Page 70 of Brother In Arms

“Mom, you need to stop. It’s not all on you! God, Rush was right – Philip and I both are old enough to know better and right now, I know that Rush, Uncle Dragon and Cousin Dray have my best interests at heart, just like you. I have to make my own decisions now. That’s part of being an adult.”

“I understand that, Bailey Lynn Berling!” my mother snapped and I felt about five inches tall when she used all three of my names like that. “What you need to understand is no matter how old you are or how big you get, you will always be my little girl.”

Okay, well, point well taken…

“Right,” I said and hugged myself a little.

“I love you.” She said and she sniffed, her own tears spilling over. I blinked, taken aback. My mom rarely, if ever, uttered those three words. It always took me by surprise when she did, and worse? I always had this little internal voice crop up that said, “Yeah, right,” because I knew in the front of my head, even if the back of my head didn’t get the message, that you didn’t treat people you really loved like cast off objects. I’d always been an afterthought to my family unless they needed me for a photo op, or to make them look good… and I always, always, did stellar at it because I craved their approval over everything else… their love… and of course, never felt like I had it or got it.

“I love you, too, Mom,” I said and I meant it… even if it did feel wooden coming out of my mouth.

It was a picture perfect family moment after that. We got up and hugged each other and that was how Rush found us. Hugging and crying, just generally being a couple of girls, but it felt so incredibly fake now. Especially considering I was sure I’d finally experienced the real thing and he was standing right there, waiting us out. When we broke apart, he cleared his throat to let us know he was there in the gentlest way possible. I knew, but my mother startled. She hadn’t and it was then that it hit me, she meant everything she was saying… there wasn’t anything fake about it and with all of the baggage of my childhood and growing up the way I had? I nearly missed it.

Thank god for Rush… if he only knew.

“Come on, let’s go see what we can find out,” he said holding out his hand to me. I frowned and took it, wondering where his spare helmet was.

My mother stared at our hands for several moments, but said nothing. We went outside to where my mother’s car and driver waited, Dragon and Dray leaning against their bikes, smoking and talking to him.

The driver snapped to and scurried to open my mother’s door for her. Rush got on his bike and tied a red bandana onto his head. Dray did likewise, tying a black bandana over his raven locks. He handed me his spare helmet out of his storage container on the side of his bike and winked at me and I felt my shoulders drop. I tilted my head to the side with a silent ‘really?’ and he chuckled quietly. I mean, I could see it but couldn’t hear it over the bikes.

I got on behind Rush, buckling the helmet on, my mother’s silver Jag pulling smoothly past us, her face worried as she stared at me through the glass.

I wished she wouldn’t, knew she would, and held onto Rush tightly as he started the bike, hating the clash of confusing emotions, my heard squaring off against my head once more. The wind was a soothing thing, the fierce wildness of it stripping off some of the insecurities, infusing me with a bit more confidence. I was beginning to realize things were all much more clearer-cut when I was with Rush, my uncle, and my cousin. They didn’t say one thing and then do another like my mother, brother, and father did.

Everything was much clearer, and there was something to be said for having the ability to take things at face value. Something you could never do in the circles I had been raised in. I was quickly starting to prefer and enjoy who I was and how things were with Rush, over who I was and the constant checking over my shoulder that I needed to do with my family, and anyone I had been raised around. I knew in the front of my head, this wasn’t supposed to be how things worked. It was how I was certainly raised, too… but it wasn’t at the same time. There were the rules on the surface, then there were the rules underneath, and they rarely, if ever, were the same rules… I was really enjoying the fact that my cousin and his people lived by one set of rules, even if those rules were simply just theirs, and that they adhered to them so strongly…

There were three Sacred Hearts on my front porch when we arrived. Data with his laptop out at my table, a cord running through my window which had been lifted a crack to allow it to run to a power source inside. Then there was the man with the bright blue eyes who had congratulated my uncle on becoming a grandfather. Finally, there was a huge mountain of a man with a blond ponytail. I didn’t know him, either.

The man with the blue eyes was helping some of my men finish up installing a new front door and he looked like he knew what he was doing. We pulled up, and I got down, Rush, Dragon, and Dray backing their bikes into line with the other three already present in front of one of my porch railings.

“Was wondering when y’all were gonna get here,” the big blond guy said. “Data’s already got something.”

“Seriously?” Rush asked.

“Fuck, like you’re surprised!” The blue eyed man said.

My mother and I were given the right of way to mount the steps and Uncle Dragon gave the introductions.

“Bailey, Trudy, these here are my men, Trigger and Reaver. You’ve already met Data.”

“Hello,” I murmured, my mother simply giving an elegant nod.

“Hey, darlin’; nice to meet you,” Trigger said to me.

“Man, you gonna tag me in? I really wish you’d tag me in,” Reaver said to Dragon, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

Dragon eyed him and said, “After the shit went down with you, Cell, an’ that little fuckwit? I’d be lyin’ if I said I wasn’t more ‘n a little reluctant.”

The man pouted. Like actually stuck out his lower lip and made a sad faced pout like a little kid before he whipped around and started working on my door again saying, “That was all Cell, man. We aren’t even the same type of crazy.”

Trigger, Rush, and Dray laughed and I could tell Uncle Dragon was trying really hard not to. He shook his head and I sighed, “There’s more room inside at the dining room table. Are we good to go through that door?” I asked.

“Yeah,” the man, Reaver, said and his tone was dejected. He opened up the door and ushered us all through. I immediately went to my kitchen to raid the fridge for cold drinks while everyone settled around the table. That done, I settled in to hear what Data had to say.

“Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it looks like your nephew is in deep with this development group on a few projects. This one being only one of them.”

“What?” my mother asked and tried to peek at Data’s laptop screen. He turned it so that she could see and her expression became grim.

---