Chapter 4
"Not Ella, she doesn't need to hear it again," I said, my eyes hard, unlike Jim's.
He looked at me for a second, respect shining through his eyes. He nodded, and led me back to the now spotless kitchen. Now that we were back in the kitchen, my stomach remembered its hunger. A loud growl emanated from my stomach, and I grinned sheepishly. "I missed dinner last night, and obviously breakfast didn't go so well this morning." Jim and the now present Grace laughed.
"Don't worry hon' I've got some pancakes cooking now," she replied kindly. "I assume you two didn't come in here to say hi?"
"Grace, Max has to tell us what happened to her family," Jim said quietly, hoping to thwart any wandering ears.
Grace's eyes widened slightly, and, pancakes forgotten, she turned to give me her undivided attention. "How much do you know?" I asked, not knowing where to start.
"We went to different colleges, I've heard from her twice in the last twenty years. Once pretty early on after college when we became godparents to each other's children, and once when she told me you two would have to live with us. I don't even know why you have to live with us or for how long."
I swallowed, desperately trying to find a way to avoid this conversation. And what did my brilliant mind come up with you ask? Absolutely nothing.
"Alright, my dad, Jeb Batchelder left us when I was six. I don't really know why—actually, thinking back on it, he might have cheated on Mom." At that point everyone on the room wore identical murderous expressions but no one said anything. "I remember hearing a lot of screaming. I was hiding in the closet of my room, trying to block it out." I shuddered as the memories continued to bombard me. "Things were quiet after that. Until my mom came home one day and told us she had ovarian cancer." I looked away, forgetting that anyone else was in the room with me besides my memories. "Her face…I had never seen her like that. And Ella…oh gosh, Ella. She was broken. That's the only way to describe her at the time. But I knew I couldn't let myself break. Couldn't let myself even be a little fragile. I had to be Mom's and Ella's rock. I remember I had made myself rules inside my head." I smiled bitterly at the thought. "I was never allowed to cry. I wasn't allowed to show my pain. I couldn't slip up ever. And I would always put them before me. That's how it's always been, actually, and I like it that way. Anyway, Mom decided it was best that she save Ella from whatever she could, so Mom sent her here. I had to stay home to help mom in any way I knew how; which was only to make her comfortable as she withered away, really. Her face was so pale, almost gray. It was sallow too, and gaunt. She was only skin and bones by the end; had no independence. What killed me was that I couldn't do anything about it." My hands clenched into fists, and I knew there would be little crescent shapes from my nails later. But I couldn't care about that now. "So now, here I am."
I didn't listen for their reactions, didn't give them time to feel sorry for me. I threw a hasty, "I'm going for a run!" over my shoulder. I have a vague memory of pushing the rest of the family out of my way as I sprinted to the sidewalk. There were voices shouting in protest, but that was far in the background compared to what was going on in my head. I didn't know where I was going, or what I would do when I got there. I only knew I needed to get away before I hit something.
I ran until I had to sit down before my legs gave out. I ended up at some park, and sat down heavily on the grass. All of the sudden, I felt a presence by my side.
I looked over, intending to shoo them away, but I saw that it was Fang. He must have followed me here. He earned some MaxPoints for being able to keep up with me; I had been running pretty fast.
"You okay?" he asked, regaining his breath.
"Of course," I said automatically. That had always been my immediate response when someone asked me that back home.
Something in the silence that followed made me want to break it. "Well, I will be. Eventually," I relented.
He was quiet for a moment, but I knew he wanted to say something. "You and Ella are so different. I expected another bubbly, outgoing, and extremely fashion oriented clone of Ella and Nudge."
"Ugh, no. I love my sister and all, but please call me out on it if I ever have an 'Ella' moment."
This made him laugh. He had a nice husky laugh that seemed to be more contagious than normal. Soon we were both laughing until tears streamed down both of our cheeks. It was ridiculous, nothing we had said had really been that funny, but both of us just burst out laughing you know? It was like our own personal inside joke that went on in our heads only.
We quieted down eventually, after getting some weird looks. I felt compelled to ask him, "Why did you follow me? I used to do that all the time at home, but no one ever really seemed to care."
"I don't know," he said, and just as the silence was becoming too much to bear he added, "I guess I just thought you might need a friend." He looked at me, and for some reason, his kindness made tears come to my eyes.
As the tears started to flow, he scooted closer to me and enveloped me in a hug. I tensed at first, not used to such an intimate touch from someone other than Ella. Apparently he wasn't expecting to do that either, because his arms were tense around me at first, but we both relaxed fairly quickly. It felt good to be comforted. I wasn't sobbing or shaking, just letting silent tears fall, as they had been waiting to since Mom first came home with the news. No, it wasn't just the thought of comfort, I realized. He felt good. I was ashamed that my resolve had broken so quickly, but I couldn't keep myself from thinking, Maybe it would be alright to make a few friends here after all.
