After All Read online

  “Brandt?” Jess called just as Ashley pulled away.

  I turned back around to see the woman who was familiar like family, doe-eyed as ever, but also a stranger and thought, Now what do I do?

  TWENTY-NINE

  Ashley

  This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. I was supposed to fall in love with someone my own age. Someone without complications, without a whole family, and without an ex-wife. I was nauseous at the thought. Ex-wife. All those wonderful firsts wouldn’t be firsts for him. They’d be seconds. I’d be the second wife. I laughed out loud and was finally able to acknowledge that I was crying and needed to wipe away a few tears. Wife. No way I'd known him long enough to even have that thought. I needed to get a grip on myself. I had to get to work. I couldn’t keep thinking about Brandt.

  I took a deep breath, and focused on the road in front of me. Mom had been so happy for me when I told her Brandt and I had things sorted...before the ex-wife showed up.

  ”You okay, Ash?” Trevor asked from the back seat, and I jumped almost forgetting I wasn’t alone.

  Ree was still quietly processing—she’d had a rough night. Her desperate call for a ride home already had my mind and heart racing.

  “I have no idea.” And I also had no idea where to go, but my house didn’t seem like a great option. What was Brandt doing? Did he want time with her? At least the kids were with me. That was something. Was Jessica better? Would she resort to violence if Brandt cornered her or if she got frustrated?

  “I can’t believe you talked to her,” Marie finally said.

  “It was weird…” Trevor started. “She felt different. Not like I remember.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “Like she didn’t feel like Mom anymore.”

  Marie blinked and a few tears slid down her face.

  “Why don’t we get something to eat?” I suggested. Anything. I flipped my phone over to double check that I had no missed calls or texts from Brandt. Nothing. How long could it possibly take to tell someone to leave? I couldn’t think about it, but I could focus on the two kids in my car.

  “I’m not hungry.” Marie sighed.

  Before I had time to process where we were going the freeway came up and I jumped on. Now what…?

  “Where are we going?” Trevor leaned between the two front seats.

  “Right now we’re just driving.” Because it seemed like the easiest thing to clear my head.

  The sound of traffic and tires on the pavement droned through the car for what felt like hours but was probably minutes. I flipped over my phone again. Marie did the same. Probably both wondering what was happening back at her house. With her dad. And her mom.

  I’d never be their mom. And it’s not even that’s what I was aiming for, or wanting to be, but seeing Jessica made her real. She would always be around, even if it were on the periphery. With her so out of the picture when I first met them, she wasn’t anyone I’d given much thought to until I saw the file. And then she was a monster. Now she was just a person with two kids and an ex-husband. A woman who made some horrible mistakes. What did she want? Why did she suddenly show up?

  My stomach rolled over and over, and I picked up my phone to check. Again. I was going crazy.

  “What’s this?” Trevor asked.

  “What?”

  “There’s a Snapple bottle back here. It fell out of your bag.”

  Oh. Great. “That’s Josh.”

  “Whoa… What?”

  “A friend. Those are his ashes.”

  “Okay. That’s insane.” Marie’s voice had the first bits of life in it I’d heard since picking her up from the party.

  “Not insane.” I smirked, actually liking the direction our conversation was headed. I was so used to the ashes that they didn’t feel foreign to me the way they used to.

  “A little weird, Ashley. I’m kinda freaked out,” Trevor’s voice sounded wary but light enough that I knew he was okay.

  “Don’t be. Josh is good company.”

  “Explain?” Marie asked.

  And I did.

  I told them about Josh’s dad, how I hated his mom, how he’d left me his ashes and I’d let him down by not finding a place for him to rest. My heart ached as I told the story, but it felt different or better telling them. They’d get it. Him. At least in some measure. Trevor already knew parts, but not Ree.

  When I finished the car was quiet for a moment.

  “Intense,” Marie whispered.

  “I know where he needs to be,” Trevor leaned back in the rear seat, looking smug in the dim light of the car.

