Lifers (32 page)

It was after 1 AM when I drove through the grove of cottonwoods and down the dirt road to Jordan’s house, hoping that I didn’t snap an axle in the potholed road.

I should have been tired after another 10 hour shift, but I was wide awake, and it had nothing to do with the four espressos that I’d drunk in the last hour. Well, almost nothing.

The porch light was on and I’d picked up my phone to text him I’d arrived, when the door swung open and he was standing in front of me, a huge smile lighting up his face.

He was barefoot and bare chested, wearing only a pair of low slung jeans. My heart rate rocketed.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he said, as he ran lightly from the porch and leaned down to open my door.

Before I’d fully stepped out, he swooped down to wrap his arms around me, and my hands automatically sought out his warm, smooth skin.

“God, I’ve missed you,” he whispered, against my neck.

“Hi!” I said, happily. “Um, you want me to park my car around the back? I mean, are your parents going to freak when they see it in the morning?”

He shrugged. “Probably. But I don’t care—unless you do?”

“No, Jordan. I don’t care,” I stated, clearly.

He grinned then stood up straight, leaving the top of my head about level with his chin.

“Are you hungry, sweetheart? Did you get anything to eat?”

I smiled up at him. “I just want you. Take me to bed, Jordan.”

He scooped me into his arms as if he was about to carry me across the threshold, and I couldn’t help yelping from surprise.

He pressed his soft lips to my mouth, and murmured against them.

“Gonna have to be quiet, my love.”

“Sorry!” I whispered, trying not to laugh.

His lips found mine again and the gentle kiss turned urgent, his fingers gripping my arms and legs tightly.

We were almost through the front door when the hall light switched on and Jordan’s mother stood facing us, an expression of hatred and disgust twisting her face.

“You’re like a couple of dogs in heat,” she sneered. “It’s sickenin’. How
dare
you bring that girl into my home! How dare you behave like nothin’ ever happened! You’re evil! Just evil!”

To say I was stunned would be a massive understatement, but Jordan stared at her coolly as he set me on my feet.

“I love her. There’s nothin’ sickenin’ about that. I think you’re the one that needs help, Momma.”

She launched herself at him, clawing at his face, rage igniting her whole body as she flailed against him.

“You killed my son!” she screamed. “You killed him!”

Jordan managed to grab her wrists, holding her away from him as she lashed out with her feet. Footsteps thundered down the stairs and Jordan’s father seized hold of his wife’s shoulders, tearing her from his son.

“Gloria! Stop! Just stop! Jordan is our son, too! He’s our son, too!”

“He’s a murderer!” she screamed. “I cain’t even look at him! How can you bear it?”

“Because forgivin’ him is the right thing to do, Gloria!” he cried out. “It’s not right to punish him forever. He’s all we’ve got left.”

“Aaaagh! You’re so weak! You’re just like him! You’re just pathetic!”

Everybody froze.

“Gloria?”

Her shoulders slumped and her hands dropped to her side, all the fight drained out of her.

“I cain’t stand it anymore,” she sobbed. “I won’t stay in this house with
him!
”

“Momma…”

“Don’t you call me that!” she hissed, turning on Jordan again. “You’ve brought nothin’ but trouble and shame to our door. You’ve ruined it all. You always did! Every time somethin’ happened to Michael it was because of you! He was good and decent and he had a future. You hated him for that so you took it from him! Get out! Get out!”

Jordan’s face was torn with indecision. I could see that he desperately wanted to run, but his curfew forbid it.

“You know he cain’t go, Gloria,” said Jordan’s father, his voice shaking. “He’s our responsibility.”

“Then
I’ll
go,” she screamed.

She ran up the stairs and slammed into the bedroom.

Jordan looked broken. His father gripped his shoulder for a second then he plodded up the stairs to follow his wife.

I stood there, uncertain what to do. Jordan’s gaze was fixed on the floor.

“Do you want me to go?” I said, quietly.

That seemed to penetrate his despair, and he looked up at me, his beautiful brown eyes coming back into focus.

“I wouldn’t blame you,” he said, at last.

I touched his arm. “No, Jordan. I’m asking what
you
need. If you want me to go, I’ll go; if you want me to stay, I’ll stay.”

