AN: so read the long authors note at the bottom please. Sorry about the wait. Review and let me know your still interested…..
Jonny stood at the hospital door and held his hand up to knock. He wasn't expecting the door to open right as he was about to knock. In fact Jonny had spent the last five minutes trying to figure out if he was really going to go inside. He and his uncle had never really seen eye to eye on anything, except for that T needed out of Carolina six years ago and that Jonny's house in Tacoma was the best option. The woman who had opened the door was a face that Jonny hadn't seen in a long time. Not since Aunties funeral, the last time Jonny had ever been in Carolina.
"hey Mrs. Beth." Jonny said in a quiet tone. The woman was older than the last time he had seen her, but she still had those eyes, the ones that saw into your soul. That held most of the secrets in his family, secrets that even Jonny himself never wanted to admit too.
"Don't just stand there, get your butt in and see your uncle. He's been waiting." She replied ushering him in the door and closing it behind her. Leaving Jonny in the room with his uncle, Jonny took a deep breath as he approached the bed. As Jonny took the recently vacated seat at the bed side, he stayed quiet wanting his uncle to be the first to talk.
"Long time no see son." His uncle said, giving Jonny a look he couldn't decipher.
"Yeah it has." Jonny replied.
"So I know why you are here. Not that I can blame you. The girl has always been too damn stubborn to think about herself for very long. Even not coming home wasn't really about her."
"So, what do I do?" Jonny asked in reply.
"Go home, I'm already working on a plan. I wont let her give it all up to watch me die. Watching one parent die was more than enough. She will be back to Tacoma soon. Even if I have to put her on a plane myself like I did all those years ago."
Jonny just nodded in response. He wasn't sure that T would let that fly again.
"Just got one question," His uncle asked.
"Yeah? Whats that?"
"He love her as much as she love him?"
Jonny couldn't help the smile that crossed his face. HE shoulda known that their trip into town wouldn't have gone by untold to his uncle.
"He loves her more."
His uncle nodded, a satisfied smile placed on his worn face.
"That girl is just like her momma."
-LK-
T didn't climb out of bed. She texted everyone goodbye, only allowing Junior and Ana into her room for hugs and kisses. She told Ana that her present would be in Tacoma by the time she got home. She pulled two boxes out of her closet and handed them over to the kids after making them promise not to open them until they were already on the road. As T closed the door after them, she couldn't help but wonder how long it would be until she saw them again. Christmas break? Or maybe spring break? Shit it might not even be until next summer. T climbed slow back into bed, Greg promised to over see the farm today. Him and Annie were worried about her, told her she looked sick and she should go back to bed. T couldn't help it, she went back to bed quietly. Her personal time only interrupted by the kids saying their goodbyes. T had never been good at saying bye. In fact she avoided it, with see you laters or just nothing at all. She knew that she might regret it someday, but goodbye always felt to ending. Goodbye was what she had said to her mother when they placed her body in the cold hard ground in a casket that was "beautiful" if you can even call awful things like that beautiful.
T climbed back into her bed. The room was a lot like it had been when she left. The huge four poster canopy, with blue sheer instead of white and sheets of all different shades of blue was still placed on the center wall. All of the posters that used to coat her walls had been taken down a few weeks before she left for Tacoma. All of her old clothes had been donated to good will, but she still had her momma's jewelry box on the vanity with the huge mirror. Mirrors, it was one of the things that T missed most about this room, the mirror over the vanity, the huge mirror in the bathroom and the mirrors that made up her closet doors. She also loved the bed, it was high enough that she had to jump into it and the pillow-top mattress was the kind that you just kind of sink into. She sheets felt like a new cotton t-shirt and her down feather comforter was cool on her body. T just laid there, letting the quiet surround her for a moment before turning on her IPod. As the country music poured out of the speakers that were placed all over her room, she snuggled deeper into the covers. She didn't plan on falling asleep, she didn't even feel tired. But somehow, the bed, the music and her body all caused her to close her eyes. And for once, she slept for eight hours, without sex or booze.
