone.

“You’ve been staying with your mom?” I asked him and he nodded, crossing his arms over his chest. The dark red long-sleeved shirt he wore stretched over his arms, and I could see how tense he was through the thin fabric.

“She’s fine. It’s just... a lot. She didn’t expect her husband to wind up in jail, but she’s been meeting with lawyers. Money is moving, news is talking… I didn’t come up here to talk about my mother,” he said, pulling his hat off and fixing his hair with his hand.

“Alright, what do you need me to do?” I asked, expecting him to need testimony or to meet with lawyers. I didn’t want a cent of their money more than getting me through the rest of school. I just wanted everything over with.

“Nothing, I-” he sighed. “I came over here to talk to you about getting your mom into a facility, there’s a bed for her if you think she’ll take it.”

“You want to put my mother in rehab…” I scowled, aware that I wasn’t hiding the confusion or the resentment for his family in my expression.

“It’s not a handout or an apology. It’s something I wanted to offer, maybe in a desperate attempt to show you that I do care. That this isn’t about the money or the news… I really am trying to be your brother, Josh.”

I chuckled, the air leaving my lungs in a low huff.

“Dean told me that you aren’t big on favors.” Silas swallowed and I made a mental note to kick Tucker’s ass for telling him anything. “Riona runs a program on the weekend in Lorette for underprivileged kids, it’s a sports program that runs in hand with the child services committee in the city. They work with kids, teaching them how to manage their emotions through play,” he said. “She wants you to come coach the baseball team.”

“A trade.” I chewed the inside of my cheek, still angry with Dean and his big mouth but also grateful for his stupid, soft heart. “Fine.”

“Yeah?” Silas perked up, and a smile spread across his face. “They’re middle school kids, rough and mean, but you have experience with that.”

“There’s really a bed for her? For my mom?” I swung the conversation back around.

“Yeah, we can bring her in today if you want, we can run by before practice,” he said, his mood lifted from before. He must have been trying to figure out a way to ask me for days before he finally found the courage.

I nodded. "She’s going to fight it.”

“That’s okay, do you need to bring anything…” he asked, staring toward the door.

I looked up the stairs, tempted to bring Dean, but I shook my head. "No, let's get this over with.”

“I forgot how horrible this neighborhood was.” Silas cut the engine on the fastback Arlo had reluctantly handed over the keys to. There was no way I was getting on the back of the bike and holding on to him all the way to Lorette.

“It’s fine, just lock the doors.” I shrugged. "If they break the windows, you’re taking the blame, me and Arlo, I just became friends.”

“I’m not, that’s what I would define your relationship as, he doesn’t want to strangle you anymore, and that’s a start.” Silas locked the car and followed me up the cracked pavement to the front entrance. The building reeked of mold, smoke, and stale beer as we climbed the stairs to her apartment.

I knocked once, but as predicted, she didn’t answer. "You should probably stay here. If she sees you, it’s only going to make this worse.”

Silas’s jaw tightened. "I told Tucker I wouldn’t let you go inside alone,” he said quietly.

“That idiot,” I sighed and pushed the key into the lock. I popped the door open, and the smell of rotten fruit was the first thing to invade my senses. “Fuck sakes.” I gagged, stepping inside to see the kitchen infested with fruit flies and trash.

Silas covered his nose with the collar of his shirt as we made our way through the apartment. I called out to Mom more than once without an answer, kicking the trash out of my way as I went to create a path.

“Maybe she’s not here,” Silas mumbled under his breath.

“She doesn’t leave, Silas, ever .” I chewed on my lip and pushed further into the apartment, my breath catching knowing that he would see the door.

“Shit, kid.” His voice was low, practically breathless as he stood behind me, his eyes trained on the locks. “I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t lock me in there,” I scoffed, ignoring how it made me feel to be back in the apartment. Even worse, without the backing comfort that Dean usually provided. I turned, pushing open the door to her room, and a blanket had been tossed over the window, making it dark inside and hard to see.

Silas flicked on the light beside my shoulder and swore under his breath as we both froze. I could feel him wanting to say something to me as I fought to control the panic that coursed beneath my skin as I stepped forward into the room.

Her messy hair was stuck to the yellow pillow case, and her shirt was pulled up around her pale blue back, exposing the decaying skin around her hip bones and the band of her pajama pants. My stomach churned, the walls built to keep out the sadness and grief already starting to crumble.

How long had she been like this?

I knelt beside the bed, where she lay face down in a puddle of vomit that looked days old. The bile ripped from my stomach at the smell of it, and I turned away from her, putting my face in a trash can that was shoved under the table across from the mattress.

“Josh.” Silas grabbed me by the arm, and I nearly swung on him, but he moved back, putting his hands in the air. “Let me do it,” he said, pointing to her again. “I’ll check, go…” he gagged, pushing down the vomit and moving around me to block my view. “Call the police.”

I stumbled backwards over some trash, hitting the wall hard and knocking the wind out of my chest before I turned and left the bedroom while Silas knelt to check her pulse.

I sank against my bedroom door, and as the shock wore off, I dug my phone out, dialling 9-1-1 and listening carefully to the operator's instructions. It was clear that she had overdosed on something, the signs of her distress strewn across her dirty sheets and floor.

Silas appeared from the bedroom with a grim expression. I looked up at him, and it was clear he wanted to say something, but he wasn’t sure how. I shook my head, all that work, all that struggle… Every ounce of pain I suffered to get myself out of this shit hole because I didn’t want to end up like her.

I never thought that I would feel guilty for leaving her behind.

I shoved whatever guilt I felt down, pushing it aside to leave room for logic.

“She’s dead, isn’t she?” I asked him.

“Yeah, she’s uh… gone.” Silas brushed his hand through his hair again, turning toward the bedroom and back to me. “I’m sorry…”

“At least it’s over,” I said and watched Silas flinch. I walked through the apartment, leaving through the front door and wandered down to the front to wait for the cops. The fresh air hit me like a ton of bricks and I stared out at the overcast just trying to micromanage the way I felt.

The hardest part was trying not to blame Silas for her death. But it wasn’t his fault, he had nothing to do with this, and I knew that, but it was easy to hate someone standing in front of you. Especially when he looked so much like the man who was responsible. He hadn’t put the drugs in her hand, he didn’t fill the needle or tip the booze down her throat, but leaving her was the catalyst. She had been emotionally beaten down until the only solution was drugs and booze.

I just didn’t think she’d ever cross the line; she had drunk herself to death and left me with even more mess. Sirens lit up the silence as the paramedics and cops arrived on the front lawn of the apartment. I inhaled slowly, knowing that all my pain had come to a crashing, tragic conclusion.

The freedom I’d been chasing my entire life, left at my feet in the form of my dead mother. I closed my eyes, just trying not to lose it entirely, a few tears streaking down my hot cheeks as I worked the emotions down and back away from the surface.

“Joshua Logan!” My name was called from my left. I turned to see a reporter cruising toward me from across the patchy dry grass with his recorder held out front. “I just have a few questions!” He yelled, but Silas was there, stepping in front of me like a wall out of nowhere.

“Fuck off,” Silas barked the curse and I had never experienced such raw anger from him until now. Usually he was buttoned up, careful with his words and calculated with the press. “I said, fuck off!” He lifted his arm, and the reporter flinched like Silas was taking a swing, but he backed away and shoved the recorder into his pocket.

“Get inside.” He turned to me and I listened without protest, letting the glass door slam behind me, just wishing that Dean and I had stayed out at camp.