His eyes were huge and dark as he stared back at me. “Stay, please?”

I nodded and took his hand in mine.

At that moment, his mom surged down the stairs, dragging a suitcase. It thundered down behind her, each thud a tolling bell.

When she reached the bottom, she glared at Jordan.

“You ruined my life,” she said, coldly. “I hate you.”

He stared back at her, his face oddly expressionless. “I know, Momma. I forgive you.”

She gasped, almost as if he’d slapped her. Then her lips drew back in a feral snarl and she spat at him.

I watched, appalled, as the spittle ran down his bare chest.

“Murderer!” she hissed.

The front door slammed behind her and a moment later, we heard her car drive away.

I pulled out a tissue to clean him up. He didn’t move

“Come on,” I said, quietly. “Let’s go to bed.”

He nodded without speaking, and threaded his fingers through mine again.

When we entered his room, I dropped my purse on the floor and wrapped him in a tight hug.

“I think you’re right about her,” I said, stroking his face with the tips of my fingers. “I don’t think she’s well. She needs help. Where do you think she’s gone?”

“She’s got an old school friend who lives in Fort Worth, she might have gone there. I don’t really know. Maybe she told dad.”

He sat on the bed, looking exhausted.

“I have to get out of here, Torrey. I’m destroyin’ my parents’ marriage as well as … I’ll tell Carson; maybe she can get me into one of those half-way homes…”

I sat next to him and leaned my head against his shoulder.

“I think they’re managing to fuck everything up by themselves, Jordan. But I agree about one thing, it’s not good for you living here in this … atmosphere. It must be so stressful. When your mom comes back … well, I think you should look into finding somewhere else to live.”

He nodded.

“I get so wound up sometimes that I…”

He couldn’t look at me, and my eyes dropped to his hands. His long fingers were rubbing the inside of his wrist. My eyes widened as I took in the thin lines of scars for the first time.

I grabbed at his hands, but he snatched them away.

“Jordan! What did you do?”

“Old scars. Nothin’ to worry about.”

“Nothing to worry about? Jordan, these are … this … did you try to kill yourself?”

He looked away.

“Yeah.”

“In prison?”

“Yeah … the second time.”

“Oh my God! What … when was the first time?”

He took a deep breath.

“I thought about it all the time, pretty much. The first time … when I was at the hospital that night and I realized, really realized that Mikey was … gone … I thought about it then.”

I squeezed his fingers again. “It’s okay,” I whispered. “I’m here.”

He looked like he was in pain as he continued to speak.

“It must have been obvious to the hospital staff and police that I was drunk, and I admitted right away that I’d been in the driver’s seat. But they had to wait for the blood test to come back. I had a blood-alcohol content of 0.24, three times the legal limit in Texas—and I was under 21. They arrested me on the spot and as soon as the hospital released me, I was taken away.

“Although the case started in the juvenile system because I was a minor, the prosecutors asked to charge me as an adult. I don’t even remember if they did, maybe the request was denied—the whole trial—it’s hazy. I didn’t really care what happened to me by that point. As soon as it sunk in that … that I’d killed Mikey, I wanted to die too. I was on suicide watch for the first couple of weeks. I nearly managed it once.” He took a deep breath. “And again in prison, but that was later on.”

I was struggling to speak, but eventually I managed to ask, “How? How did you … try…”

He shrugged.

“You get creative. The first time I tied some sheets together and tried to hang myself. I was found…”

“And … and the second time.”

“I planned it better. I waited ‘til I had the cell to myself for a few hours. I’d been grindin’ down the end of my toothbrush. The plastic is hard, so you can make it pretty sharp. Some guys used them as weapons. I just wanted to hurt myself. I opened a couple of veins.”

“But … someone found you.”

“After a couple of hours. Guess I had a lot of blood, or somethin’. So I didn’t even manage to do that right. They made me see a shrink after that. I don’t think it made much difference. He didn’t really care one way or another. Nor did I.”

I choked out a small sob, but the memories were pouring out of him too fast to stop.

“You have to wise up right quick, learn to feel people out when you’re inside. The first guys who come up to you are the dangerous ones, the predators, but also the losers and the snitches. I learned it was safer to keep to myself. This big guy tried to punk me the first week I was there…”

“What do you mean?” I asked, afraid of his answer.

