Committed to You (8 page)

“So Ms. Evelyn Thompson how do you feel about Jay trying to get in your panties this evening?” Pipe held a Cuban sandwich up to her face like a microphone.

“No comment,” she said.

“And are you still in a relationship with him and Cynthia?”

“No comment.”

“Do you regret anything?”

“No comment.”

“If I ask you another question will you be punching me in my balls?”

Evie grinned. “Yes. That is a possibility I began thinking about after the first question. The probability gets higher with each one.”

“Then thank you for this lovely interview, Ms. Thompson.” He took a bite out of the sandwich.

“Pipe can you go a day without smoking?” I said more out of annoyance with him for stating my intentions out loud for Cyn to hear than even caring about the answer. Evie had figured as much on the plane. I didn’t need Cyn to realize my intentions too.

“Sounds like a topic change, but I’ll answer you. As a matter of fact, I can go a day without smoking.”

“Prove it.”

“I wasn’t high yesterday.” Pipe turned to Evie. “Or was I?”

“You were.” She leaned on him and finished the last square in the tin. “If I remember correctly. You were smoking out of a penis-shaped bong.”

“Aww, Michelangelo. My favorite one of them all.”

Cyn twisted around in her seat and rested her head on the edge. “You name your bongs?”

“Yes. After famous painters,” Pipe said. “I brought a few of my bongs with me for our initiation ceremony.”

“Initiation?” Cyn smiled.

Oh God. Here we go.

“Jay, Evie, and I are a crazy crew. You ever get what links us three to each other?”

“No.” She raised her eyebrows. “What?”

“We’re all in the Broken Heart’s Club. Each one of us lost a parent.” He placed his arms around Evie as she lounged on his chest and closed her eyes. “You’re going to be initiated tonight, so for the rest of your life when you’re feeling torn up inside and just want to scream to the world, you can call any one of us and we’re bound by blood to be there for you.”

“By blood?” Cyn formed her lips into a half smile.

“Pipe is being dramatic.” Evie stretched her arms. “There’s no blood involved.”

“There will be some cutting of the flesh.” Pipe pointed at Cyn and let out an evil laugh. “So tell us about your family. Any skeletons in the closet? Any weirdoes or hot gay cousins that you would like to introduce me to?”

“Or any hot heterosexual cousins that you want to introduce to me?” Evie added, still with her eyes closed. I was glad she had them shut while I gripped the steering wheel hard.

I see a hot cousin come her way, and I’m breaking his hot jaw.

Cyn turned around in her seat. “Nope. There’s nothing interesting about my family. And yes I have plenty of hot cousins, but I have no idea who is single or not.”

Evie chose that time to open her eyes and toss me a skeptical look in the rear view mirror. I mouthed the word,
what?
She moved those lush lips but I couldn’t make out anything she was saying.

“Oh goodness.” Evie rolled her eyes. “Cynthia, do you feel safe going back home? Is there anybody you want us to help protect you from?”

Cyn twisted her t-shirt’s fabric with her shaking fingers and bit her lip. “I’ll be fine.”

My heart broke for her. I didn’t like seeing Cyn react that way. This was why I could never walk away from her, why it wasn’t so easy to just throw her out of my life. Something about her tugged at the deepest part of me and made me yearn to protect her.

Whoever this sicko is, he better not come near her when I’m around.

“Are you sure you’ll be fine?” I asked.

“I’ll let you know if I need you.”

I didn’t say it out loud, but she needed to be as straight with me as possible. Tonight, once we checked in, I planned to have her sit down and talk to me.

Evie studied my facial expressions through the rear view mirror.

What are you thinking?

In addition to stressing over whether a predator would be preying on Cyn once again, I had the problem of losing Evie. The entire situation wasn’t fair. I faced many problems in my life. Some I recognized I couldn’t change and moved on, like my parents’ death. I’d learned for several mourning years that no matter how much I begged God and read the bible, my mom and dad wouldn’t return. I didn’t even want to consider the fact that not having Evie in my life like I craved would be one of those problems I couldn’t solve.

I checked the mirror again. Our eyes met and then she immediately closed hers.

How do I get you back?

Hours later and still high, I stuck my house key into the front door and let all four of us into my old childhood home. A numbing sensation swam throughout my body. I had no idea marijuana could do this. If I’d only known, I might’ve been one of those kids that everyone called stoners in high school. Jay begged me not to go straight to the house but sober up at the hotel. I disagreed. Now was the best time to see my family, when I walked as a numb being with no care in the world. This sensation was paradise. A sort of euphoric daze fogged up my brain. I breathed in and out as if for the first time that week, or even in my life.

Plenty of cars were already parked in my mom’s front yard and along the side street leading to the Taylors’ farm. They were our quiet neighbors who had always kept to themselves. I scanned all of the vehicles and recognized
his
car right away. He’d been texting me all day to let me know that he’d arrived in town and needed to see me.

How dare he ask to see me, after all of my begging him to leave me alone? Not even Dad’s death could force him to give me a break.

Evie captured my shaking hand and firmly gripped it. “Are you okay?”

“Yes.”

“Will you tell me who the person is so I can—”

“I’ll be fine.”

She nodded, but didn’t look satisfied at all. I more hoped she hadn’t told Jay or Pipe about my molester being a family member. Jay was already on edge, swerving in and out of traffic as well as barking an annoyed remark anytime one of us said anything to him. Once we got to the house, he’d grumbled the entire way to the front porch.

“This is a bad idea.” Jay squeezed my other hand.

