The Secrets We Carry

Chapter Twenty | Take Me There

Adam

My hands feel sweaty as I grip the steering wheel.
I'm nervous to see Angela because of the conversation I'm about to try and have with her.
It could go many ways and we didn't know each other well enough for me to even ask her to leave.

The afternoon was spent with Liv and James trying to help coach how our conversation could go.
Bouncing ideas back and forth. We finally landed on something that might work, the truth, but it would put our secrets on someone else's shoulders.
I'm starting to wonder if that's a selfish thing to do.

As I head there now, doubt starts setting in and I'm starting to think it's a crazy bad idea.
She might think I'm insane even asking her to leave town.
As I pull into her driveway I see Angela sitting on the porch swing. Too late now to turn around.
She's rocking it back and forth with her toes barely reaching the ground to move it.
The wind catches her hair and it storms around like black clouds floating through the wind.
She looks up at my car and I catch a smile, small and fast.
I put the car in park and she makes no move towards my car.
I roll down the window leaning against it.

"You coming?" I ask her.

"How about you park your car there and yourself here." She pats the bench beside her.

I laugh turning off the car and getting out towards her.
I take a seat on the swing and she leans back removing her feet from the floor. "Now you can swing us." She smiles at me and crosses her legs. She looks like a fairy the way she's sitting, small and fragile.

"That means you move your feet back and forth." She nudges me.

I slowly move us back and forth and lean into the cushion behind me. After a few moments of silence she finally breaks it.

"So, you going to tell me why you weren't in school today?" She's looking at me and I start to lose the small amount of bravery I have left.

I know I need to tell her the truth in order to explain why we're leaving in a few months and to see if she would come with us.

"A friend needed help today." I don't look at her when I say it.

"What kind of help?" She asks, I knew she would.

"He was having some family issues and there aren't many people he could turn to about it." I look over at her our eyes meeting and I watch as understanding passes through her features.

"Don't we all." She says as the saddest smile graces her lips.

"Everything ok?" I ask her positioning myself so I'm turned towards her.

She just shrugs.

"You know you can talk to me. I know that we don't know each other very well, yet, but you can confide in me."

She looks up at me and her eyes pierce through mine like she's trying to see deep within, to see if she can actually trust what I'm saying.

She exhales. "Remember how I told you my sister went to live with my dad?"

I nod remembering our conversation.

"Well since my little sister is gone my mom figured she didn't need to be around as much." She takes a breath. "Or at all."

"What do you mean?" I ask her.

She looks down and starts playing with the lace of her shoe.

"She decided she wanted to take an extended vacation." Stopping she looks back up at me. "She left with one of her boyfriends to Europe. Told me she wouldn't be back for a few months, maybe longer. Since her work can be done remotely she could do it from anywhere." She finishes and I watch her shoulder sag.