Shift by Ginger Scott
23
“Waiting at the end of the driveway is not going to get them home any sooner,” Tommy says.
I don’t bother to answer. My brother is as anxious as I am. He’s pacing the same driveway I’m sitting in.
I was the first in our house to know. Bailey wakes up earlier than any teenager should. She likes to run in the mornings, before the Arizona heat sets in. She had no reason to turn the television on, but it was cloudy and she wanted to see if the morning show was on yet, maybe catch the weather. Chance of rain is a big deal around here. That’s when she saw the clip of the crime tape and the reporter camped outside the familiar trailer park. She called me on repeat until I woke up and answered.
My stomach sank and my heart went into panic rhythm as I raced down the hall to my parents’ room and shook my dad awake. He spent the morning getting the details of what happened, a partial puzzle with too many holes. It all came together when he got a call from an old friend. And that’s what I keep coming back to as my mind spins with repeating thoughts: What if all of life’s dominoes didn’t line up just right? I can’t help but wonder if Dustin would have been lost to us for good.
My dad went to law school with someone in the county prosecutor’s office, a guy who’d been to a race or two back in the day and followed my dad’s posts about his son and like-a-son on Facebook. So when Dustin’s name came through the system, he looped my dad in. Suddenly, me and Dustin holding hands at the kitchen table didn’t seem so important. Dustin is family, and we take care of our own.
“I think I see Dad’s truck,” Tommy says, hopping off the retaining wall by the garage that he climbed up on for a better view.
I get to my feet and move to the middle of the street along with my brother. It’s a late afternoon sun baking us and the clouds have cleared, so the pavement sends up waves of heat. Despite that, neither of us moves. I stare through the glass on the passenger side until the reflection of the sky clears enough that I can zero in on Dustin’s eyes. I cup my mouth, covering my silent gasp the moment I do.
He’s a shell of himself. There’s a blankness to his eyes that fills my chest with suffocating fear. This has changed him, more than everything he’s been through in his life. He’ll always be different now. I’ll still love him, no matter what, no matter who he’s become.
My dad parks closer to the house and I run to the passenger door before Dustin opens it. He’s slow to move, almost as if every action he takes hurts. His head rolls to the side and our eyes meet, mine full of tears, his still empty—void of anything. He pushes his door open and steps outside, his limbs seeming too heavy to hold up, his legs to numb to move.
“I’m so sorry,” I say, words way too small for all he’s been through. I move into him, sliding my hands under his arms and around his back before flattening my cheek against his chest. He holds me back, but it’s flimsy—fragile.
“Let’s get inside,” my dad says, his tone serious. Not stern, and definitely not unkind. But there’s a hint of immediacy that makes the hairs on my arm prick up a little.
My brother rushes to the door ahead of us, opening it wide, signaling how welcome Dustin is. I think he’s overcompensating for the way my parents have behaved and maybe a little how he did at first as well. It doesn’t matter, though. None of that matters. My parents woke up and remembered how much they loved Dustin when he needed them most, and I’ll cherish that forever.
I thread my fingers through Dustin’s and hold his bicep with my other hand as I guide him inside to the table where my mom has a sandwich waiting and his favorite cherry soda. I take the seat next to him and slide myself close.
“I’m really okay,” he croaks, and what I think might be a slight attempt at laughter follows. “I’m not the one who got the life nearly kicked out of him.”
His eyes flicker to my dad and I follow his gaze in search of some clue to what really happened. All I know is what we pieced together from the news and the things my dad shared when he took off to get Dustin. Someone Colt was in business with came to collect. Dustin’s mom wasn’t home. She never came home from her shift at the gas station store. She basically vanished. Dustin is worried her disappearance means the worst. I can’t help but have this feeling she’s safe, that she maybe knew what was coming for Colt and purposely removed herself from all radars.
“I’m so glad you didn’t go home earlier than you did. If you showed up when whoever did that to Colt was there . . .” I choke up and Dustin squeezes my hand tightly.
“I’m okay. I promise,” he says. Again, his eyes flit to my dad. It fills my body with an uneasy poison that is possible to ignore.
“Did they tell you anything about Colt? Are they charging him?” Tommy pipes up, his eyes darting between Dustin and my father for answers. My dad eases his weight back on the edge of the counter as he folds his arms over his chest, his brow pulled in tight, as it’s been since he got the call about Dustin being held at County.
“I’m not sure what the charges are, but there are several. My buddy couldn’t tell me everything, and I probably got more out of him than I was supposed to.”
My dad’s answers seem purposely vague and I can’t help but feel he’s protecting my delicate ears, and perhaps more so my heart, by not telling me everything.
“What about the guys who beat up Colt?” I ask, my instincts telling me this was the source of my dad’s forehead lines.
My father draws in a long breath, one brow raising as he shakes his head.
“They don’t know much. They’re interviewing witnesses, but mostly people only heard the noise when everything went down. I can’t imagine anyone stepped outside to get a better look, but maybe someone saw something,” my dad says.
I shift my gaze to my brother’s face, reading his eyes for answers I don’t seem to be getting from our dad, but he looks as lost as I feel.
“You’re staying here, right? Dad? He’s staying with us for now.” Tommy’s insistence eases my ache. I’m glad he’s the one who asked.