-LK-
Momma Sarah Jane and Momma Beth were not exactly happy with T. They thought that she was acting just like her momma, trying to give up all her dreams just to make everyone else happy. She didn't notice the fact that her not being happy made everyone else unhappy. She loved that man, she loved him more than they had ever seen her love any other man and she was just giving him up. Hopefully, he would be like Tay's dad and never give up until he makes her realize that she deserves to be happy too. As always though her daddy was coming up with a plan to make her realize she needs to think about herself. They knew that it might not play out the way he wanted it too. That Tay wasn't exactly the same girl she had been the last time he put her on a plane. They weren't stupid though, he was signing himself out of the hospital and going home to spend the last of his days on his farm with his family. Leaving Tay with no choice but to move on, he was going to tell her that his last wish, was for her to go back to Tacoma and be happy. He had a plan and his plans hardly ever failed. He knew when he put his daughter on that plane six years ago that it would be a long time until he saw her again. He made peace with that, he had faith that she would do better things with her life than she would living out on the farm. The three of them though admitted they were not too sure if she accomplished what the dream had been or not. They didn't know the details to her life, except for her graduating school and working for a CSI like those TV shows they found compelling. The shows that they watched because it made them feel closer to the girl they had lost so long ago. She was a woman now, in love with a handsome and scary looking man. They could tell when they saw that man though, that nothing bad would happen to her if he could prevent it. The look of love in her eyes when she looked at him didn't escape them either. She avoided the subject as she always had. Being open about her relationships like other girls had never been something that Tay found important to share. It had driven Ari and Cora crazy for as long as the mommas could remember. Just like it had driven them crazy when Tammy never shared the details of a date or a new love interest. They were private people about their private lives. They were loyal and strong and stubborn as hell, always putting others before themselves. They were selfless, not selfish but as smart as both woman had always been they also failed to see the fact that their own lack of happiness faded the happiness they were trying to provide others with.
Neither momma was happy with the task they were now completing. Nobody wanted to be the one to pull up that long West family drive way with her father. Nope, they knew that Tay was going to go mad cow crazy but it wasn't really like they were given much choice. Neither woman could blame him for wanting to spend his last days in his own home. As they pulled out of the hospital parking lot and onto the lone highway, no one spoke a word. All they could do was take the twenty minute ride to brace themselves for the anger they were sure they would receive when they arrived at their final destination.
-LK-
T didn't stay on the farm when she woke up in the early evening. All the chores were done, dinner had already been eaten and to be honest she wasn't in the mood for a lot of conversation. She had a single destination in mind, her momma. T didn't allow the memories of her and Seth sitting there jar the peace she planned on finding as she approached the grave. She held tightly to lavender she had picked from the garden in her hand. Her momma's favorite and just the smell of it always brought her tears to the surface. There was a light hint of lavender in everything that T wore. She washed her clothes with lavender soap, just so she could smell it when she put them on. She used perfume and shampoos and body washes with hints of it. It was never the light smell that made her eyes water, it was the strong smell of fresh lavender that always did her in. It was passing the fields of it, passing the little plant in the kitchen window that held it during the winter or the garden that smelled of it during the summer and spring months that did it.
T took a seat at the grave, she laid the lavender down carefully near the gravestone. She didnt talk or fidget. She just sat and let the birds and the wind and the rustle of the leaves be the words she couldn't find. Once she found her peace, she flipped open her cell and scrolled through her pictures. Upon finding the picture she was looking for she just prayed she didn't make a mistake.
