Revive Me (16 page)

“It’s a long story.”

“Shorten it then.” There was more to the story, and I needed to know why Reese had looked so pissed at him. The altercation and chaos was pulling away my high, and I was falling back into reality.

He groaned. “He dated this girl for awhile.”

“Alexa?”

“My shortening it means I’m not naming names. I’ll tell you the story, but you aren’t getting specifics.”

“Fine, carry on,” I said, waving my hands through the air.

“He treated her like shit, cheated on her all the time, and got into some heavy shit. Eventually, he ended up taking her down that road with him. He had her drinking, doing drugs, and doing whatever he wanted her to do. I came across her crying at a party one night. She was so messed up she could barely stand.”

“Sounds familiar,” I said quietly.

He nodded his head in agreement. “She was hysterical and crying about Reese hooking up with some other chick upstairs. I’ve known the girl since she was little, we’d all grown up together, and I wasn’t leaving her alone like that. I didn’t give a shit if she was my brother’s girlfriend or not. I was only giving a shit about her. So I put her in my car and drove her to my place to crash. I slept on the futon and let her have the bed. Reese stumbled in the next morning, still wasted and high off his ass, and flew off the handle. He always thought she’d be there, no matter what terrible shit he did to her or to himself. But she finally grew tired of his shit. I want you to do the same thing.” He looked away from the road and stared directly at me.

“He probably needed an explanation,” I said quickly, averting the attention away from me. “I’m sure it looked bad.”

He shook his head. “Reese isn’t as dumb as he leads people to believe. He put his hands on her. I interfered, and that’s why he thinks something happened. He’s so fucked up he believes that only a guy sleeping with a girl would protect her. Now he wants nothing to do with her and he blames me for their break-up.”

“Why does she still hang out him if he did all of that?”

“She’s a strong girl. She acts like nothing bothers her. But deep down, she still feels love for him. He was her first boyfriend, her first love, and there’s always something about the bad boy that wronged you. For some reason, you girls always love them.”

I grabbed an old water bottle sitting in the cup holder and took a drink. “So you’re not a bad boy?” I asked.

He slowly braked at a stop sign. “I’m not anything. I’m not a fan of labels, but I’m nothing like my brother. My dad isn’t around to look out for him half the time, so I try my best to help him out.” He turned right and cruised down the street.

“But you buy him alcohol?”

“I don’t buy him shit. He has a fake.”

“Why would he lie about that?”

“Probably because he didn’t want you to know how often he frequents bars and gets wasted.”

I avoided his eye contact and looked out the window. I watched dead leaves fall to the ground to their new home. What a simple way to go. You die along with everyone you’re surrounded with, fall onto a beautiful setting, and then get blown away for a short ride.

“Oh,” I said quietly. In a way, I felt bad for Reese. Maybe that was in his past. Maybe he was trying to change.

“You realize now why you need to stay away? I know he’s my brother, but like I said, you’re a good girl, and you know it. You can tell just by looking at you you’re dealing with some heavy shit. That’s obvious, but he will break you, girl. He will make your problems ten times worse without you even realizing it until it’s too damn late. He’s fucking toxic. He will poison you.”

“Maybe he’s changed,” I said hurriedly. “He says he hasn’t met a girl like me before.”

He snorted, his dark eyes blinking. “I hope you’re smarter than that.”

“I don’t know what I am anymore,” I grumbled.

We pulled up to my house, and he turned in his seat to look at me. “Look, take my advice, don’t take my advice, it’s up to you. If you feel like Reese can help you get away from whatever you’re going through, then fine, whatever. Just be careful and don’t tread so deep you drown.” His phone beeped, and a black truck pulled up behind us. “That’s my ride. Be careful, and I hope you find what you’re looking for. I hope you get happy before you let my brother ruin you.” He swiftly jumped out of my car and got into the truck.

