Page 96 of Malice and Surrender
“Yeah, I do.” Pushing open my door, I got out before she could question me any further.
Her movements were tentative, like she expected a zombie to reach up and grab her from the ground. I made a growling noise at her, and she jumped and yelped.
“You’re an asshole,” Raine said as I laughed at her.
“They’re dead, Peaches, and trust me, even when you want them to, they don’t come back,” I said and held her gaze that softened. “Come on, over here.” I tugged on her hand and led the way to where my family was buried. Well, the family I loved, anyway.
I pulled her to a stop in front of the black granite wall. Lifting my hand, I ran my finger over the three names, and Raine followed it as I did.
“Janice Everly, my mother. Everly was her maiden name, and I was named after her. My father was a dick, and my stepfather was worse, so I took her name. Chad, my fifteen-year-old brother, and Shannon, my twelve-year-old sister.” My hand dropped from the wall, and I walked over to the low crypt beside it. I placed the pizza box on top before turning to Raine. “Do you need a hand to get up?”
“You want to sit on that?” she asked, her voice low and horrified.
“Do you really think whoever this dude was cares? Besides, I sit here all the time, and no one has struck me with lightning. Come on, up you go,” I said and held out my hands like a step.
Raine stared around as if someone would come down the dark path screaming that we were going to hell. She tentatively stepped up and placed her hands on the top of the flat roof of the crypt. With a push, she jumped up and sat down with her legs swinging over the edge. I took a few steps back and jumped, using the tomb on the right to push off and up, and landed on the roof of the one Raine was sitting on.
“Holy shit! How did you do that?”
I laughed as I sat down beside her and flipped open the pizza box. It was so quiet here, and I loved coming and just letting my mind wander. I wrote two number-one hits in this cemetery.
“I used to dabble in parkour. I was pretty good, but Avro made it look easy.” I nudged the box in her direction. “Try it.”
She picked up a piece and stared at it like it might bite before taking a tiny little nibble off the end. I smirked as her features lifted into a smile, and she took another bite. Soon she was eating it and letting out little moans with each mouthful.
“Told ya. The man is a genius with his flavors.”
“This is incredible,” she smiled and then looked around. “Can I ask what exactly we are doing here, Jace?”
I ate another slice of pizza and stared at the lines of names I could no longer make out from here, but I knew exactly where my family’s names were.
“I’m going to tell you why I was so angry earlier.” I glanced at Raine from the corner of my eye. Taking a deep breath, I started telling the story that seemed so unbelievable that it had been aired across the country, so I relived it in every time zone.
“As I said, my dad was a dick—my biological father, I mean. He had a boatload of money but took off on my mom when I was seven with his secretary. Do you get any more cliché than that?”
“Oh wow. I’m sorry, Jace.”
I smiled and looked over at Raine. “Oh, Peaches, that’s not even the main course. That’s the appetizer to the appetizer, so you may want to hold off on your sympathy until I’m done.”
She bit into her slice of pizza and narrowed her eyes like she was tempted to say something but held her tongue. I was mentally daring her. Not that I needed a reason to fuck her right here on the crypt, but I should finish the story first. Then…we’d see.
“Anyway, it was just as well. He liked to smack us around when he was in one of his moods. It didn’t happen all the time, but it happened, and my mom was terrified. He had her so scared that she breathed a sigh of relief when he took off and sent her divorce papers. She’d joke with her friends on the phone when she didn’t know that I was listening that she’d never signed something so fast in her life.”
A car driving past the cemetery blared its horn at someone else, but we couldn’t see what was happening, just heard the loud, fuck you. That’s kind of how I felt all the time, like I was trapped inside a large area while the rest of the world revolved around me, except with Avro.
“Sometimes I wonder if that prior relationship with my bio-dad tainted how she saw people. Like she couldn’t judge who was good anymore, so she decided just to be really nice to everyone. She was always nice, but I think her asshole meter was broken. Then again, so was mine.”
I closed my eyes and let the memories I never wanted to think about race to the surface.
“My mom was the best. She was this amazing, warm, caring person and just a little too good. She was the type who never missed helping with homework and would kiss ‘booboos’ better.” I chuckled. “I can still hear her voice and how ridiculous she sounded when she’d say that. She made the best cookies and never made you feel bad for your dreams. She was always telling me I could be whatever I wanted, and she’d support me all the way. My mom meant it too. It wasn’t lip service. She’d take extra shifts if it meant I could play sports and would go without new clothes or eating dinner.” I paused and bit at my lip as I pictured her beautiful smile that lit up any room.
“She was the type of mom every kid dreams of having, and she saw the best in others, even when there was no good in them to see.” Tossing the rest of my crust in the cardboard box, I leaned back on my hands and stared up at the night sky.
It was rare that it was so clear out. There wasn’t a single cloud to block out the stars. I used to wish I could be one of those stars, and I ended up a rock star instead. The universe worked in weird ways.
“When I was eight, my mom started dating Lyle, and they decided to marry after she got pregnant with Chad, and then along came Shannon. My stepfather, Lyle, was fine enough, or I thought he was, but I never really saw him as a dad.” I shrugged. “I can’t say why. He didn’t treat me any different from how he treated Chad or Shannon, but it never felt right.”
I turned my head to look at Raine, and she looked like one of the statues placed around the cemetery. She wasn’t moving or blinking, and for a moment, I wasn’t even sure if she was breathing.