“Of course he is,” my mom says, slipping into the chair directly across from Dustin. She slides her palms forward on the table and Dustin lifts his head from his plate that he hasn’t touched to give her a forced, tight smile.
“Thank you,” he utters. His throat labors on a swallow.
A thick silence settles in, a combination of me and my brother not knowing what to ask, Dustin not wanting to talk, and my parents satisfied to not talk at all. The longer it lasts, though, the more questions brew in my gut. I listen to that faint voice in the back of my head that says it’s not the time to dig deeper. I need to trust this silence, that it’s purposeful, and Dustin will share his pain with me when he’s ready.
He picks at his sandwich, and my parents delve into some logistical conversation about making a few calls and getting some paperwork done. My dad called in a lot of favors to keep Dustin out of the system. It helps that he’s almost eighteen. Two weeks shy exactly. And my parents are in possession of more of Dustin’s personal papers than his own parents are. We’ve held on to his birth certificate since my dad entered him in his first solo kart race when he was seven.
After another hour, my brother gives up on the idea of learning more tonight, and dismisses himself to his room. I can tell by Tommy’s silence that he’s worried, and maybe later tonight he’ll come down and talk to Dustin for real. We both will.
Colt has been a threat to Dustin’s wellbeing since the moment our friend—my love—was born. That’s the vision that tortures me now, too. That threat carries the potential of taking his life. In the back of my mind I always worried that one day Colt would punch Dustin a little too hard, would be a little too drunk or high to know what he was doing and think his son was his enemy. Would take his life.
My body shakes at that thought and my voice breaks without my permission. The slip in my veneer is enough to trigger Dustin out of his trance, and he abruptly pushes away from the table.
“I need some air. I’m sorry, but . . . I need a minute,” he says, ducking his head as he bolts to our front door.
My eyes flash to my dad in search of answers, but my father is watching him go. I stand to follow him.
“Let him go, Hannah. He’s been through a lot today, last night,” my dad says, his eyes on the now closed door Dustin just tugged shut behind him.
I stand by the table, torn between believing my father and wanting to be there for the boy I love when he’s hurting. Dustin’s pain wins out and I shake my head.
“I’m sorry, but I can’t. I can’t just let him go,” I say, jogging to the door and rushing out to the driveway where I find Dustin standing at the end by the road, his palms pressed against his crying eyes.
“Dustin!” I cry out. He spins and drops his arms helplessly, his tortured, red eyes finding solace in mine. His lips part as they stretch wide with the need to cry. He’s caught in this limbo where he’s too tough to show his emotion, but the pressure building inside his all-to-human body is dying to explode with everything he feels.
“I can’t, Hannah. I just . . . I don’t know what to do,” he says, and I throw my arms around him. This time, he does it back.
“You’ve got time. It’s okay, Dusty. It’s okay,” I say as his weight crushes me, his chin falling into the crook of my neck as his spine curves and his frame shrinks to fit with mine.
I hold him tight, letting him quake against me, his body warm under the weight of his black zip-up hoodie and his black jeans. The sun drops below the horizon, and we stay where we are, eventually sitting on the concrete driveway. The air cools, a mix of warm currents in the slight breeze brewing from the desert, but I don’t suggest we change a thing. If this is where Dustin wants to be, it’s where we will stay until he’s ready to go inside. His head hasn’t left my shoulder in an hour, and the only clue I have that he hasn’t fallen asleep is the rare utterance of “I’m sorry, Hannah” against my ear.
“You have nothing to be sorry for,” I keep repeating. I hate what Colt has done to him, what his mother has done. If she left, knowing what was coming, and didn’t bother to take her son with her, she is more shameful than I thought her to be. Who could do that to their child? To anyone they claim to love, even if they choose their addiction over that person. There has to be a thread of humanity in her soul that remembers she is someone’s mother, that she has a son—a son who is becoming such an amazing man.
Night comes, and we stay as we are. My dad occasionally comes out to check on us, each time encouraging us to come inside. He doesn’t press, though. He gives Dustin the time he needs, and he doesn’t insist I leave him alone any more. Maybe he realizes it’s useless. Or maybe he sees how I’m holding our boy together. I’m thankful for this compassion.
Little by little, Dustin comes back to me. His hands kneed mine, his fingers drawing tiny circles on my palms, his arms coming alive enough to hold me tight. His legs curl around my body as we sit, he scoops me into his cocoon, and finally—finally—his lips find the place where wisps of baby fine hair line my temple. I’m soothed by the strokes of his hand in my hair, and his heart isn’t racing in his chest.
Still, though his body has calmed, he insists he’s sorry.
“I’m just so fucking sorry, Hannah,” he finally expands, as if somehow this gives it meaning.
I pull back enough to hold his head between my palms. Our eyes dance, his focus less manic than before but still not the restful expression I’m used to from him.
“I love you, Dustin Bridges. You did nothing wrong. And I love you for you. I love you,” I say. I’ll repeat these words until he believes them, until he hears them in every part of his body. I’ll say them to anyone who asks, to anyone who dares to question where my loyalty lies. I’ll pronounce my love for this boy in a court of law, in the face of death, at the line of fire. I’ll love him for always because I know, whether he can say it yet or not, he loves me back. He loves me, and I won’t let go.