-LK-
Happy hadn't said anything since they pulled off the long dirt road. He barely looked around or anything. He didn't know what to say. He left her and she let him. She didn't say goodbye again, she didn't text him or call or anything that might indicate the she wanted to take back having ever said goodbye in the first place. He brushed the thoughts off as quickly as they came. HE had done his part to right his wrongs with her. It was time for him to move on. He would be parting from the guys in some random Midwest state to do one last task for Glen as nomad before heading to Charming to have his vote put on the table. Charming was the best choice. It's close to his momma, he would have a set family even if they were full of drama, and there wouldn't be reminders of T everywhere. He wouldn't have to remember every detail of a night spent with her in his dorm in Charming. Nope, T wouldn't be able to haunt him there, at least he hoped. But what the Angel biker dude had said was sticking with him. He hadn't told Hap anything he didn't know but to know that he wasn't the only one who had felt like that was a shock. To find out that his (well not his anymore but no matter what she thought she would always belong to Hap) old lady stuck with and haunted more people then just him was a slight relief. Happy didn't need to feel like he was going soft or crazy because he wasn't the only one who felt like that. Happy heard someone shout out something, turning and looking around he saw Jonny pointing at the sign about a rest stop ten miles ahead. Giving him a confirming nod, Hap looked to see his surroundings. On either side of him were fields of wheat, at least that's what he thought until he took a deep breath and smelled the lavender and instantly his mind was flooded with thoughts of T.
"Just great" he mumbled "and the nightmare begins."
-LK-
As he climbed out of Beth's car, he looked around the farm. His puck up truck was missing, making it clear to him that his baby girl wasn't currently here. He let out the breath he had been holding, part in fear and part in anticipation. He knew that Taylor would take his being home as a bad sign, which of course it was. She would never guess he was about to flip her world upside down, one last and final time. He and Greg had worked out all the details. Greg had said that even though the man was slightly rough around the edges, he and Taylor had a love that shouldn't be ignored by ignorance from either one of them. Apparently, he was just as likely to give in as Taylor, which was not at all. When Greg had relayed that information, he couldn't help but laugh. Taylor was just like her momma, in both good and bad ways. She wouldn't take the world if it was on a gold platter in front of her. Nope neither of his girls ever felt like they deserved the best of anything if they didn't work hard for it.
He had been so lost in thought that he didn't really pay attention to where he was going but it didn't shock him at all that he ended up on the back porch by the fire pit, which was already going. He knew that Taylor sat out there with a glass of wine every night, much like how her momma had. No one would really believe that she drank wine though, Taylor had always been a liquor or beer girl. Something told him though that she drank the wine because it reminded her of her mom. Of everything that she and her momma had done together, Taylor always said that was one of the memories she held closest. It was those nights all of them sitting on the porch with the fire going, roasting marshmallows that they could act like a normal family. Like his wife wasn't dying, his daughter wouldn't grow up to hate him and they would all live happily forever after. Not that it really happened that way and in the morning sitting on the same porch with his coffee as he looked over his farm, he didn't see the fairytale anymore. He had never admitted to anyone except his wife when he sat upon her grave one day, that he felt like it was all his fault. Every single thing, he felt that he deserved to hold the blame for it. Even though the doctors said that no one was to blame for his wife's illness, he knew that he was only partly at fault for Taylor hating him, he knew that she was living in a world of turmoil and he just couldn't figure out how to help his seventeen year old daughter so he sent her to the only person he thought could, Jonny.
He wasn't sure how long he had been sitting on that porch before he heard the footsteps. He knew those foot steps well, had heard them sneaking by him a million times but he didn't look over. He wasn't ready to fight with her, to see the sadness or the anger once she realized what was really happening. He felt the swing swift and creak as she added her weight to it. He heard the clink of the wine glass as she set it on the ground, he still couldn't find the strength to look at his daughter. He couldn't erase the guilt he felt at her having to sit by and watch one of her parents die, again. She didn't give him much choice as she laid her head on his shoulder. He felt his shirt become wet, leaning his head against hers he wished he could take all her pain away. She didn't deserve to sit by and watch this, but he knew she wouldn't go anywhere else. She was going to stay by and watch him die, she would stay strong and wait. She would make arrangements, she would have him buried next to her momma and then maybe she would go about her life. The thing she didn't know of course was that, even from his grave he wasn't going to give her much of a choice. She would return to Tacoma and to her man, if she liked it or not. After all it was the last thing he could do for her.
