Mile marker 247 blurs past.
“I mean, Iliterallyruined her life.”
“Caleb.” Harper’s hand shoots out and squeezes my thigh. The touch electrifies every nerve ending, even through my jeans. “Caleb, that’s not true. Your mom loves you.”
I nod, stiff. “I know. I know she does. She said she’d make the same decision, no matter how many times she had to do it over. I just...” I shake my head, gutted the same way I am every time I think about it. “It’s not fair. Her future was so fucking bright. And that bastard basically groomed her.”
“Jesus, I will fuckingkillSilas if it turns out he’s scamming her after all,” Harper mutters.
“You’ll have to get in line.” But I love her even more for the fierce protectiveness. For caring about Mom.
“What about your dad?” she asks. “Did he just nope out of the picture at some point, or what? I mean, clearly he still paid for your school and stuff, but...”
“They kept seeing each other.” Each word costs me. “He paid for an apartment for my mom to stay in. Paid for me to go to the best preschools. Then the best starter schools.”
“So even if he’s not that great a guy, he clearly... loves you?”
The bitter scoff escapes before I can stop it. “That bastard doesn’t love anyone besides himself.”
I pause. “I’ve got two half-sisters. Not that I’ve ever met them. But I looked them up once.”
Harper’s confusion is obvious even without looking at her.
“He only ever paid for my upkeep because I was a boy.” My jaw flexes. “A son. To carry on his—I don’t fucking know—legacy? I certainly didn’t take his name. He’s a misogynistic asshole.”
My glare could bore holes through the front windshield.
“He groomed my mom and then trapped her. He would literally just come over, barely even say hi to me, then lock himself in her bedroom.”
“Jesus,” Harper breathes.
“I was too young to really understand what was happening, but it was all I’d ever known. I had no clueabout the financial manipulation he was holding over Mom’s head to keep her stuck there. I just knew I was so angry all the time.”
The admission hangs between us.
“I acted out a lot at school. I just had all this emotion, and I didn’t know what to do with it.”
“You? Acted out?” Harper shoots me a smirk. “What aboutthe rules?”
My head tilts. “I didn’t have the rules yet. The rules saved me.”
“How?” Genuine curiosity in her voice. She’s hanging on every word, and it makes my chest ache.
“They helped me gain control oversomethingwhen I didn’t feel in control ofanything. Bit by bit, it felt like I was getting the ground back underneath me. Rule by rule.” I say it slowly, picking through unfamiliar territory.
I’ve never really talked about this to anybody. No one at school would’ve understood. And I never really let people that close anyway. I was too busy with my rules, achieving the next thing, trying to make Mom’s dreams come true... eighteen years too late and only vicariously through me.
But still. It felt like some sort of… I dunno. Righting of a wrong?
“So what changed?” she asks. “If you were never actually a Boy Scout... when did you start being such a goody two-shoes? And how the hell did Helen suddenly get rich and ditch the asshole?”
I uncap the Gatorade from the gas station and take a long swig to buy myself time.
“Well. Mom got cancer. That’s what happened.”
“What?” Harper’s whole body stiffens.
“What?” Louder this time. “Helen had cancer? Why didn’t anybody tell me? What thefuck?”