  “Oh. You know the perfect spot to put my friend to rest?” I asked incredulously.

  “The lake, Ashley. It’s perfect. We’re there. You’re there. You love it. We love it. Everyone loves it. We’ve already proven that we’ll all be friends, even if you and Dad… Well, I don’t even know what you two are… But it doesn’t matter.”

  My chest swelled because Trevor was exactly right. Trevor and Marie saved me the way Josh saved me. I hoped that I’d do some good in their lives, and it wasn’t about me and Brandt or love or anything. It was about people sharing histories and futures and feelings and hardships and freedom.

  “Okay.” Resolve washed through me a in a wave of relief. We’re going to the cabin.”

  “We, um… We might need food to drive that far.” Trevor chuckled.

  I sniffed a few times and wiped the tears from my eyes the rightness of it all settling in. “Done.”

  THIRTY

  Brandt

  “I’m so glad we’re talking, Brandt. You have no idea.” Jessica sighed in the passenger’s seat of her BMW. A gift from her folks, I was sure.

  I just nodded as I drove barely able to speak. The longer I was near her, the more her abandonment raked on me. Yelling would never work on Jess. Even sending her away wouldn’t have worked. Not in the long-term. I had to do something to show I was serious about her not just popping in.

  “I like the house.” She smiled a little too brightly. “Looks like you guys are doing good.”

  “Hmm.” I wanted to scream at her for what she’d put them through but knew it would get me nowhere. “Where have you been?” I asked.

  She shrugged, her too bright smile starting to fade.

  “You were only in jail for a couple of years. I was told by the court you were in an inpatient treatment a few months ago. About the time I got notice of your hearing.”

  “Yeah…” She sighed. “It all happened too young. Us. The kids. When I was let out, I needed to pretend it was just me.”

  I bit down the anger. “So, you did what in the two years since you were let out?”

  “Traveled.”

  “While on probation?” Her parents probably swooped in and fixed everything. Mine paid for school, but I was on my own for everything else. Jessica’s parents paid for our house, our car… I busted through school wanting to be independent from all that. And once they jumped in and hired one of the largest firms in Phoenix to represent her, I knew she'd never want to be independent from them, their money, or their influence.

  “I had my therapist explain why it would be beneficial for my anger management problem.” She snorted. Not just her parents, but her therapists were letting her feel like there was no problem. The abuse was all just a silly little mistake. Only her.

  “The kids have written.” I swallowed a lump in my throat at the idea that she’d been out traveling when they’d been staring at the mailbox and sitting on the steps waiting for the mailman day after day.

  Anger welled in me again, but it was so weird to be sharing a space with her again that I couldn’t focus. How many years?

  “Not for a while.”

  “Not for a while?” I clutched the steering wheel more tightly. “A few years, Jess. Years. They wrote you for years with nothing back.”

  “It was hard, Brandt.” There was the petulance he remembered. “I was locked up, or don’t you remem
ber? I needed time to just be me.”

  I bit back everything I’d wanted to scream at her. “I’ve watched them be angry at you, mourn the loss of you, and then be angry over that loss. They deserve better.” I took another deep breath in before continuing or I’d get into yelling territory quick. “I’m going in to talk to the victim’s rights advocates and I’m also going to talk with child services. You can’t just show up like this.”

  “Brandt!” She spun in her seat to face me. “They’re my kids!”

  “That you lost the right to when you started hitting them!” I yelled. So much for keeping myself under control. Just a few more miles and I could drop her off so she knew I was serious. It would definitely be an insult to take her to her parents’ and that’s exactly what I planned to do.

  “Who was the woman they left with?” Jessica tried so hard to sound neutral, but she failed. I knew her too well.

  “Ashley.” Simpler was better.

  “And who’s Ashley?” Definitely didn’t hide the annoyance this time.

