Homewrecker

06 - 𝓽𝓮𝓶𝓹𝓸𝓻𝓪𝓻𝔂

I stayed in the McKnight's locked bathroom for almost two hours according to my phone, ignoring when Indie and then her mom came knocking on the door, asking me to open it, at least talk to him, but I never answered either of them. I never even said anything when her little brother T.J. came tugging on the doorknob before he went to bed, complaining to his mom that he had to brush his teeth when she told him to just go to bed.

I sat slumped against the edge of the bathtub, reading the backs of shampoo bottles, sniffing the insides of candles with burnt wicks, wetting toilet paper and wiping down the toothpaste stains on the inside of the sink. I was used to this, waiting whoever stood outside the door out, except it was usually my mom, who gave up easily. She cried, pleaded, begged, and then became so exhausted she fell asleep somewhere, staying there until afternoon the next day, and by then, I was usually sort of over it. Enough to at least walk into the kitchen and pop a slice of bread into the toasted that normally burned rather than toasted.

I wasn't used to someone actually waiting, resolved, determined. Which was why, when I finally stepped out at around nine in the evening, I wasn't expecting someone to be sitting on the bottom step down the carpeted staircase in front of the second story bathroom.

I also really wasn't expecting it to be David Soliday either.

He glanced over his shoulder at the sound of the door hinges creaking, a slight glimpse of his profile as he craned his neck, and I thought about bolting down the hallway into Indie's bedroom, a sliver of light extending onto the floor in front of it. He stood up as I considered this, turning to face me, and shadows stretched over the lines in his expression.

"I heard about the tornado," he explained, as if I had asked him what he was doing here. "I went to the command post at the school and they said you were staying here. They also told me that you couldn't find your mom."

I shrugged, looking away from him. "So?" I muttered. "I will. You can go."

There was a pause. "You don't have anywhere to stay. I went by the trailer."

I weakly gestured with my hand around the hallway, the banister, staircase. "I'm staying right here, right now. I'll find Mom and we'll get another trailer or something. We don't need you here."

"Bronwyn, if we can't find your mom, I'm your closest relative."

The words carried an old ache, an old sting, a familiar wound reopened. Closest relative. Not dad or father or even sperm participant. Closest relative. "If I can't find her, I'll go just live with my grandma in Pennsylvania. I don't need my closest relative."

Something twitched in his expression as he heard me say this. "Your grandmother died in 2001," he pointed out.

I frowned, wondering for a moment about how he could've known that. "I meant my step-grandmother. I don't get technical. Family's family, right?"

It was a subtle movement, but his head jerked back somewhat, something flaring his eyes as he looked at me before glancing away. "I'm here now," he said after a long moment, his voice lower than it had been before, like he was holding something back from me. "And you don't have a step-grandmother either. Your mom never met her dad."

I widened my eyes, sardonically. "Wow. Talk about the circle of life, huh?"

"Bronwyn," he sighed, rubbing a hand over his jaw, and for a moment, in a part so far deep down, in a place I wouldn't admit existed, I was almost kind of satisfied. "I'm sorry, but you don't really have a choice here. You have to come back with me."

I blinked, all the feelings swirling in my chest—weird satisfaction, anger, aching, scorn—it all came to a breaking, screeching halt. "Wait, what?"