even get in a good swing. He didn’t even try to deny it.” His eyes

glaze over as he recollects. “Anyway, he’s been dealing for a while,

here and back home, so I thought I’d try to get him in trouble for

something. If he ever shows up, he’ll be in deep shit. On top of

growing, he had, like, five pounds stashed in his floorboards, which

is considered drug trafficking.” A ghost smile rises on his face at

the thought.

“How did you know it was there? The weed?”

“Let’s just say I took a lucky guess.”

“Didn’t the police question you?”

“I called in an anonymous tip.”

I’m grateful, but also really sad. Warm tears force their way

out from my eyes and I turn my head so he won’t see me cry.

Kayden starts to open the door, but I shake my head and then shut

my eyes as the tears stream out. If Caleb ever comes back, he’ll be

in trouble. If not, he’ll roam around free. Regardless, my brother

did this for me and I’ll be eternally grateful.

“Thank you,” I whisper, wiping my tears away with the sleeve

of my coat.

“Don’t thank me,” he mutters and I detect a hint of guilt in

his tone. “It doesn’t fix anything.”

“It’s not your fault,” I say, drying off the last of the tears and

then I look at him. “It’s not.”

He doesn’t respond, instead rising to his feet. “But it kind of

is, you know. I feel like we all kind of saw what we wanted to see

and I blamed you all that time for making everyone in the family

stressed.”

I stand up too and brush the snow off the back of my jeans.

“People generally do see what they want to see, but it doesn’t

make them bad.”

He presses his lips together and then runs his fingers

through his overly long hair. “Yeah, I guess so.” He huffs out a

breath and then blinks as he looks at me, changing the subject. “So

are you headed back to school?”

I nod and walk backward toward the truck, staying in my

footprints to keep from sinking in the snow. “Yeah, school starts on

Monday.”

He gazes at the people in the truck. “Are you driving back

with them?”

Smiling, I nod. “Yes.”

“With a bunch of dudes?”

“Yes.”

“Is that safe?”

My smile expands into a face-consuming grin. “I’m safer in

that truck than I am anywhere else.”

He crooks his eyebrows at me with cynicism. “Well, okay

then.” I wave at him as I start to turn, when he calls out, “I’ll let you know what happens.”

Glancing over my shoulder, I nod again, knowing all I can do

is hope everything will work out, that I’ll get a little bit of justice and Caleb will have to pay. But no matter what happens, I spoke

up, made a voice for myself, freed the haunting memories that

have owned me every day for the last six years. I found my

courage.

Kayden

“I don’t fucking understand” are the first words that leave my

lips when I enter my house. It’s empty. Cleared of all the furniture, pictures, books, plates, and food, and the cars aren’t even in the

driveway. The floor is bare of rugs and the few dressers that are

left have been emptied out as well, including my clothes. My

parents took them too, probably to punish me for existing.

“They even took the blinds down,” I say, astounded, turning

in a circle in the living room. “Why would they do that? I mean,

there’s no for-sale sign, no nothing.”

Callie steps up beside me beneath the chandelier and right

in front of the bulky marble fireplace and she threads her fingers

through mine, giving my hand a squeeze. “They never mentioned

they were moving?”

I shake my head slowly, her hand feeling so diminutive in

mine, yet enormously comforting. “I haven’t even seen my dad

since he beat the shit out of me.” I think about the itinerary papers in the trash bin. “Did they just bail?”

“What about your brother?” she asks. “Could he still be here?

Maybe he knows where they went.”

Shaking my head, I tug her with me as I rush toward the

open front door. I trot down the stairs and round the corner of the

house to the basement. Kicking the snow out of the way from the

front door, I grab the doorknob.

It’s not like I’m upset I’ll never see them again. I’m pissed off

because I was starting to warm up to the idea of pressing charges

and now… “I have no idea what’s going on,” I mutter as I open the

basement door and find that that room is empty too. The leather

sofa Callie, Luke, and I played truth on is the only thing that

remains. The mini fridge, the television, and the futon are missing. I walk in, still clinging onto Callie’s hand and it soothes the

loneliness and feelings of abandonment rising up in my body.

I stand in the entryway with my jaw hanging open, just

staring at the room I spent countless days hiding out in. “What the

fuck?” I don’t move or breathe. I can’t even think straight as my

thoughts become jumbled. There’s a crack in the wall just outside

the farthest corner where my dad rammed my head through the

Sheetrock and then didn’t patch it up correctly. I had a concussion

from a “collision with another player on my baseball team” my

mom had told the doctors. There’s a hole in the carpet that was

once hidden by a recliner. Tyler had dropped his lighter when he

was smoking weed and it had burned a hole. To cover it up from

my dad, we’d moved the recliner over it.

“Can you try and call them?” Callie asks. “Maybe not your

parents, but you could try your brother.”

I shake my head in disbelief. How can this be happening?

How can he walk away to Puerto Rico or Paris or wherever he

ended up? And why? It’s not like he’d definitely be in trouble if I

spoke up. He could easily deny it.

“I don’t get it,” I mutter, turning back to Callie. Her hair is

twisted in a clip at the back of her head and pieces of her bangs

frame her face. Her lips are turning purple because the low

temperature in the room almost matches the winter air outside.

“We should go,” I say, shaking my head as I attempt to sort

through my rapid, disorganized thoughts.

She tightens her grip on my hand and holds me in place.

“Are you sure? We could look around and see if we could find

some clues or something.”

I sigh. “Callie, this is real life. There won’t be any clues, and

even if there are, none of it matters. To anyone. It’s better if I just walk away from it… move on.” I feel the hole inside my chest

developing again and the need for infliction is surfacing. “I really