  “The woman I’m going to ask to marry me someday.” So much for simple. But I got a rush when I realized I meant it. All of it. I could already see it, which probably put me in dangerous territory with a woman who still had a lot of things to do on her own. But that was fine. I could wait.

  Jessica’s eyes widened, her mouth opened and closed a few times, and then her jaw dropped when we pulled up to the gate at her parents’ house. Just as I figured, her car or something in her car, was wired to opened the gate and we drove in.

  “You’re just dropping me here?” Back to the frightened, sad little deer she played so well.

  “Yep.” I stopped got out and tossed her the keys. “Bye, Jess.”

  “Wait. Brandt. You want to come in? My parents used to love you.” Her smile was wide, and I couldn’t remember why I’d loved her. I thought in that moment she was always probably always playing games in one way or another.

  I scoffed. “Your parents hated me, Jess. I got their daughter pregnant in high school and refused to give in and work for your dad instead of going to college. Then they spent a small fortune trying to make sure that their daughter didn’t go to jail for abusing their own grandkids. They don’t stop by. They don’t write. Ree and Trev get birthday cards with cash. We have nothing to say to each other. Don’t contact me directly again.”

  And I walked away.

  I intended on calling a cab, but once I started walking, it felt good. The hot, dry air helped clear my head and the cicadas mixed with traffic were the sounds of my youth and I settled into that, too.

  After a couple miles, or maybe a lot more than a couple, I realized it had been maybe hours since I’d talked to Ashley. I jerked my phone from my pocket to see that I was down to 10% battery. Of course.

  I typed a quick text. Where r u?

  And got one in response almost immediately. Almost to cabin

  The cabin? I started to text back, but only got halfway through when my phone died in my hands. I should’ve turned off the network first. Crap.

  I jogged to the nearest gas station and miracle of miracles, snagged a cab home. If all three were at the cabin, I had to get there as fast as possible.

  THIRTY-ONE

  Ashley

  “You’re sure we have to swim out?” I asked. “The lake is black. This is when the creature stalks the swimmers,” I teased knowing they’d catch my reference after watching Creature from the Black Lagoon.

  “I think we should swim out to the raft and set him loose in the middle.” Marie nodded. “The boathouse is locked and we don’t have a key, so we can’t take the boat. We’d have to break down the door and Uncle Cooper would have a fit.”

  The night was hot and dry enough that it wouldn’t take long to warm up once we were back. We set all three phones down on the dock and started taking off the pieces of clothing we didn’t need.

  Shoes and extra shirts, and watches were left in three small piles with keys and our phones. Josh sat in his Snapple bottle until we were ready.

  “You carrying him out, Ash?” Trevor asked.

  “You take the first turn, and don’t lose him, okay?” I’d only been able to ditch my shoes and my phone, not really wanting to be down to bra and panties in front of them.

  “Okay.” He picked up the bottle. “Come on, Josh. That bottle looks cramped. Let’s get you out of there.”

  I loved that kid.

  The warm water wrapped me up as we jumped in together and started the swim to the raft in the middle.

  “What if we get off course?” I asked.

  “I can sorta see it,” Marie said.

  “No way.” Trevor snorted. “Way too dark.”

  But the moon was out and reflecting off the water and the trees, and I lay on my back and swam slowly. Suddenly I was small. So tiny. The space around me from the water to the sky spread the hurt and the memories and uncertainty of my future across an expanse so wide I knew I could cross it. I knew I wouldn’t be tied to my past forever. To Josh forever. I knew that even partway through law school, I could shift careers. I knew that in five years, I could do it again.

  I knew that where I grew up would always affect me, but it didn’t have to define me. I defined who I was. And in that moment, Marie and Trevor and Josh floating across that lake, I knew I’d be okay. It was something I never expected to feel, and in the imperfection of myself and my life, I felt whole.

  “Told ya we’d make it!” Trevor hoisted himself onto the small raft easily. I opted for the stairs, even though there was a fair amount of slime. Marie did the same thing with several exclamations of ew’s and grosses.