-LK-
T didn't think anything out of the ordinary when she pulled up to the farm. She didn't think anything when she went in the kitchen and got her wine but she did feel a nagging in her gut. Something she had been ignoring since moving to the farm. She didn't need to worry about or at least she thought. Looking back on it, she realized that she should of but she just didn't want to worry about anything. She wanted to keep the peaceful feeling she had found at her momma's grave. As she went to the porch door though, she noticed the figure sitting on the swing. His face was illuminated by the fire. For a moment, she was reminded of when she was younger, she was reminded of before momma died, or before she became a crazy ass teenager. His face was older though, creases lined it from both worry and laughing. He always had a wonderful belly laugh that was contagious, no one could not laugh when daddy did. Even if it wasn't a funny joke, even when they were mad or sad if daddy laughed you couldn't help it you laughed to. She knew as she looked through the glass, the reason that he was home. She felt her eyes water as she opened the door. She counted her footsteps, much like she had when it was her momma sitting on the swing, sick and dying. It was something she did to try to keep her mind of the realization that the world she had always known was about to end. She knew the time would come, she figured that he would demand to come home soon, that he would want to die in his own bed, the same way her momma had. She remembered when her mom refused the last round of treatments, told the doctor she wanted to go home and be with her family. She wanted to die in the place she loved the most surrounded by the people who loved her. Not in some hospital that smelt of death and bleach. Momma had always been honest that way, much like T herself. They didn't hold shit back, life was too short to keep it all in. Her momma had always told her "Live life, love fully and never ever let anything get you down."
The only reason that it wasn't a tattoo on her body was because it was one of those sayings she didn't want other people to steal. It was a saying that her momma had told her and she wanted to keep the memories of her momma and the times she told her that to herself.
She set her wine glass down on the ground after sitting on the swing. She noticed her daddy not looking at her on purpose. She knew that he felt guilty for doing this to her again, he had stated that a million times since she had been home and she had always given him the same reply. There wasn't anywhere else in the world that she would rather be. In some sick and twisted way, T felt like she deserved this. All the bad shit she had done, had lead to this. She wouldn't leave because she felt as if this was her punishment for all the sins she had committed, all the sins she was sure to still commit. She wouldn't ever admit that to her dad though. She wouldn't let him know his baby girl was a killer, a trained one, a good and she would never admit that she enjoyed doing it. She leaned her head on his shoulder, she couldn't help it as the tears feel. She felt him lean his head against hers and she knew than that it was almost time. But she wasn't stupid enough to believe that her dad didn't have something up his sleeve. This town was small, she was sure he had heard about the sons trip in and of course about the son who held her heart.
-LK-
Seth wasn't sure what to say. The Sons had left, by what he was sure was Tay's demand by he still hadn't heard from her. He still hadn't seen her and his guys he had watching her place had reported that her dad was home. When he had been told that, he felt the rock form in his gut. He knew that her dad was coming home to die and that made Seth worry about her. It had taken awhile for her to admit that she had to watch her momma die and now she was having to do it with her dad. Seth could never understand how she could live in that house, how the deaths there didn't haunt someone like her. Now, he understood. She was a killer and in some ways slightly cold at heart but it was the love that kept her there. He asked her once how she could do it. He had expected some smart ass reply, not the very serious and thought through one she had give
"You learn to only see the good. You focus on those memories because that's how you want to remember them. You only see them for who they were in your life, the lessons they taught you, the way that they made you feel. Those are the things you see, the things you remember. All the other shit is just noise, its like static. You ignore it, otherwise it drives you crazy."
