Page 83 of Love and Lies

“What?” It was foolish to argue with her, I knew, but I shook my head. “There’s no point in blaming Valerie. They’re both dead. And nobody knows exactly what happened.”

“She bewitched him,” Trish hissed bitterly. “You know it, and yet you still talk as if wasn’t plain as day. Today of all days—really? Do you have absolutely no respect for your brother?”

“Of course I do. I just meant—”

“What? That Adam was the one who persuaded Valerie to take cocaine? Is that what you’re trying to say?”

“No.” I tried again. “But maybe the circumstances were different from what we think. Maybe neither of them is responsible for what happened.”

“You’re defending that woman?” Trish’s voice was unusually shrill, and I knew we were on the precipice of the same argument that reared its head every year. “Why? So you’re off the hook?”

I was well aware of the logic behind the accusation, even if it lingered unspoken between us most of the time. In my mother’s eyes, Valerie was to blame over all others for the fact that Adam was dead. But next in the firing line was me, because I hadn’t come home to talk Adam out of the relationship.

“Right. Because I’d have been able to stop them being together,” I said bitterly under my breath. I’d beaten myself up about it for a long time. But ever since I’d met Helena and learned that the connection between my brother and her sister had been more than some reckless infatuation, I thought differently. Maybe out of self-preservation, like Trish said. But maybe it was also the truth. “What exactly makes you believe that? Do you really think Adam was so stupid he would have blundered into a relationship, into a marriage, just because Valerie had a pretty face?”

My mother reached for her glass. “You didn’t see what he was like. Ask Eli how Adam changed suddenly when he met her.”

“Leave Eli out of it,” I demanded before my little brother could reply. But he did anyway.

“He was happy,” said Eli quietly, squaring his shoulders as if bracing himself for the reaction that was bound to follow. “Adam was happy with Valerie.”

“That’s enough,” my mother chided him.

“But it’s true!” Eli exclaimed. “Adam was always so serious; he always took care of everyone. I used to stay over at his place all the time, and every time I woke up in the night, he would be sitting at his desk working. I asked him why, and he said he couldn’t sleep because there was too much going on in his head. It only got better when he met Valerie.”

“I told you to hold your tongue!” my mother yelled at him, slamming her hand on the table. Eli flinched, then got up and fled to his room.

“Without a doubt, you really are Mom of the Year,” I snapped, rising from my seat to go after my brother. “You must be the only person who’s ever claimed the title twenty-five years in a row.”

She didn’t reply.

I left her alone and made my way to Eli’s room. The door was closed. I knocked, but there was no response.

“It’s me,” I said, and heard a muffled reply, so I went in cautiously. Eli was lying on the bed with his back turned. I sat on the edge of the mattress and went to put my hand on his arm, but he shrugged it away.

“Leave me alone,” he said, burying his head in his pillow. “I don’t want to talk to you.”

“Okay. But I want to say goodbye before I go, at least.”

With a sudden movement, Eli turned to face me, glaring at me, his eyes shining. “That’s what you’re doing, is it?”

At first I didn’t understand what he was saying. “What do you mean?”

“You’re going.” He wiped away his tears. “Just like last time. You’d leave here tomorrow if you could. If Adam was still alive to look out for me, you wouldn’t even be here. Right?”

My throat tightened at his words. I swallowed and ducked the question. “Did Trish say that?”

“Does it matter? The only thing that matters is if it’s true.” His voice was shaky, but still more determined than I’d ever heard him. “Is it, Jess? Are you only here because you think you have to take care of me for him? Yes or no?”

What could I say? If I said yes, I was putting the burden of my unhappiness about having to live in New York on his shoulders. If I said no, I would be lying to him. And I’d sworn never to do that. Because I was supposed to be the one person in his life who told him the truth. Adam and I had promised him that years ago, and we had always stuck to it. And now it was only me who was there to keep that promise. But what price would he have to pay for it?

I took a deep breath and made my decision. “No,” I said, ignoring how much it hurt. “It’s not true.”

As soon as I said it, I knew it had been a mistake. Eli looked me in the eye and knew it wasn’t the truth. I had always been a bad liar, and he was a fucking good lie detector. How could I have forgotten?

Because you wanted to protect him.

“You can go, you know,” he said in a choked voice. “You don’t have to stay on my account. I don’t need you here.”