CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Grimacing and hoping I'm not about to meet the reaper I'm staring at as I follow Clay through to the office, while everyone else mounts bikes, or ends up back in my 4x4 When it's just the two of us in the afternoon quiet that is the lot after all the mechanics have left. Trailing behind him as he closes the bay doors he starts talking quietly.
"When you left Donna was inconsolable. It wasn't till about a week later that you must have finally contacted her. She came to us, told Gemma that she'd heard from you but you wouldn't tell her where you were. Sarah, you can't do that again. It wasn't just Donna that was devastated. Gemma hid it well from everyone but me, you leaving, it almost destroyed her. She's already lost a husband and one child. When you left, and I know she won't tell you this, it was like she lost another one." Clay seems incredibly serious with what he's telling me, and I know that Gemma has no idea I'm being given this information.
I'm stunned into silence for the second time in a short space, but I can see where he's coming from, The Morrow household became more of a home to me then my own by the time I was 14, Gemma was the female adult figure I always looked towards, Clay the male. While Uncle Jacob had been alright, Clay was the open book who would answer any question, and was always there when I needed a father-figure.
I feel guilty, and I know Clay can read it in my face cause he shakes his head, "No, don't feel bad. She eventually forgave you on her own. Donna gave her all the updates you gave her and the pair of them are very close now. So thank you for that, but, that is the ONLY good thing that came from you leaving."
"Actually Clay, more good did come from me going than just that. I leant who I was when I wasn't trying to catch Jax's attention. I learnt to be an adult. But I guess the best thing about me leaving is I learnt that Charming isn't just where I lived, its home. It's part of me and it's somewhere I'm not leaving again." I know that answering Clay back normally isn't the best thing to do, but he needs to know that I feel more good came then just the demolition of the boundary between Donna and the club.
The work that I had put into making her realise that the hatred she thought she had towards the club stemmed from the brain washing her parents did took a lot of time, but thankfully when it finally broke she realised that without her accepting the club her relationship wouldn't last past the first hurdle, and that the club would help her with anything she would ever need during the course of her life, provided she never treated the club badly, she was now the closest Old Lady to the club, right behind Gemma of course.
He seems to accept my interruption, a rare thing for him, before he turns and says, "Right, let's get out of here. Foods waiting."
Running towards my car I yell over my shoulder, "Bet I get there before you old man!"
He laughs, waving a hand at me as I tear out the car park, past the prospect assigned to guard the lot overnight, mainly due to the trailer tucked in the corner that contains everything I own.
Pulling into the driveway a record 3 minutes 45 seconds later I'm not sure whether I'm impressed or annoyed that Clay's bike is already tucked at the front of Gemma's Caddy and he's striding towards the door.
"Did you stop for a nap on the way?" He taunts as I climb out of the car and head towards him.
"Nope, obviously a few streets have changed though if there's a shorter shortcut to get here then I used."
He doesn't confirm what I'm guessing, but he doesn't deny it so I resolve to ask Donna about it later when I have a minute.
Pulling open the door he looks over at me as we go inside, he heads towards the coat rack while I stalk over to the kitchen where I can hear loud voices, both of which I recognise, pausing just out of view. I'm suddenly interested it what's about to be said.
"Do you know how much shit we had to go through to get her to TALK about what happened here Prince Asshole? Do you know that it took us six months before she would stop cringing every time she heard a motorcycle? In a city like New York that's a fuckload of cringing every day. It took us a full year before she would even tell us where she was from, and you know what. It was only half the truth. She told us she was from, and I quote, 'Some backwater hillbilly bum fuck town in the middle of California that no one has heard of, but the people who live there are sure it's the centre of the world'." Al snaps, obviously her time travelling has worn her thin temper to breaking point. I've never known her to speak to a complete stranger like this, but then I guess in her mind Jax isn't a stranger, he's the shadow that followed me around for 4 years.
"Do I look like I would have let her leave? It's not just you that had to deal with non-information. I didn't know she was going till she was already gone. For at least a week I thought she was DEAD because of her connection to the club. We heard nothing for months after the 2 lines sent to the garage that she was alive and well." I hear a thud, and I hope its Jax having sat down, but what he's just said makes me incredibly grateful again to Donna. When I found out Tara left, I asked Donna, begged her I guess, not to tell Jax anything about me other than that I was still breathing, until it seemed he was getting over Tara leaving.
