“Oh no.” I turned my attention back to Teddi as the painting on the wall shook.
“What’s going on? Why are you at Austin’s?” She narrowed her gaze. I heard Austin knocking on a door in the apartment.
“Open. The. Door. Goddammit.” His voice echoed through the crack under the door.
Teddi’s anger morphed into concern. “Endgame texting me is freaking weird. Taylor? What’s going on? Please tell me. I have to finish this meeting and I won’t be able to think.”
“Roberta and I… It wasn’t working.” I glanced at the door as I heard a loud bang. It sounded like someone was kicking in a door.
I stood and went to the doorway, opening it to peek out. Just as I did, Endgame’s door swung closed. The living area was empty, so I knew Austin had gone to confront his ex-lover.
“In the middle of the night I needed help, and Austin came to get me. Things here are a little complicated.” The screaming back and forth started up. Cursing. Shit.
“Hey, are you okay? Is Austin okay?” She was centering her laser focus on me.
“He’s pretending that I’m his girlfriend to make Endgame mad,” I whispered to her as I closed the door.
“Oh. Oh. That is something else. Okay. Wow. Okay, I hate to leave, but I need to go.” She focused past her screen.
“We’re okay. I’m safe. Austin’s having it out with Endgame for texting you, I think. Go do your thing. I love you.”
“Okay. I love you.” She looked reluctant, but the video ended.
I wanted to give Austin privacy, but my little cheating heart really wanted to know what the hell was going on. I turned back to the door and opened it another crack.
I couldn’t hear exactly what was going down, but the heat and anger were as clear as a bell.
I closed the door again and made my way back to the bed. The fighting was taking me back, making me want to be small. I was at the Burathons’ house a lot as a kid. They were very kind to let me come over as much as I did.
I never invited Teddi to my house, and we ignored how weird that was. She had a pool. She had all the kids over all the time. Her parents seemed to love kids. They seamlessly enveloped me into their family vacations.
My house was not the same as theirs. My parents fought. They fought each other. They fought us kids. It wasn’t until I had stayed with the Burathons for a week that I knew adults didn’t have to fight all the time. Picking what was for dinner wasn’t a federal case. No one threw a vase at anyone else’s head.
I took a deep breath as the panic started to claw at my chest. It was like this for me. This way I handled the feelings, feeling like they were zooming out of control. That was my job at my house. Keep my sister, Raven, out of the parents’ way. If they roped you into the fight, you were bound to become part of the battle. You’d have to listen to lectures and shouting, sometimes the same topic over and over again.
Sometimes when I was at the Burathons’ house, I felt guilty that I was leaving Raven to fend for herself. She was so much younger that Mom would often be caring for her. Until Mom set her down one day and left, never coming back. The daycare Dad invested in was a priority for him afterwards. It was a considerable cost, but Raven really enjoyed it. She had a bunch of friends. I’d feel guilty trying to get her out early, because I'd be bringing her back to the house that was not relaxing at all. So, my sister was there more than she was with us.
You’ve got to handle your stuff however it makes sense. The shouts of Endgame and Austin brought me back. A place I never wanted to be. Never wanted to have to live in twenty-four seven ever again. Don’t get me wrong. I love my family, but just having to spend time with them was exhausting. Not relaxing. As we’ve grown, we all have our peculiar ways of interacting. Because it wasn’t healthy—all the fighting that used to happen before Mom left.
I heard smacking sounds followed by a groan. A door slammed again, and before I was ready, Austin stormed back into the room.
Tears rimmed his eyes. He had a very clear imprint of a hand on his cheek.
He held his open palm up. “I’m so sorry, kitten. This isn’t cool.”
I left the bed, letting the phone drop. I gently reached out my hand, holding it just above the mark.
“Did he do this? To you?” And then it was rage. Pure, unadulterated rage. The thing was, in my family you had to learn to fight. To stand up for yourself. To scream louder than everyone else sometimes, well, before Mom left and everything was quiet.
Austin grabbed my wrist and lowered my hand. “Don’t worry about it, baby.”
“He can’t hit you. He can’t.” I tried to walk around Austin, and he put his hands on my shoulders.
“It’s over. Nothing to think about.” He stepped to make sure I was staying put.
“You need ice.” I tilted to see the rest of his mark.
“I’ll be fine. Let’s talk about when your classes are. We can set alarms so we don’t miss anything.” He attempted to smile.
“You always try to take care of everyone else, huh?” I stopped trying to maneuver around him.
He shrugged. “Listen, you’ve seen a very carefully curated version of me, but here? In my world? I’m the draft. I’m messy. I make mistakes. I make the same mistakes over and over.”
“I get that.” I stepped backward and then moved to the bathroom.
I grabbed a washcloth and let the tap run cold. I heard the bed squeak under the weight of Austin sitting down.
Once the washcloth was wet, I wrung it out. When I got back to him, he looked defeated and I hated it. Hated Endgame.
I put my finger under his chin and gently lifted his face. I slowly applied the washcloth, holding it gently in place. He kept his eyes on the floor and spoke quietly. “You shouldn’t have seen this.”
“And you shouldn’t have had to get naked and peel hundreds of Post-it notes listing my faults off walls, but here we are.” I lifted the washcloth and flipped it, to get the cold again.
He lifted his eyes and stared at me. “You’re not a little kid anymore.”
I nodded. “Haven’t been for a long time.”
He covered my hand and took the washcloth from me. “Thanks, kitten.”
He lay back and pulled on my arm so I had to crawl on the bed next to him. I rested my head on his chest.
I wanted this more than anything, but knowing that he and Endgame had fought took the filter off the dreamy fairy tale in my head.
Austin fell asleep, and I didn't. I knew he was a heavy sleeper. It was a Burathon inside joke that you needed a bullhorn to wake Austin up when he was tired. When I pushed myself up to move, his breathing was deep and steady.
It wasn’t my place, maybe, but Austin had been mine in my heart for so long, I had no other choice.
I slipped out into the living room. It had to be dinner time now. There was a low bass in Endgame’s room, with the door closed. I gasped when I saw him sitting in the living room. There was a glowing orange tip tapping in his hand. The lights were out, but he was silhouetted enough that I could see him. Endgame.
I crossed my hands over my chest.
“Say what you’re going to say.” His voice was gruff.
“You hit him.” Each word snapped off in my mouth like brittle branches.