In my empty living room where I’d shivered in fear as a child many times from my mom’s rage or even the lonely nights when I sank in confusion at what I’d done with
him
, I dreamed of some savior swooping down from the heavens and just taking my body away. Now I stood in the same living room, holding hands with Evie and Jay. They flanked me like guards and walled me into protection without even understanding why they protected me themselves. Pipe got in front as if the first line of defense and with all of their gestures and worried expressions I knew, in that moment, that I was loved.

I don’t know if this is what normal feels like, but this is what I always want to experience. Whatever this sensation is, I love it.

I had no doubt that my fantastic three would be there for me as much as I needed. I didn’t deserve it and had done nothing for their love, but I relished in it just the same. No one could break me with them around, and if
he
tried, I knew my group would help me put the tattered pieces of me back together again.

How do I keep them?

“Where’s everybody at?” Evie asked me.

“When there are a whole lot of people and it’s a breezy day, Mom has everybody sit in her garden. They should all be in the back.”

Jay stopped me before I could guide them all to the back door. “Don’t you think we should wait until you come down from your high before seeing your mom?”

“She won’t notice.” I put on the shades Evie had bought me at the gas station. “All I have to do is nod and say yes, and it will be normal as usual. Besides, she’s dealing with Dad’s death. Although they divorced a few months ago, she was still in love with him.”

Jay formed his lips into an angry line, but said nothing else.

“This is freaky.” Pipe pointed to the wall.

A large shelf rested in front of him. My mom’s and my dead cats throughout the years decorated the shelf. There were twenty little stuffed corpses in all. Evie and Jay exchanged glances that made me uneasy. I tried to step back and study the view as if I was a stranger, checking out the shelf of dead cats for the first time.

I guess this is a bit odd.

Chuckles escaped my mouth. My high brought the humor out the situation. Mom had put elaborate outfits on our dead cats—lacey dresses, velvet short sets, pinstripe suits, and even beaded gowns, all with matching hats, canes, and cloth shoes. The dates of their births and deaths read on tiny gold plated plaques with a paw print on the side of their names.

Pipe yanked out his phone and snapped several pictures. “You’re telling me that they were all alive and your mom had them stuffed?”

“Yes.”

“And this is just … a hobby or what?” He took a few more pictures.

“My aunt is a taxidermist. I didn’t even know that stuffing our dead pets was weird until I had my first slumber party, and all of the girls screamed when they came into the living room.”

“I’m posting this on my instagram. I mean one does not walk next to a shelf with well-dressed dead cats and
not
take a picture to share with the world.”

On the other side of the cats was a fireplace that we never used. A huge mantel hung over it and held all of my mom’s and my pageant trophies. There’d been so many, Dad had build several more shelves above the mantel to hold more of them. Mom and I pretty much looked alike. I could see it even better in these pictures. If her photos hadn’t been in black and white, then surely people would’ve been confused at which one of us it was holding our trophy.

“How many beauty pageants were you in?” Jay asked.

I cringed. “So many I hate talking about it.”

“I don’t know what trips me out more, the dead cats or the way you’re smiling in those beauty pageant pictures. It’s like you’re forcing yourself to grin through pain.” Pipe put his phone up.

I guess my beauty pageant pictures won’t make instagram.

“Well, I was definitely forcing myself to smile during the torture.” I towed Jay and Evie down a dark hall. The ceiling light must’ve needed to be changed. Usually Mom kept one on regardless of whether it was day time or not. Today it was just shadows and blackness.

Pipe followed us down the darkened passageway. “I’m starting to think Jay has a point. Maybe we should wait until we come down from our highs. I mean the stuffed cats were freaky, and now we’re going through this gloomy hallway. It’s like some sort of horror flick. It’s like Norman Bates meets that reality show Toddlers and Tiaras. I’m just feeling evil spirits radiating from the wall. I’m sensitive to things like that.”

Evie tapped him on his shoulder. He jumped and shrieked. She did her best to hold in her laughter. “Pipe.”

“Y-yes.”

“Breathe in and out,” she whispered. “Think through the paranoia. You’re just tripping right now, nothing else.”

“Everything is okay?” he asked.

“Yes, you’re with friends.” She held his hand as well as mine. “You’re just having a bad head trip right now. Come back to us.”

“So there were never dead cats in gaudy clothes?” Pipe hooked his arm around her free one and frowned.

“Umm … well the dead cats were real,” she admitted.

“And the scary beauty pageant pictures?”

“Hey, they weren’t that bad,” I said.

“Just breathe and forget about the cats, Pipe.” Jay tensed on my right as we left the darkened passageway and a glass door greeted us. It led out to the back yard, and I could see a few of my family out there in chairs.

Our house sat on five acres of land so the yard was huge. Platters of food covered a long table in the center. Several relatives lounged in chairs scattered throughout the space, chatting and nibbling their food on small plastic plates. I spotted my mom farther off in the right corner, surrounded by all five of my aunts.

“Okay, here we go.” Evie released my hand. The urge soared through me to grab it back, but I remembered that she hated for us to touch her in public.

It’s enough that she even came down here with me. I won’t push her anymore.

Jay opened the door. The hinges squeaked, and everyone’s attention turned to us

“Cynthia!” Mom shot up from her seat and dashed toward me.

It took everything in me to not roll my eyes and groan. Mom loved drama, especially when an audience surrounded her. A pink dress with a rose print at the top clung to her slim frame. She rushed to me with open arms. It was so unlike her usual bored welcomes to me. However, due to the audience, it was now time for Mom to play the stricken and widowed mother.

“I worried so much. You didn’t call me when you got in.”

“I’m sorry, Mom.”

She hurried to me with swinging arms, and then barely two feet in front of me, she gasped and swayed back. “Oh God. I just can’t deal with all of this. I just can’t. God, take me now. Just take me.”