"She is not the only one that had it hard that first year, my girlfriend left me and one of my best friends left at the same time. Do you know what that feels like?" Jax sounds like he's about to lose whatever hold he has over his control so I decide now would be an opportune time to make my entrance.
Turning the corner I see Jax standing behind the table, the thunk having been him setting an almost full beer on the table. Al is on the other side of the table, she's leaning onto the table, her entire body tense and I know that if I hadn't have stepped in there the next words would have been information I didn't want anyone in this room to know, I look at the faces of my friends and quickly realise that no one has bothered filling Jax in on names, no one would have had a chance to. I'm pretty sure Al's temper has been simmering since she left New York.
"Right guys, I'm here. Please stop arguing over me. Yes, Al, I was a mess when I got there, and yes it did take me a long time to get over what had happened. But I did get over it, and I'm okay now. Jax, you have no right to compare me and your bitch leaving with the anguish I had when I had to leave my ENTIRE family and EVERYTHING I had known since I was dumped here as an orphan. So, fuck up okay...just fuck up." I am over trying to be nice to Jax; he's been acting like Prince Asshole again, so my mind goes to the setting I seem to have developed for dealing with those sorts of people.
I can see the exact second Jax's control snaps, and so does everyone else in the room. I'm suddenly being ushered into the kitchen by Cam and Donna and Jax is being manhandled out the door by Clay and Opie.
I look at Gemma, and I can't quiet read the emotion in her eyes, it looks like she's proud of something but given her son has just been pretty much shoved out her door I'm not sure if it really is pride, or if it's another volcano about to explode.
She walks over and hugs me, "Don't worry about him. He'll be fine I'm sure. Prince Asshole...that actually fits the way he behaved when you left, but don't tell him I said that."
I nod, I would never tell him anything that happens, or happened, in the conversations Gemma and I have.
I'm not sure if introductions got done before the shit storm broke, but I introduce Al and Cam to Gemma and I'm equally shocked and gobsmacked when she turns to them and hugs them both. She holds Al out at arm's length, laughs softly and says, "I would love to see it when my thick son gets it into his head that the Al and Cam we've heard so much about are not males like he thought." Gemma does not hug strangers. But perhaps that's something that changed while I wasn't around.
Ushering us all the to the table Gemma and Neeta, who was hiding in the kitchen, start piling dishes into the middle and before long we're all talking, though I feel like most of the questions are still being aimed at me. I guess after 4 years there is a lot of catching up to do.
Going through the mundane questions, where did I live, where did I work, did I enjoy school we get to dessert before someone, and I am pretty sure it's Tig who is not known for his compassion, in fact he's more known for the bluntness, "Do you really think that you're that important to your ex that he'll follow you here?"
With all eyes suddenly on me, I'm stuck in the spotlight fishing through the words I know I need to say, but that seem to be stuck.
Al saves me, "Craig was possessive right from the first day. He made her get rid of everything she had that reminded her of Charming. He wanted her to get laser tattoo removal on her ankle. He told her, within my ear shot, that it was stupid having marked that on her skin, and how she'd never be able to escape it. He then criticised the work itself, I guess he didn't know I'd done it. He would come over in the morning, take her to school, go to work and then come back to the school to take her home again. During which time he'd be ringing her every hour and texting every 10 minutes. It wouldn't surprise me if the phone he gave her had a tracking chip in it. He seemed to show up everywhere she was where he wasn't."
Cam looks up, meeting the steely eyes of Tig and holds his gaze, something not many people I've met in my life can do, "We managed to save a lot of her Charming stuff by hiding it as ours, but she had this massive painting she'd done of the lot at the garage, full of bikes and people. Different leather, but all with the same image on the back. It took her about 8 months to paint, she called it her 'final therapy'. She loved that painting, but he took a butcher knife to it one night while she slept and it couldn't be repaired. She cried for about 2 days and he just told her to get over it and stop living in the past. That her life was with him now and the sooner she got over whatever thoughts of Charming she had the better."
The hard men around the table seem shocked that I spent that long on something depicting them, but I see the light dawn in their eyes as they remember the images I've had painted on my vehicle. Each of them seems like they can't comprehend how I'd managed to get involved with someone so opposite to all the men I grew up around.
Thankfully the conversation gets changed quickly by Donna who'd been watching me since we sat down and had noticed how tense I had gotten. The path that the conversation they'd started could have headed down made me cringe and hope that the floor would swallow me whole.
She checks on the twins and innocently asks Clay something about her car which turns the looks around the table from me back to work related stuff that I can ignore and try and forget New York and it's horrible memories.