Dad hadn’t spoken one word at all, but his stare was on Reese’s every move. Studying her entire existence. I hated how it felt whenever I was around him. I hated how we could have been so close, yet he felt so far away.
“Well, I’ll be damned, if it isn’t Emery Taylor. It looks like it’s a Taylor family reunion,” a voice said with excitement. I looked over my shoulder to see Bobby, my high school friend, walking in my direction. If only he knew how bad his timing was in that very moment. “It’s been too damn long, that’s for sure,” he said the moment his eyes locked with mine.
He went straight for a hug, and I let it happen, mostly because I was in a state of shock. He completely missed the uncomfortable situation unfolding before us, probably due to the alcohol in his bloodstream. “How have you been?” he asked. “It’s been too long.”
Before that very minute? Pretty great. In that moment? Awful. “I’ve been good, Bobby. It’s good to see you.”
“Shit, you too, Emery. This town’s sure missing your face—and your cooking. Sammie has been cooking the meals down at the church after services, but it’s nowhere as good as your cooking. Maybe before you go, you can whip up some of that mac and cheese you used to make for—”
“Where is she?” I asked, turning straight to Mama as my stomach dropped. It felt as if boulders were sitting heavy in the pit of me, weighing me down from shock.
Mama shifted uncomfortably in her shoes as Dad looked away from me. They didn’t say a word. Guilt sank in Mama’s eyes, yet Dad didn’t show a blink of remorse for the news that Bobby had revealed.
“Where is she?” I asked again. A rage was building up inside me, and I didn’t know how it was going to explode from my system with the news my parents had been hiding from me. “I called you, Mama. I asked about her, and you didn’t say a word.”
“I don’t have to tell you a thing,” she said, crossing her arms as if her stance made any sense.
I turned to Bobby. “Do you know where Sammie is staying, Bobby?”
“Don’t answer that, Bobby,” Mama ordered, scolding him as if he were a child.
“Bobby.” I took a deep inhalation and locked my eyes with his. “Do you know?”
Bobby’s stare dashed back and forth between Mama and me, and his aloof persona was completely drained away as he began to read the seriousness of the situation at hand. “Oh man, look, I didn’t mean to cause any trouble,” he explained, ruffling through his curly hair.
“It’s fine, just tell me,” I said, trying everything to keep myself from shaking him out of fear. Oliver stood behind me with his hands on Reese’s shoulders. He leaned in and whispered that he was going to take Reese off to play a game to give my parents and me space to talk. I nodded in agreement.
As they began to walk away, Mama’s eyes widened in shock. “You’re just going to allow a strange man to walk off with my granddaughter?”
A strange man?
Her granddaughter?
She couldn’t have been serious in that moment. She couldn’t have been questioning my parenting skills, when she’d been lying to me about the whereabouts of my sister for who knew how long.
I didn’t even give her question the answer she was in search of. My eyes stared into Bobby. “Bobby?” I asked again.
He grimaced and rubbed his hand over his mouth and then shrugged. As he was about to speak and give me the information, Dad jumped into the conversation.
“I think it’s about time for you to walk away, Bobby,” he ordered.
Bobby took the command and ran with it. Literally. He jogged away and didn’t look back once.
Acid began to burn at the back of my throat as my panic rose. My little sister had been living in our small town for so long and had never reached out to let me know. She’d made it seem as if she was going off to find herself, not to return to my parents’ chains.
“How did you get that child?” Mama asked, her voice harsh. Her forehead was dripping with sweat, and it was the first time in a long time that I remembered seeing Mama nervous—outside of Dad yelling at her.
“Excuse me? Sammie left her with me five years ago. She said she was going off to find herself.”
“No. That can’t be. Sammie said the baby didn’t make it. She said she lost it, and that’s why she came back,” Mama said, shaky.
“Why in the world would she leave a child in the hands of someone like you?” Dad barked, disgusted by the idea. That hurt me more than he’d ever know.
I couldn’t grasp what was happening, or why it was happening. “Why didn’t you tell me she’s been living back here?” I asked Mama.