“Then who did tell her?” Eli asks.
I keep eye contact with him and purposely ignore that Violet exists. For all her faults in the past few months, I still love her and I will never rat her out. I’ll protect her because that is what family does. “You either tell Emily the truth before she goes home or I will.”
I show Eli my phone containing her numbers and a muscle in his jaw ticks.
“That is not your decision to make,” he says.
“Since I’m in love with her, it is my decision.”
It’s like the air is sucked out of the room as Eli and I glare each other down. I sense the million questions forming in everyone’s mind, but Olivia sticks with what’s currently important. “I’ve told you before, Oz, you don’t know the whole truth.”
“Does anyone? Emily’s right. This entire family is messed up and dying. We all have cancer, problem is it’s the lies that are making it fester.”
I yank my keys out of my pocket. “Because I have always respected you, Eli, you have until she touches down in Florida to make it right with Emily or I’ll tell her the version I do know. Then you and Meg can decide on whatever lie you’re going to tell next.”
I told Emily that I never said I love you before and I was serious. Not to some girl and not to anyone else in my life. I decided to tell her because, to be honest, I don’t know if I’ll ever see her again. Looking at Olivia as she watches her family implode, I finally understand that Emily isn’t the only person I’m going to lose.
I wrap my arms around Olivia and it doesn’t take long for her to hug me back. I kiss her cheek. “I love you.”
She presses her lips to my cheek and whispers, “I love you more.”
A lump forms in my throat and as fast as I let the moment happen, I abandon it and walk out the door.
Emily
MY BIOLOGICAL FATHER tried to kill my mother’s brother. My biological father tried to kill my mother’s brother. I flip the cell in my hands over and over again as I complete the thought. It’s one in the morning. Oz tore off on his motorcycle a long time ago and like he promised he hasn’t contacted me. Yet I flip the phone over again.
My biological father tried to kill my mother’s brother.
No wonder Mom ran and never looked back. No wonder she never told me about this and she refuses to discuss the past. How do you get over someone you loved trying to kill your family?
I’ve sat on the window seat watching the party aftermath. The clubhouse is still lit up like runway lights. The bonfire that had been raging before has now simmered down to where the logs glow red. A few stragglers hang out in the clubhouse and around the yard, but most everyone left shortly after my screaming fit with Eli.
Eli has stayed in the same spot since after Oz left and while I hate to admit it, it’s the reason why I’m sitting here. He leans a shoulder against one of the massive Lincoln log poles and peers out into the yard. Occasionally, he smokes a cigarette and I’ll watch as the red butt burns brightly in the dark night, but mostly he stands there and stares. All seventeen stars still on his arm. All the questions in my mind unanswered.
I know more now than I have before and yet the truth still eludes me.
My biological father, the man who treats me like a princess, the man who taught me how to drive his truck, tried to kill my mother’s brother.
It doesn’t make sense. None of it makes sense.
In less than twenty-four hours I’ll be heading home and I don’t trust anyone to tell me the truth...not my mother, not my father, not anyone. A few weeks ago, I believed everything my parents said, now I’ll second-guess.
My biological father tried to kill my mother’s brother.
I slip off the window seat and crack the door to my room. Once in the hall, I spot Cyrus asleep in his recliner with his hand extended over, touching the top of Violet’s head. She’s curled up in a ball on the couch also sound asleep.
My heart flashes with a quick ache. I never knew they were close, but as things go around here, I don’t know much of anything.
I move down the hallway and pause in the doorway of Olivia’s room. Her light is on and she’s tracing a picture in a photo album.
“I lost a son once,” Olivia says without looking up. “His name was James. He was restless living in Snowflake and died in an accident in Louisville. He never met his own son. Never knew that a woman was pregnant with his child. In a sad, pathetic tribute, we named your elephant after him.”
She removes a photo from the album and holds up the one she had shown me when I first arrived. It’s of me and her and pink, fuzzy James.
“You sent me on this bizarre scavenger hunt so I could find out that your surviving son is an attempted murderer.”
“No. I did this so that you and Oz would end the vicious cycle and stop making the same damn mistakes of the generations that came before you, me included.”
“My mom left. She broke the cycle. Me returning here, it’s messed everything up.”
She slams the album shut. “All your mother did was run and all she’s taught you is to run. Running is still running. It doesn’t matter if it’s a physical move from one place to another or if it’s to within yourself.
“Yes, her leaving Snowflake, marrying Jeff, placing you in a padded bubble of a world did give you opportunities you would have never had here, but it didn’t get rid of the problem. You’re still doomed to repeat the same mistakes your mother and your father made. You do it now. You ignore the truth, the world around you, in order to keep your illusions of safety. That’s not living, Emily. The only way for you to break free is to understand the past so you don’t continue to follow in their footsteps.”
I cross my arms over my chest. “So Mom was in the wrong on this? She was wrong to run from a man who tried to kill her brother?”
Olivia closes her eyes and I’m reminded how sick she is when she presses her fingers to her forehead. My stomach completely drops. “I still don’t want you to die.”
A bitter smile pulls at her lips. “I still don’t want to die, either. There’s more to the story and I’m praying that Eli will tell you before you leave.”
Of course there is and of course she won’t tell me and part of me understands why. I’ve lost respect for my parents—my mom and my dad—and they’re going to have to work to get that trust and respect back. The three of us have time, but Olivia, she doesn’t.