The Years After (44 page)
Authors: Leanne Davis
Dear Reader,
I would be so grateful if you took a few moments to leave a review of
The Years After
.
It really helps expand an author’s audience, and we really do appreciate the effort.
Otherwise, thank you for reading, and I hope you try another of my novels. Read on for more information on upcoming novels that I will be adding to
The Sister Series,
along with a peak at the spinoff series
Daughters.
If you would like to keep up on my releases, please go to my
website
and sign up for my email distribution list or contact me directly at
[email protected]
.
Here is a preview of my other novels.
Sincerely,
Leanne Davis
Christina (Daughters, Book #1)
My entire life I’ve lived with shadows lurking behind what otherwise appears like the perfect family. My mother often disappears into her bedroom for days at a time because her life becomes too much to deal with. I never understood it. I know the family has secrets. I hear the whispers and innuendos. But no one wants me to know the truth.
The thing is: I’m not a little girl anymore. I’m tired of not being told. I must seek the answers and discoveries that will change my life and the relationship I have with my family, possibly forever. I soon discover that there is another daughter. The betrayal I feel from having to learn that on my own sends me running off to find her, no matter how much my parents, and Max, discourage me. I’m tired of all the lies. I can’t do it anymore, and I won’t.
My best friend since my early teens is Max Salazar. He’s my cousin by adoption, and best friend in the world, even if lately, he has been acting like anything but family. He is often in trouble so I’m always trying to bail him out. But this time, I get in way too far over my head and there’s only Max to turn to. Max, however, refuses to accept my comfort. How can I think about caring for someone who can’t even stand my touch?
Christina (Daughters, Book #1)
Prologue
~Christina ~
“Christina, can you go home and please make your sisters some dinner and start their homework? I just had a call come in that I have to take, so I’ll be late.”
“What about Mom?” I’m trying to study for a test at the library and I really don’t want to go home yet. I still have at least two hours to go.
“Your mom isn’t feeling well. Christina, I’m not really asking here,” my dad says, his tone clipped and sharp. He’s not kidding. His frustration almost comes through my cell phone. I roll my eyes. Seriously? He expects me to give up my time to, yet again, babysit my little sisters because poor Mom is holed up in her room, yet again, with some imaginary ailment? I’m pretty sure she’s one of those hypochondriacs who always think they have some new disease. She takes to her bed, locking the bedroom door, not coming out for at least an entire night. Once in a great while, for a couple of days we aren’t supposed to disturb her. When it happens, whatever “it” is, she doesn’t go to work or tend to us three kids. And as long as I can remember, she’s had these strange episodes. And stranger still? My dad allows her to have them. He’s usually Mr. Responsibility. We have to tow the line, follow the rules, and do our shit. Whether it’s chores or homework, we are not allowed to flake on things. Yet my mom? Way too often, she gets to vedge. And for the last few years, I’m the one who gets called on to fill in when Mom’s taking one of her mini vacations. I completely resent it. I mean, I don’t mind helping out when both of them are working late, but when Mom is
in the house
? What the hell? Get up and take care of your own freaking kids!
At some point, she comes out of her room and acts all fine. She’s smiling and interested and just Mom again, and she continues on as if she hasn’t just checked out on us and life. Sometimes, it’s for mere hours, while others? It’s for several days. Dad has to be in charge of feeding us and making sure my sisters don’t kill each other. But often, Dad has to work late, so guess who gets to pick up all the slack? Yours truly.
I swear I was born to be their permanent babysitter.
“Christina?” Dad’s tone is, as usual, insistent.
I sigh and mumble, “Fine. But it’s seriously stupid for a grown woman to so often be unable to get out of bed and care for her children. I have stuff to do too, you know. You know those straight As you demand of me? I need to study to get them. And I didn’t have three kids,
she
did.”
“
Christina,”
Dad says my name again, this time his tone is low and full of tacit warning. That tone tells me if I continue to speak like that, he is going to make my life miserable when he gets home. No one is allowed to even comment about Mom, let alone, complain, or God forbid!
point out the obvious
with her. At least, not with Dad. He’d throw any one of us kids under the bus to allow Mom to be however she needs to
be.
It has always been that way, for my entire sixteen years.
“Fine. Fine. I’m going home. I’ll flunk out. But Mom can get all the sleep she needs.” I click the phone off before he can answer. I hope to God he forgets about it before he gets home. It’s not that I ever worry he’ll hurt me, or anything. He’ll just give me that disappointed look. I hate it when he does that. I still have a childish need to make my parents, including my mom, proud. I don’t like to disappoint them. But sometimes… it gets so old.
I drive home and pull into the driveway. Light is just fading from the sky. The March evening is cool as the sun starts to sink across the horizon. The lights of our house shine out, nestled in the endless flat spaces and trees of the twenty acres we own.
I throw my keys and backpack down next to the front door. Melissa, only eleven, is stretched across the couch, watching the TV as if she’s catatonic, and ten-year-old Emily is playing with some kind of crafty thing in front of her. Beading jewelry probably. She makes us all rings and earrings and necklaces… I pretend to wear them out sometimes before ditching them in my car. But her cheeks turn rosy and she gets all pleased and embarrassed whenever she thinks any of us wear her treasured creations. She’s pretty shy and sensitive about almost everything.