I sighed, tossing my head back against the headrest. I didn’t understand anything anymore. Everyone was warning me away from Reese like he was some boogeyman creeping under my bed at night, but he made me feel so safe. It hurt me to think about what it would feel like losing him, losing the way he made me feel, and the attention he was giving me. A single tear fell down my cheek. I was different. That’s what he said, and I believed him until it hit me when I was walking through my front door. And I felt like such an idiot when it did. Reese had his lips and hands everywhere on my body, but not once did he kiss me on the lips.

“Get up!” A voice yelled, startling me, and I quickly jumped from my bed. The room was dark, and I shook my head to be sure I wasn’t dreaming. I winced, when the light was suddenly turned on, my eyes burning and sensitive to the bright light now shining above me. I noticed my mom standing in my doorway, looked at my alarm clock, and fell back down on my bed.

“It’s four in the morning,” I said, raising my arm up to block the light from my eyes “Go back to bed.” She had to be drunk. What a good combination we were. I was hung over and she was drunk.

“Your father’s in jail,” she spat, and I moved my arm away to see if she was kidding.

“What?” I asked, still in shock from her words. My dad, the professional, well-respected lawyer, was in jail? I moved my hand to look up at her. She was in her pajamas. Her hair was a mess on top of her head. I remembered the woman I’d once admired, the woman who helped me with my homework and with my hair before school dances. That woman was gone. She’d died alongside Tanner.

“Your dad got arrested,” she spat. “Now, get up.”

“Dad’s in jail? Are you sure?” She’d drunk too much. There was no way.

“Yes, your friend’s piece of shit father arrested him for drunk driving. Years of friendship with those people, and he pulls this shit on us. After everything!” She threw her hands up in the air.

This wasn’t good. Daisy’s dad was the sheriff in our town. My parents had been friends with Daisy’s since they were in grade school. They’d all grown up together. My parents had been in their wedding and vice versa. We vacationed together, and we celebrated birthdays together. Every great memory I had, Daisy and her parents were always included. But her dad couldn’t be blamed. My dad was the one who got behind the wheel drunk. Daisy’s was just doing his job.

“Let me get dressed, and I’ll go with you to bond him out,” I told her, wanting her to calm down, so I could diffuse the situation. She couldn’t go into the jail screaming like a manic.

Tears trailed down her face. “Thank you, sweetie. I don’t know what I’d do without you,” she said softly. “I’ll go get dressed and meet you downstairs.” I swallowed the large lump in my throat. Seeing my mom like this was heartbreaking.

I jumped up from my bed, threw on some yoga pants, and raced down the stairs to find my mom waiting on me.

“You should probably let me drive,” I suggested, holding my hand out for the keys dangling from her finger, when I smelled her breath. The last thing I needed was for both of my parents to be in the drunk tank tonight. I’d slept my alcohol off, but I could still smell hers.

She set the keys in my palm and followed me into the garage. I got into the driver’s side of her SUV, and she jumped into the passenger seat. I opened the garage door and geared the car into drive.

“Do we need to go to a bail bondsman or to the jail?” I asked, pulling onto our street. I’d heard stories about people getting DUIs before when I’d been at Daisy’s, but I wasn’t sure how the process worked.

“Let’s try the station first,” she said. I looked over at her to find her shaky hands clasped together in her lap.

“You know they can’t just let him go.” I didn’t want her to get her hopes up.

“There’s no way David is going to make him stay overnight. No way,” she said, sounding like she was trying to convince herself more than anything.

“Okay,” I drew out, still not sure it was a good idea. There was no way, friend or not, David was going to let him walk out there, still intoxicated, with no repercussions. He was a good man and a friend to our family, but he was no pushover and never broke the law for people. Even if it was people he loved.

“You want to talk about why you quit your job?” I asked, taking advantage of the situation. I’d gotten a phone call from a co-worker of hers asking if she was okay. When I’d asked why, she told me she hadn’t shown up for the past week. No call, no show. If one more shift went uncovered, she’d be fired.