“He wanted to have sex with me. I was shocked and just beat the crap out of him. Turned out that was the best thing I could have done because the others like him left me alone after that.

“There’s a lot of weird shit you have to get used to. The restrooms don’t have doors on them—too many chances for people gettin’ beaten up or worse. You get your own clothes taken away from you—well, I didn’t have much and what I had on was covered in blood, so … I was strip-searched and fingerprinted when I got there. And small stuff, like you only get three minutes to have your shower, and lights out is at 9:30 PM; I arrived in the summer so it was still light outside which was weird. Not that I could sleep. There were some kids who screamed all night, some of them were really young. One kid was like 13 or somethin’. There was a lot of fear, mostly because you didn’t know what was gonna happen next. But because I didn’t care, it made me … I don’t know … like I was untouchable or somethin’. Some of the older boys tried to mess with me, but I was pretty tall for my age, so I got in a lot of fights. That didn’t help when it came to sentencin’, I guess.”

“Did your parents come and see you much when you were inside?”

“Once when I was still in juvie; once again when I was sentenced—the first time I was sentenced.”

“What happened?”

He pulled a face.

“Momma cried. Dad told me … Dad told me I was a murderer and I should change my surname because he didn’t want to have me for a son.”

“Wow, that’s … harsh.”

I felt him shrug.

“He hates me. They both hate me. But I don’t blame them—I hate myself. If I’d just done one little thing different that night, Mikey might still be alive.”

“He was the older brother, he could have decided at any time not to get in the car with you.”

“He was protectin’ me, like he always did. He said he wasn’t going to let me drunk-drive my ass home. It was pretty much the last thing he said to me.”

“He loved you.”

Jordan didn’t reply. I looked up so I could see his face. His eyes glittered, and I saw him rub moisture away with his fingertips.

“The last time I saw them was after the funeral. I’d wanted to go to the service but they wouldn’t let me. I still don’t know if that was like a rule or whether my parents didn’t want me there. It was the day I was sentenced: Momma couldn’t even look at me, and I didn’t have nothin’ to say to them neither. Dad just kept sayin’ I should pray for Mikey. I was sent to a long-term detention facility in north Texas, and from there to prison. I didn’t see them again. Not ‘til eight weeks ago.” I blew out a long breath. “I guess you know the rest.”

“Have you … have you thought about doing it, um, hurting yourself, since … since you got out of prison?”

He nodded again.

“I thought about it, but I didn’t … I couldn’t…”

“Jordan, promise me,
promise me
that if you ever feel … that you won’t … that you’ll come and talk to me first.
Promise me!
”

I thought he was going to refuse, but eventually he nodded slowly.

“I promise.”

I rubbed my eyes tiredly.

“Okay then. Let’s talk in the morning. We can think about finding you somewhere else to live. We won’t solve anything when it’s so late.”

“I don’t know why you’re still here,” he said, his voice aching. “But I’m so fuckin’ glad you are.”

I’d been shocked to the core to think that Jordan had tried to kill himself. Twice, maybe more. It broke my heart to think of a 16-year-old version of Jordan getting caught up in all of that ugliness. But I’d been even more stunned when I realized that he’d thought about it since he’d gotten out of prison.

It was too much to think about when it was so late and I was beyond tired. My brain was spinning in so many different directions, I felt dizzy. I badly needed to sleep.

“I’m glad I’m here, too,” I sighed. “And I’m really sorry to have to mention this, but I’m dying to pee!”

He gave a small smile, and I saw a glimmer of light behind his eyes.

“Two doors down on the left, sweetheart. I’ll be waitin’.”

I grabbed my purse, glad I always carried a spare toothbrush with me, and headed to the bathroom. Soap and water would be fine for cleaning off my makeup, but I
had
to brush my teeth, whatever else I skimped on.

A few minutes later, I slipped back into his room and shut the door.

He was sitting up in bed, his jeans neatly folded and laid out on the chair, his face thoughtful. It was all too tidy in his room, too institutional, so I kicked off my boots into different corners, flung my socks over my head and dropped my pants where I stood.