Seth figured that the real reason he hadn't heard from her had to do with the dude that showed up at their spot. He figured that she loved him, real deal loved him. A lot like she had loved Seth himself and having felt that love, knowing that love was as real as it could possibly be made him know that his shot was over. It wasn't really anybodys fault that they lost their chance. The blame needed to finally be placed where it belonged. Not at her feet or his, not at her dads or Jonny's. It was all just random acts of fate or karma or whatever the hell that shit was. Jonny fully believed that they had been placed into each others lives for reasons that neither one of them could of known at the time. They seemed clear now, they set each other on the paths that they were meant to follow. Sure Seth didn't want to really be the one to blame for the creation of "T" and he knew that he wasn't all at fault but he had turned her towards the things she craved and now loved. She had made him a better person, showed him what it really meant to love and to commit and to want more. Yeah, he would always love her and he knew in his heart that she would always love him. But he was finally seeing what his guys had been telling him, had been trying to explain to him for years. He got it, he knew that their time was over, that the girl he loved, was changed and that if he wanted to cherish those memories forever he really needed to let her go. Otherwise all the things that had drove him crazy in a good way about her would drive him crazy in a bad way. Tay and T while the same girl in some ways, was way different in others. Like she had told him at her mothers grave the first time he saw her since she landed her ass in juvie…. "Tay is dead. All that is left is T, is the little killer of Tacoma."
Seth had never seen her in action but he had heard stories, seen the after math and every time he was grateful that his club and the sons were on good terms. He never would of guessed the person behind those stories, that made even some of the most hardened men he knew quiver was the same girl who used to own his world.
Seth looked down at his phone, it was ringing. The number displayed was from the prospect he had watching her house. He knew that it was time than, flipping it open he said the words that both killed him and lifted the weight he had been carrying off his shoulders.
"Pack it up. Time to come home."
-LK-
After she saw her father to bed, she walked out of the house. She couldn't help it, she felt caged in by the house, the farm, the people but mostly she felt caged in by grief and by death. She didn't plan on her dad making it past the week. Her father, always the planner had his whole damn funeral planned out. Leaving T to only, make sure that the obituary that Greg had written got published and make the phone calls. It was a sucky thing. She didn't want to just sit by and watch him die, but she wouldn't leave either. She was sure that was his plan. She was sure that Jonny had told him all about her and Happy and the love she holds for him. She figured her dad was hoping that with his return home to die, that it would turn her away make her want to go back to Tacoma. But she wouldn't or couldn't or maybe a little bit of both. The farm needs her, her dad needs her and the truth is that she needs them. She needs the normal life, the life she grew up in. She craved it, to T, it made her feel less… sinful, less evil. She didn't feel like the church was going to burn down every time she set foot in it. Everyone in town only saw her as who she was, as what they knew she had done with her life. They saw her as someone who helped catch the bad guys, not as a bad guy herself.
T drove for a long time, letting her thoughts cycle. She just let her body take her away from her house and somehow, she already knew where she would end up. She hadn't been back to the park since the night she drove away from Seth. She didn't have the heart to relive whatever memories would pop up at the sight of the place. It was a demon though, it was something she needed to deal with. And it was easier to face than her father, than her farm and the death that seemed to always follow her home. It was a place of semi innocence. It was a place where she could be reminded if the time before she became a bringer of death, before she ever knew what it felt like to have a boy break your heart or to know how much life can really change you. How the little things are just as important as the big. She wanted to remember that she had a choice that she could stay here, run the farm and meet someone knew or even go back to life with Seth.
She climbed out of the truck slowly, she was surprised by the bike that was parked in the lot. Not that she should be, she knew Seth still came here. He had told her as much. As she approached him, his eyebrows were creased and he was smoking slowly, a trait that he always had when he was thinking deeply about someone.
"You know, your going to get creases and look older than you are if you don't quit that." She heard herself say.
Seth looked at her and smiled.
"Guess we still are connected, something told me to come here tonight. I guess that something was you." He replied
T made no comment but approached him, she took a seat on the ground next to the same chain link fence that Seth had slammed her against the last time they had been there together. The memory of that night of the fight, of the fuck and of her leaving was still there. It fought for its attention, it wanted to be the one she always remembered there, instead of all the good times they had. She shoved that memory down as far as she could and lit a cigarette.
