Ignite

Chapter 34

That evening, I'm sitting on our tiny front deck, surrounded by creeper vines and basking in the rays of a setting sun, when Jake joins me. I haven't spoken to him since school, and from his expression, I know he's spent the afternoon stewing, running through every reason I could be avoiding him — and probably getting every one wrong.

There are two mugs in his hands and he holds one out to me.

"Tea?" he asks.

I take it and he sits next to me.

We're quiet for a while, watching people walk by and cars squeeze between those that are parked, manoeuvring their way up another Sydney street that's too small for the amount of traffic it carries.

"Is something going on with you and Lewis?"

My skin tingles, the ghost of Lewis's touch running along my back, across my torso, against my lips.

"No. Of course not."

Jake nods and sips his tea.

"You've been avoiding me all week, though, haven't you?"

He poses it as a question, but there's no doubt in his voice, and I know the conversation I've been avoiding is about to start.

"Yeah, kinda."

I look down at my tea, swirling it and watching the surface ripple, and Jake waits, the question in his eyes clear.

"I saw your research," I say eventually. "About how to get someone out of jail."

"You've been looking at my search history?"

"I opened the laptop and one of your searches appeared. Then, I looked. But I didn't think you were... Until then I hadn't thought to..."

My voice drops away and Jake runs a hand through his hair, a motion he only does when he's agitated or nervous. I imagine, right now, he's both.

"I know you don't understand."

"No, I don't at all."

We fall silent and I know Jake is no longer with me. Not really. His eyes aren't with our surroundings. Instead, they're somewhere down south, across the Victorian border and behind jail cell bars.

"It just helps," he says. "I feel less guilty when I'm trying, when I'm doing something for her."

"Do you really think she deserves that?"

The words loaded in a way I'd hoped they wouldn't be, that makes them sound like an ultimatum.

"Of course. She's our mum."

I swallow down the panic the simplicity of that statement ignites.

"You shouldn't," I say. "We aren't allowed to sympathise with her. Not after what she's done. She doesn't deserve it."

Jake pales, his eyes flashing with an emotion that he pushes away too fast to identify.

"Everything isn't that black and white, Claude. It could've been an accident."

"Has she told you it was?"

"No, but—"

"Then why do you think that? She would've said so when she was charged."

"I don't know," Jake says, the words running into each other. "She should've said that. That's what she should've done."

"Not if it's a lie."

Jake's eyes fill with demons and he laughs — manic, painful laughter that makes my hair rise on end.

I stare at him as he curls over, laughing until he cries. It isn't until he start shaking, the tea gripped tight and spilling over onto his shorts, that I grab him.

"Jake?" I ask softly, pulling his hands to me and trying to force their tremors to still.

But it doesn't work. Instead, he shakes harder, his laughter disappearing into wheezes that are all too familiar.

It makes me feel weary and helpless, because I recognise the warning signs of a panic attack well enough. Only I was used to recognising them in myself. Not Jake. I'd never wanted them to hit Jake.

I move over to his chair, crouching in front of him and grabbing his face, forcing him to look at me as he gasps, tears pouring down his cheeks.

"It's going to be okay, Jakey," I murmur. "I'm here, okay? I understand. Just breathe. You just need to breathe."

I'm stroking his cheeks, repeating what he's said to me a thousand times since December.

Slowly, painfully slowly, he starts to listen, to mimic my breathing, and let air back into his lungs. I watch, relieved, as the tears stop pouring, as the colour returns to his face and his knuckles unclench, and then I sit back and turn away. Because he won't want me watching as he recovers.

I'm still staring at the street when Jake sits back, resting his head against the wooden panels of the house.

"I'm sorry," he says.

"It's okay."

He's quiet for a moment and I can tell he's building to something.

"Are you ever going to forgive her?"

His words are loaded in a way I can't quite define, that makes them heavier than they should be. A group of girls walk past our house, not two metres from where we sit, and I wait until they're gone before I answer.

"She killed so many people, Jake. Whether or not she meant for it to happen, the result is the same."

"Even though she's our mum?"

"Yeah."

He stands up, his face sheened with a film of sweat, and I can tell my words have been felt, that they've hit harder than I wanted them too.

"You know I love you more than anyone else in the world, right?" he asks.

"Of course. I love you that much too."

Jake's face contorts.

"You shouldn't."

And then he walks inside, leaving me kneeling there with a heavy feeling in my chest. 

...

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- Skylar xx