“Is Mom here?” I demand.
Melissa finally tilts her head up on the pillow so she can answer me. “I think so. Bedroom door was closed when I got home.”
I sigh and start towards the kitchen to find something to eat. Crashing around, I take out my anger on the food and pans. I’m making tacos and adding meat just to spite my mother, the vegetarian. Both of my sisters are used to the nights I cook and Mom not coming out to interact like a normal person. They, of course, don’t get stuck picking up all the slack. That’s my job. Mom and Dad waited five years between having them and me. It’s like they planned to always have a ready-made, built-in babysitter.
I dump the food on plates and go off to my room to eat, thinking they’ll figure out how to feed it to themselves. I mutter before I shut the door, “Start your homework after you’re done.”
Then I slam my bedroom door and try to get back to
my
stuff.
My mother… she is a complicated woman. I mean, I know she loves all of us and she takes cares of us on the whole. She’s also a doctor and works almost full time with my uncle, running the town’s veterinary clinic. She’s a good mom and all… she just has some strange quirks. She hates the sight of blood. Yet, she’s a veterinarian. Go figure. Once, when I was eight, I sliced my finger with a knife cutting up some apples, after she told me not to do it, of course. I am the type who, if you tell me not to do it, I almost have to do it just so I can prove it to myself. Anyway, so there I was, bleeding all over the kitchen counter, the cutting board, and the apple and my mom walks in while I’m holding my injured hand with my unhurt hand. Instead of rushing forward to help me… you know, grabbing a towel, helping me wash up, etc., Mom simply freezes and stares at me in complete silence. She was transfixed by my blood. Her face went waxy and I ran
to her,
believing she was about to pass out. I helped her sit down as I dripped blood all over the floor until I could finally get to the bathroom to clean up. I remember crying from the pain and all the blood and because my mom wasn’t helping me.
But there are other incidents I remember that show me more about whatever her episodes involve. When I was eleven, I decided I wanted to start shaving my legs. My mom freaked out about it and would not give me a razor and let me. I snuck in a disposable razor and tried to do it on my own. I didn’t want to risk the safer and much less scary electric razor because my parents might hear the noise. I thought I could sneak my smooth legs by them. However, I nicked a scab and it bled everywhere. It hurt like hell too. I cried out and my mom heard me because she stood on the other side of the door, freaking out. I mean, she was crying and screaming at me and threatening to break the door if I didn’t open it. I didn’t want to open it at first because of the evidence that I disobeyed her. But finally, I had no choice as I limped to the door, bending down to hold the towel on my bleeding leg. Mom glanced at me and then into the bathroom where the blood was a harsher red against the white porcelain tub and the pink, disposable razor sat innocently on the tub edge. I remember her yelling at me. A lot. She took the razor and threatened all kinds of punishment and would not even listen to what I was doing and why. I mean, what middle school girl doesn’t want to shave her legs? Mom acted like I was trying to kill myself with it. It was so over the top. Several times, her reactions were like that. She called dad and he had to come home from work. She kept saying, “Wait until your dad gets here.” Then she collapsed into a chair and didn’t move or speak again. It was like she was just… gone. I was convinced he was going to come home and really punish me.
But he didn’t. He came in and found Mom still crying and clutching the razor. It was weird. Like one of those moments that stay with you forever and you never really understand what you witnessed. Dad asked me quickly if I was okay. I was. I had long ago quit bleeding and covered the stupid, little nick with a Band-Aid. He squatted in front of my mom and gently said her name as he touched her knee oh so gently. He is a big guy. He has huge muscles and there is never an occasion anyone would confuse my dad for a metrosexual. He nearly screams
tough
. Until it came to my mom. It breaks my heart sometimes how gentle he can be with her. As if she were a fragile, little baby bird he had to coax into his hold. She glanced at my dad and I swear to God she was confused about who he was. She whispered, “Will?” and lifted a finger to touch his face. Her eyes filled with huge tears that splashed down her cheeks. She still clutched my razor. She grabbed it by the razor head and clasped it in her hand as blood oozed around it. It was like she didn’t even notice it. I mean, who holds a razor like that? It was crazy. It scared me and I started to cry from where I sat watching them across the room. What was that? She had called him home from work, for a pointless reason in my estimation, yet she seemed confused about who he even was.
Dad nodded and smiled oh so softly and sweet, “It’s me, Jess. I’m right here. Always.” And then he picked her up and carried her off to their bedroom. She kind of snuggled up against his chest and tucked herself up like Emily does when Dad carries her off to bed sometimes still. But this was my
mother
. It was only three o’clock in the afternoon. I watched them disappear into their bedroom and the door shut and locked. I remember sitting there as the silence of the house seemed to fall over me like a heavy weight. It was oppressive. My sisters were at school still. Mom was supposed to be at work; that’s why I snuck in and tried to shave my legs. Now? Nothing. No sounds.
Later, like an hour later, my dad reappeared, shutting the bedroom door oh so gently behind him. He came right to me, and without a word, wrapped me up against him just as he had my mom earlier. Only there was no crazy gentleness, it was just a big, warm, bear hug and I started to cry against him. He leaned his mouth into my hair and gently shushed me, mumbling, “It was okay.” He was unlike many dads in that he could hold and comfort and show his affection as easily, and sometimes even better than Mom could.