They were in Jesse’s house.
My house.
And I wasn’t supposed to create a scene. As I remembered that part of the email, my eyes narrowed to slits and my jaw firmed. I got out of the car and slammed the door shut. As I walked into Jesse’s house, I didn’t expect a crowd around them. Tiffany. Cord. Some girl whose hand he was holding. Derek and Kara. And at the same table, across from my parents was Jesse. His grin couldn’t stretch wider.
He loved them. They were his idealized image of what parents should be, but they weren’t real. Ideal. That’s all they were.
I lost what every teenager should have. Parents.
There were no words to describe the burn inside of me.
My breath rattled. My heart went nuts, but I couldn’t feel it. Everything dimmed for me.
My parents were here, in Jesse’s house. They visited him while they emailed me. They missed him, but I was a concern?
Jesse noticed me first. He waved me over. “Come here. You didn’t tell me they were coming.”
Even Tiffany was grinning. I didn’t know she could. And then I looked at them. Both my parents lost their expressions of happiness. That’s all it was, because they weren’t happy. They weren’t joyous. They weren’t real. They were fake. What people saw is all they saw. That was all there was. There was nothing more in them, certainly not love.
“Alexandra.” My father started to rise.
“Don’t.”
My mother sucked in her breath, “Alex…”
I shook my head. They had gone wrong, so far wrong and they knew it. Guilt flared in both of them before they remembered their best course of action. Denial.
Pathetic.
I now looked at my parents as pathetic. I said as much, “You act like you love him.”
Jesse frowned.
My parents shared a look and I stepped forward. My hands gripped a chair in front of me. I held on so hard, for dear life, and I didn’t care if I broke the chair in two. “You don’t love him. You want to use him. You want to replace Ethan with him.”
“Alex,” Jesse murmured.
I laughed, bitterly and loudly. The louder, the better. It boiled out of me, but I held on to that chair. I couldn’t move from it. It was my anchor. “I wasn’t supposed to make a scene, right? If I ‘crossed paths’ with you, I wasn’t supposed to make a big deal out of it. This is my home, Dad.”
He paled.
I grinned. “Mom thinks of me often. Are you kidding me?” I pinned her down with my gaze. To her credit, she didn’t squirm. She raised her chin and her shoulders lifted as she took one small breath. Oh yes. She was getting ready for me. I started, “We’re supposed to reconcile? Is that what your life coaches want to happen? Did I do you wrong, Mother, at some time in my life?”
My father pounded his fist on the table. “Alexandra, you will not speak to her like that. Your mother is fragile.”
“My mother is a fraud!” My head swung back over.
She sucked her breath in again. It was loud and dramatic. Just the way she wanted, I was sure of it. My father gripped the table, mirroring my stance with the chair. He held on to keep from doing…what, I wasn’t sure? Hitting me? I frowned to myself. Would my father harm me for speaking the truth? Was it that essential for him to protect their lies? But it was. I knew it was as I saw him fighting for control.
“Alex,” Jesse murmured again. He had circled the table and stood beside me. His hand touched the back of mine.
I shrugged it off. I didn’t need support, not then, maybe not ever again. I needed restraint because I was losing mine fast.
“The nurses didn’t think you really tried to kill yourself.”
Her eyes threatened to pop out while I heard someone gasp behind me. My father shoved against the table, the same rage in him that I felt. Welcome to the club. He spat out, “You will not speak any longer. You shut up. You will do more harm than ever before.”
I sucked in my breath. “Ever before? What damage did I do before?”
Jesse tried again, “Mr. Connors—”
“You weren’t the only one grieving, Alexandra. Your mother was as well.”
“And you were too. We all were.” I rattled the chair. I wanted to lift it up and throw it across the room. “Why are you two more important than me? You left me. I’m your daughter and you completely left me. You wouldn’t even talk to me when Mom was in the hospital. You talked to Jesse. You hugged him, but you couldn’t even look at me. Jesse, Jesse, Jesse. That’s all you cared about then.”
“Alex.” Jesse moved even closer to me.
“Stop.” I shifted away so he wouldn’t touch me. “This is my secret, Jesse. My parents. They dropped me after Ethan died. I got a fucking email from them this morning. They warned me they were coming to see you and if I ‘would run across their path’ I wasn’t supposed to make ‘a scene.’ A scene! Can you believe that?” I lifted my wrist and showed him the burn. “I got this after I burned the letter they sent me. A fucking letter that told me they were starting a new life without me. Without their daughter! How can parents do that? How can you justify that in your head and abandon your own blood, your last kid? You lost Ethan. You think you’d want to keep me closer because you already lost a kid, but no. You cut me loose. Fuck you. Fuck you both! I burned that fucking letter and I didn’t even notice my own burn until weeks later. You did that to me. Do you know how screwed up I am because of you? What did I do to you? Nothing. I didn’t do anything! Nothing! I got perfect grades that last year. I stopped partying. I did everything a perfect daughter could do, but none of it mattered. I should’ve gone the opposite. I should’ve partied or tried to kill myself. Good one, Mom. Maybe you knew what you were doing. If I’d done that, I might’ve gotten something from you. Maybe even a fucking hello in the morning!”
“Alexandra,” my father barked. “Get ahold of yourself.”
“I have.” I shook my head. The rage was in there. It was flying around, but it was starting to leave. That wasn’t right. I was supposed to have enough to last me weeks, but it was depleting fast. Then I felt Jesse’s hand over mine. He interlaced our fingers. When my parents saw the movement, their eyes widened and they both went still. They had no idea, but did it matter? I lifted our hands and asked, weakening by the second, “Does this make things different? Am I worth your love now because he loves me?”
My mother asked in a quiet tone, “He loves you?”
I shrugged. “Does it matter if he does or doesn’t? I live here. We’ve been together—”
“When?” my dad demanded.
I frowned. He couldn’t have been protective of me; it must’ve been for Jesse. He didn’t want me to infect his new favorite son.
“Does that matter too?”
“When!?” he shouted now.
“Ethan’s funeral,” Jesse spoke for me. He drew closer. I felt him trying to nudge me behind him, but I stepped to the side. He wasn’t going to take them on for me. No way. This was my fight. I’d see this to the end.
My mother sucked in her breath. Again.
A fierce frown came over my father.