“Now is not the time, Tessa,” she declared, rummaging through her purse and popping a breath mint.

“It’s never a good time,” I grumbled. “You got fired from your job, Dad’s been arrested, and our family doesn’t even talk to each other. What’s going to happen next? We go broke, lose the house, and have nowhere to go? Because that’s what our future is looking like right now.”

“I didn’t get fired, I quit. I told Millie I couldn’t handle it anymore.” Mille was the owner of the pharmacy she worked at. “She understands.”

I turned right into the police station and parked in an open spot. “So are you going to be looking for another job?”

“Not at the moment. We have plenty in our savings account, your father is still working to make money, and I need a break. Eventually, I’ll get back into the work force. I just need time.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. I was beginning to resent my own mother. “It’s been months. I’m back at school, and so is Derrick. I know what you’re going through, what we’re all going through,” I corrected, she wasn’t the only person dealing with this. “It’s hard, but you can’t break down and not live. You can’t die, too.”

A tear trickled down her cheek. “Don’t try to talk logic to me. You’ll never know the hurt of losing a child until you’re a mother. I miss him every single second of the day. When you two were born, I prayed to God I’d never have to bury one of my babies. But he didn’t listen. He only gave me seventeen years before he took him away. Seventeen years! That’s nothing.” She slammed her hand against the glove compartment and cried out in agony.

I fidgeted in my seat and undid my seatbelt. If it were in the past, I’d lean over, wrap her in my arms, and console her like she’d done for me so many times. But now? I had no idea what to do with this stranger. She continued to cry, and I finally patted her arm a few times.

“Can you please go see if they’ll release him?” She sniffled. “I can’t go in there like this.”

I knew this was going to happen. “I don’t think they’ll release him to a minor.”

“Just do it!” she shrieked, and my hand shot away from her.

“Fine,” I snapped. I should’ve been more sensitive to her emotions, but she was selfish. She only cared about the fact that she was hurting. I was seventeen and heading into the police station at four in the morning to try to persuade an officer to release my drunk driving dad from his cell because she “couldn’t take it.”

“This isn’t going to go well,” I whispered to myself, grabbing the door handle to the glass door and walking into the station’s lobby.

“Tessa,” David said, moving around the front desk in his uniform, a phone in his hand, and a worried expression on his face. It’d been months since I’d seen him. “Please tell me you’re not here for your dad.”

“I am,” I said, embarrassed.

“I’m sorry honey,” he said, his tone gentle, “but I can’t release him.” He looked past me. “Where’s your mom?”

I swallowed hard and clutched my arms to my chest. “She’s out in the car.”

“Maybe you should ask her to come in.”

“Yeah, she’s heaving a breakdown at the moment.”

“Shit,” he hissed under his breath. “I’m sure she’s angry at me. Look, I can’t let him go. I could lose my badge, and I won’t risk the safety of our town. He has to stay in there for the rest of the night. When he’s sobered up, your mom can post bail.” Great, my mom wasn’t going to be happy about this news.

“Can we please bail him out tonight? I’m driving, I’ll put him in bed, and no one will get hurt,” I asked, hopefully.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t let him go anywhere tonight.” He paused for a moment. “And it’s too late for you to be out. Do you want me to take you guys back?”

“I’m good, thanks.” If my mom saw him, she’d probably scratch his eyeballs out.

“I want you to text me when you get home to assure me you’ve made it home safely. Tell your mom to call me in the morning, and I’ll let her know when he can be released. You don’t need to be worrying about this stuff.”

“Thanks,” I whispered, turning around and heading back outside.

“And Tessa?”

I twisted around to look at him. “Yeah?”

“If you or Derrick need anything, and I mean anything, don’t hesitate to call Janis or me. We’re all still family.”

“I know.” I opened up the door and headed out into the dusk, staying in line with the parking lot lights overhead, until I made it back to the car.