  “Are you ready?” Marie handed me the bottle.

  And I was ready. In a way, I’d been saying goodbye to him all the way out here. I’d never tried to say goodbye to him before. I always thought that the place I left him would be the place I felt closest to him, but it wasn’t about him as much as it was about moving on. I’d let him go.

  I unscrewed the top off the bottle.

  “Maybe dump him on this side of the raft, since we’ll be swimming back on that side, so…yanno…” Trevor trailed off.

  “Right.” Marie sat on one side of my and Trevor on the other.

  “So.” Marie started. “I never knew you Josh, but you seemed like a cool guy and a good friend. I hope you like our lake.”

  “I hope you like it, too. And we promise to bring Ashley up here all the time to visit.” And even Trevor sounded serious enough that it felt good.

  And then it was my turn, but my throat closed off because this was final. No more car rides or sitting in the backyard, part of me thinking he could appear at any moment. This was it. The real let go.

  I put the glass so close to the water that it nearly touched, and poured the ashes into the lake, then let the water come into the bottle so that could sink to the bottom, too.

  “See you around, Josh.” And I threw the bottle cap as far as it would go.

  And the craziest thing happened. No one wanted to move or swim back or talk. A few hot tears slid down my cheeks, but nothing like it would have been even a few days ago. The hot night air dried me off quickly, and I wrapped my arms around my legs in the dark. It was done. Josh had a place and it was perfect.

  The ring of my phone carried across the water to the raft from the dock on the shore and we all chuckled.

  “You gonna get that?” Trevor laughed knowing there was no way we could make the ten minute swim in time to catch a call.

  And then a moment after mine quit, Marie’s rang, and with every ring of her phone we all laughed harder.

  “It’s got to be your dad, right?” I asked.

  “I don’t know, let’s—”

  But Trevor was cut off from his phone ringing.

  “That’s Dad.” Ree grinned. “I can hear his frustration from here. ‘I pay for those phones so I can reach you…’”

  “You know I love you two, right?” I asked as I bit my bottom lip h
olding in a smile. “I mean it.”

  “Love you too, Ash.” Trevor looped his arms over his knees and Ree leaned her head on my shoulder for a moment.

  “Okay.” I stood up. “Let’s swim back before your dad has an aneurism.”

  And as much as I hated the awkwardness of leaving Brandt with Jessica, it now seemed… Okay. The world felt bigger, and in a bigger world there were a lot more possibilities. Everything felt okay because I knew that no matter what happened, I’d make it out the other side.

  THIRTY-TWO

  Brandt

  They knew to answer their phones. Being able to reach those two was the primary reason they both had phones. It wasn’t to call Alex or text friends, it was so I, their dad, could reach them.

  Ashley… That was a different story. What was going on that none of them were answering?

  My mouth started going dry as I thought of the possibilities—a wreck, a kidnapping, stolen car—and my foot pushed further down on the gas. It felt like an eternity ago that I’d dropped Jess off at her parents’ house. And the cabin. Why there? I wasn’t even sure if there was a way in. Were they just sitting outside? And why?

  I dialed again, all three phones, but still had no luck.

  Twenty more minutes. Less if I pushed the speed just a little more.

  As I came around a sharp corner the back tires protested, and the back of the car swung to the side. I twisted the steering wheel, headlights of the oncoming traffic were a blur and horns rang in my ears until I stopped, sideways on the edge of the road. Hands shaking, breath cut off. That was way too close.

  It took four deep breaths before the adrenaline started to leave my system, giving me even worse shakes. Not worth it, Brandt. Slow down. They’re with Ashley. They’re okay.

  And in that second, I got it. As a family, we were going to be okay. I may not have always done the right thing, but I wanted to. I wasn’t perfect. Ashley, amazing as she was, wasn’t perfect. Probably. The kids weren’t perfect. And that was okay. Mistakes were okay.