Page 108 of Bad Boy
It hurts my fucking heart.
“Your mother passed away two years ago, Rainy. Suddenly. Did you get my letter? Any of them?”
“When the letters stopped for nearly ten years, and I got one out of the blue, I knew it was something important. So, I finally opened one. I just couldn’t bring myself to come back here. It was too painful. She died with us both hating each other, and that’s something I’ll carry with me for the rest of my life. I tried, Dad. I really, really tried.” Mom breaks down, and it’s hard for me to watch, but this is their moment, so I let Richard be the one to console his daughter.
He crouches in front of her, pulling her into his arms as she hugs a moose-print pillow tightly to her chest.
“Did you know I tried to reach out when I was eighteen?” She sniffles. “I called Mom and invited you to the small wedding Logan and I were finally having. I was so excited and ready to bury the hatchet. Start over. Let you back into our lives. Remi was the cutest little ring bearer with his suspenders and shiny shoes.” She smiles fondly at me even though I know this hurts to talk about.
“She told me I was dead to her. That I had died two years earlier when I let some trash defile me and then run off with him.”
Richard makes a choking sound in the back of his throat, and I sit forward quickly, worried he’s about to have a fucking heart attack or some shit.
Mom doesn’t miss a beat, though. She just keeps landing blows.
“I mean, honestly, Dad. What did y’all even tell people when your sixteen-year-old daughter just disappeared?”
He clears his throat and shifts back, releasing Mom from his arms. “You won’t like it.”
“Tell me.”
“She told her friends that you were out of control, got pregnant, and we sent you off to get help while you finished your schooling.”
Mom scoffs. “And after that?”
“Then, she told everyone you moved to Michigan and that we visited you occasionally. No one really thinks anything of it anymore. There are only a few people who know the truth.”
“Who?” Mom demands, her spunky attitude coming back in full swing.
“We can talk about that later, Rainy.”
“No. Let’s just finish this conversation now and be done. I’d like to move on from this and not wallow in the past,” Mom insists.
Grandpa sighs deeply before saying, “The De Luca brothers. Their father, too, God rest his soul. I see Sterling regularly, and until recently, it’d been close to ten years since I’d seen Otto.”
“Otto. . .” Mom says somewhat wistfully, and I dart my eyes to her right before she dropsanotherfucking bomb. Another secret. “I should have chosen him over your father. He was ready to raise you as his son.”
“Ma, what thefuck?”
Is she really for real right now?
“Otto was one of my best friends. When I found out I was pregnant with you, he begged me to stay. Said he’d raise you as his own. How could I do that to him? To a sixteen-year-old boy? No way. Your father was a sweet talker, said we would build a family together. Just the three of us. And I believed him. Not to mention I just needed to get out of Hunter Springs. It was toxic for me, physically and mentally, and I loved you so much, baby,” she says, smiling sadly at me. “I made a decision, and there’s nothing else to say.”
“And you just cut him out of your life after an offer likethat? Ma, that’s fucking cold-hearted.” I feel bad for the guy now.Jesus Christ, she tore this town up when she left. And I can’t help but feel some residual guilt for it.
“Remi. Do you really think your father would have allowed me to keep in touch with aboyfrom home?” She smiles regretfully, and yeah, she’s got a good point. He didn’t let her keepanyfriends.
“No wonder you and Otto jumped into things so fast.” I had no idea they had so much history. A horrible thought strikes me, and I just need to be sure. “He’s. . . he’s not my. . . I mean, there’s no chanceOttocould be my father, right?”
She chuckles, and it lightens the tense atmosphere in the room. Even Gramps relaxes his uneasy posture.
“We would only be so lucky, baby. But no, we were never together like that in high school.”
“Okay. Just needed to make sure.” I mean, we do kinda look alike.
“We can move on from this and heal. I know we can,” Richard says earnestly. “We’re all each other has, and we’re in this together.”
Gramps is right, and I’m not going to let my scumbag father take this away from us. This ismyfamily now. And Lincoln and Otto are included in that.