Neither person spoke for a long time, comfortable in the silence and each at a loss of what to say. Seth knew she wouldn't want to hear and sorrys and that she would be pissed if she found out he had guys watching her, even though she probably knew. T wanted to just talk, she wanted to just feel something other than guilt and nothing. She didn't want to be numb any longer.
"you know, I saw him. I had a conversation with the guy. As much as I want to hate him, I cant. I see parts of me in him, but mostly I see a man who loves you as much or more than I do or ever did. I know hes part of the reason that you are who you are. I think that I can relate to him because that was me, still is me sometimes. Even though I finally see what my guys have been telling me, I know now that you are not that same girl I loved, you are different. Your stronger, colder and more grown up but when I think of you, this place or the past I see you as that girl as Tay. That's what I know, that's what I want to remember. It made me think of the conversation about you living at home still, in the place that your mom died. How you said that you only want to see the good, how the bad and the different is just static. How if you don't ignore it, it will drive you crazy. I don't want to see you as the LK, I don't want to see you as T. I want to remember you as Tay and that's why I know as much as I still wish we could be together, we cant. Because your not that same person and I'm not that same person. Life has changed us. But that dude, he loves you for who you are now. I know he does. I see it, just like I saw it in me than. When the guys talked about you, when the stories got passed down about you and I saw grown men who kill quiver and I knew that the girl I loved was gone. But even in knowing that, you didn't quit haunting me. I still saw you in places I knew you couldn't be, I still smelled your perfume on my sheets, I dated girls that looked like you and girls that didn't but all I ever saw was Tay. You don't wear the same perfume, you cut your hair different and you have a whole different attitude. You are a different person. You don't go to church on Sundays and eat at the dinner with your dad after. You don't wear cowboy boots and wranglers with plaid shirts and cute little tank tops underneath. It wouldn't even surprise me if you hate blue now. I can finally say that, I'm making peace with the fact that your different in a lot of ways but your still the same in one. You still push the people, the men who love you away. You still feel like you have to do the "right" thing, the "best" thing for everyone, or at least what you feel is best. You still over analyze things that don't need to be thought about but just plain ol' felt. You love that man, that club, the family you have but you still plan on leaving them to stay here on a farm that you were afraid to come back to because you think that it's what your supposed to do. I would bet you that you're the only one in the whole situation who feels like that. You should ask people how they feel instead of assume because you know what they say about people who assume shit…."
She couldn't help it, she laughed. "They make an ass out of themselves."
Seth laughed and nodded too. T stood up than, she gave Seth a smile and walked towards the truck. Halfway there she stopped and turned around.
"My favorite color will always be blue. Every time I walk into a church I feel like its going to burn down and I do love him and I will always love you. Thanks Seth… Seems like one of us finally grew up. Take care of that boy. You ever need anything, you let me know."
She didn't wait for a response. She didn't figure she would even get one. She extended her hand to him, even though she knew damn well he would never ask her for anything. She had made peace with her biggest past demons since being back in Carolina. Her dad and Seth. It made her feel lighter knowing that she didn't need to carry that guilt around anymore. She didn't need to feel like her past was something that would come back and bite her in the ass. She still didn't plan on returning to Tacoma or to Happy. She sure as hell didn't want to live in Charming, California. But she didn't plan on the events that were about to follow either….
-LK-
AN: while I hate cliff hangers, I just didn't want to add anymore into this chapter. I feel like I have kinda pulled T away from how I had envisioned her while trying to make her seem more venerable in this hellish time. I needed to make it that way, I think. I think that she needed to be brought back to some bad memories. I am hoping to have this story wrapped up in the next couple of chapters. It has ended up being way longer than I wanted it to be and it has changed from the way I had wanted it to end. I am sure that you guys are going to like this ending better than the one I had wanted it to be. I might, write an alternate ending with the way it was supposed to go but it just doesn't fit with the story anymore. Oh well. T is a crazy, indecisive bitch whos full of contradictions. I guess we will see what happens. Hope you guys enjoyed the chapter. Sorry about the wait.