Javi, Come Home

CHAPTER ONE

      Javi's mother is dead, so he must be coming home.

      He has to because to not come home is unthinkable. And even though Tatum Rowe stopped knowing Javi the day he packed up and left, he still thinks — no, he still believes that the Javi he grew up with didn't burn that day. It was just everything else that did. And the Javi he grew up with loved his parents deeply and would see his mother off.

     But his mother's terminal diagnosis had not bought Javi home, and Tatum had expected it then, too. Was on edge for days, certain he'd stop by the Castillo's and Javi would be sitting at the kitchen table, spooning soup into his mother's mouth, urging her to eat some more.

     Tate's imagined it, spent way too much time playing with this thought. Javi would return and they'd share this thing, caring for their ailing mothers, and it'd be like the last seven years never happened. There'd be no hole between them, only bridges.

     Despite every reason he shouldn't, Tatum started expecting things again. Because it was Lena and for however Javi may have felt about him (unwarranted, he couldn't help but think) this was his mother. He thought he'd be there for her.

     It doesn't matter now. Lena was sick, and then she was sicker, and then she was gone. He blinked, and it was over. Oscar was standing on his porch, clutching his hat to his chest as he said, "My Lena passed this morning."

     It's the morning of the funeral and Tate feels like he may throw up. Javi is going to be there and he's going to see Javi for the first time in seven years.

      This will be his only return home since he left, for his only mother's funeral, and so Tate will relent only slightly, given the circumstances. He will walk up to the boy he does not miss, never missed, could not care less about, and he'll say, sorry for your loss. He'll mean it because Lena was...Lena was a second mom, and a mom to all. She was a force of a woman.

     So he'll say it and he'll mean it. And then he'll turn away. He won't look back. He'll take a page out of Javi's playbook.

     For a long time, Tate thought he would never see Javi again. The years passed and the feeling that he lost something he'd forgotten he ever had grew. Hope this thorn nestled in the slots of his ribcage, pushed to the surface with every breath but still trapped under skin and sinew.

     He's shaking as he dresses, fumbling with the top button of his shirt, deciding against his tie. He hasn't been anxious about his appearance in years. His work doesn't call for it and everyone in this town knows very well what he grew into. But now he's wondering if he should've had his hair trimmed or let some facial hair grow in.

     There's a knock at his door. It's open and Pepper's standing there, dressed in dark blue scrubs, leaning against the frame. She drags her eyes across him. He wants her to tell him he looks nice but they aren't friends like that.

     "Your mother's ready," she says. "She's having a hard day. I wouldn't keep her out long."

     Tate nods, thanking her quietly. Pepper stares at him, assessing, and then turns away. They aren't close, often do not see eye to eye on his mother's care. But Pepper does a lot of good for his mom, who doesn't want Tate caring for her.

     He reaches for his cologne on his dresser, two spritz behind each ear before he sets it back down. Seven years, he thinks again. It's already been seven years.

     Tate goes downstairs, finding his mother in the living room, near the windows in her wheelchair. "Morning mom," he says forcefully chipper.

     When he told her about Lena, she'd dropped her head and he watched the tears dangle from her chin. He couldn't imagine what it must feel like, getting older, your body giving up on you, your friends dying off like a lousy murder mystery novel. And then there was none, and then there was just you.