Together

32. Taking a stand

Maybe a hundred bad days
Made a hundred good stories
A hundred good stories
Make me interesting at parties
No I ain't scared of you
No I ain't scared of you no more
-AJR

Anna can feel Kiara glaring at them from the back seat as they drive away from Victor's house. She's rubbing her forehead like the whole ordeal gave her a headache. Mike's hands remain firm on the steering wheel, and he doesn't make a move to look or speak to either of them and she can't really say she wants to do the same.

How embarrassing. Victor Shoupe didn't live on figure 8 but he was still a Sheriff's deputy, probably going to be Sheriff soon, and her husband just about hit the kid living with him. She was horrified by Mike's reaction. He wasn't like this, this isn't the person he was. That wasn't the man she married.

When they arrive home, she can feel the tension grow even thicker and she knows there is going to be a fight. Only this time, it's not going to be between her daughter and her husband.

"Kiara," Anna regards her, not showing any indication that she is leaving the vehicle and Mike pauses his movements to exit. "Go upstairs to your room."

Kiara wants to fight but something about how her mother is speaking confuses her. She's clearly upset but it doesn't feel like it's directed at her, at least not entirely. She leaves the car and heads inside, only glancing back when she notices that neither Anna nor Mike have left the car.

Anna fumes silently as Kiara heads inside. She's trying to compose herself before she speaks. This wasn't a conversation she wanted Kiara to overhear, and it certainly wasn't one she wanted their gossipy neighbors to eavesdrop in either.

Mike glances in her direction, feeling Anna's energy shift. She wasn't angry when they decided to go to Shoupe's to track Kiara down but now? Now she looked like she was ready to go ten rounds and never quit. He lets out a sigh but Anna speaks before he can comment.

"What the fuck, were you thinking?" she growls. She can't say more, not yet. Not without losing all composure she has been trying to muster during the short drive back.

"Anna—"

"Stop," she says, putting a hand up. "You grabbed him, Mike," she says in disbelief. "He's a seventeen-year-old kid and you practically attacked him!"

Mike pinched the bridge of his nose as he contemplated his actions for the first time since arriving in the driveway. He was so angry he barely registered his actions in the moment. Anna always had a way of bringing him back and holding him accountable and the disgust dripping from her words made him realize how bad the scene was.

He tried to grasp on to any excuse for his behavior but was coming up short. Everything he thought of could be argued against. There was simply no reason for it.

"I know that JJ Maybank is not the boy you want for Kiara," she continues through gritted teeth. "Believe me, I am not in disagreement with you over that. But your vendetta against him is going to cost us."

Anna thinks about the way Kiara stood by JJ. How she made her own stand, letting go of his hand and choosing to resist. JJ wasn't keeping her from them. Kiara was putting distance between them on her own. She felt she had no choice but to pick a side and she chose him.

There was a time when she would have picked her parents. She would have at least gotten into the car without that kind of standoff. And it killed Anna that she wasn't the reason Kiara got in the car. Victor was. Telling her that she had to leave, that her staying would only make things worse for him.

Anna realized that they didn't have Kiara's heart anymore. She was choosing to live out of her suitcase and couch surf before she would come home. All because Mike chose to be an absolute dickhead and Anna was tired of it. Enough. She wasn't losing her daughter over this.