“Anna? Maybe you should just get the phone. It seems important,” Charlotte suggests, pulling the open ends of her knit sweater together.
Annalisa huffs and turns her phone off. “This caller hasn’t been important to me since he ran off when my mom died and chose heroin over his own sister.”
We look at her in stunned silence. She’s talking about her older brother—or half brother—Luke. It was just a few days ago when Luke approached Annalisa at the Tracks, begging to talk to her for a moment, wanting back into her life. That had left her raw, him showing up, clean for the first time in years, wanting to be a part of her life. She’s kept quiet about it, and after yelling that he had killed her mother and storming off, she hasn’t mentioned him since, and we haven’t pushed.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Mason asks gently as Julian pulls out his own vibrating phone.
Julian looks at the caller ID and sighs, a look of resignation on his face paired with a clenching of his jaw. He holds up his phone to show Annalisa who’s calling, and her kohl-lined eyes narrow into slits.
She grabs the phone from Julian and answers it, not giving the caller the chance to speak. Her voice is hard and threatening. “Leave me the fuck alone.”
She immediately hangs up, stopping herself seconds before slamming her boyfriend’s phone onto the table.
Noah bites his lip as if to stop himself from talking, trying to take a cue from the rest of us, who remain deathly quiet, and fails. “I’m sorry, Anna. We’ve been trying to ignore the fact that you’re very pissed off at someone, but it’s hard. Like, you’re angrier than my mom when she’s just home from work and I forgot to take the chicken out of the freezer like she asked me to do hours before.”
The only indication Annalisa gives to show that she finds Noah amusing is that she doesn’t roll her eyes as forcefully as she normally would.
“It’s Luke,” she says.
We look at her expectantly, having already pieced that information together ourselves. When she doesn’t elaborate, Julian continues for her.
“He’s been calling her all day. We haven’t really heard from him since that night at the Tracks.”
“And you’re not going to answer? What if it’s an emergency?” Chase squirms in his seat under Annalisa’s intense stare.
“The only reason I haven’t blocked his number yet is in case I need
blood or an organ or something. But even then, we don’t have the same father, so maybe we won’t even be a match,” Annalisa deadpans, no hint of joking in her voice.
Poor Annalisa. Other than Luke, the only family she really has are the people sitting in front of her right now. I can relate to that. My mother is absent the majority of the time and even when she is around, I still feel like we’re miles away. The people crowding my kitchen table right now are the ones I feel I can call when I need help; the ones I can depend on.
I’ve never asked Aiden about Annalisa’s past because like her, I also have things I’d rather keep a secret, things that I don’t want anyone knowing. I understand secrets and messy pasts, and this is one that Annalisa should have the right to tell me and Charlotte about or not, since we’re the only people at the table who don’t really know her story.
“I mean, who does he think he is? Just calling me up like nothing ever happened?” Annalisa rants.
“He’s sober now, Anna. Maybe he wants to make amends,” Mason says softly.
Annalisa looks at Mason like she’s trying to use her brain to make his head explode. “You’re supposed to be on my side, Mason! Why are you sticking up for him?”
Mason shrinks into himself but holds his ground anyway. “You’ve been holding on to this extreme hatred and anger toward your brother for so long. It can’t be good for you. Don’t you just want to get rid of that and move on? Be happy?”
“I am happy. You guys right here are all I need. I don’t need or want anyone else.”
“Maybe you should just hear him out. See what he has to say,” Aiden suggests. “If you decide you don’t want anything to do with him, at least you won’t spend the rest of your life regretting the what-ifs, and wondering what it was he had to say.”
Family is the most important thing to Aiden. I don’t think he could even fathom the idea of never speaking to his brothers again. His advice sounds pretty reasonable to me, and the others nod their heads in agreement, not wanting to push Annalisa into something she doesn’t want but knowing that it might be best for her in the long run.
Annalisa squares her shoulders. “I will not speak to the man who killed my mother.”
Julian puts a comforting hand on Annalisa’s thigh. “Babe, heroin killed your mother,” he says gently.
Annalisa’s mother overdosed on heroin when Annalisa was sixteen, and then her older brother deserted her, leaving her to deal with everything by herself. So that day all that time ago, when Kaitlyn suggested that Annalisa drop out because she’ll end up just like her mom, Kaitlyn was suggesting … a shiver runs down my spine. Kaitlyn is lower than low.
Annalisa sneers. “And who gave her the heroin? Luke. It all comes back to Luke, and I will not forgive him for ruining my life.”
“You know I’m there for you, always. And I’ll always be on your side, but maybe Aiden’s right. Just hear Luke out, and then once he says what he needs to say, maybe you’ll never hear from him again, until you decide you want to,” Julian advises, tucking a piece of hair behind Annalisa’s ear.
Annalisa moves her head away from Julian’s touch, and his hand falls to his lap. She frowns at the wall in front of her, choosing to ignore her boyfriend’s reasoning.