When I Was Theirs

41. Emmy

41

Emmy

“ Y ou really do like the weirdest shit.” Jared peers over my shoulder. “Any cursed dolls in there?”

“It’s not weird,” I defend as I pick through the crate. The stall owner gives Jared a dirty look. “It’s… quirky. What did you get?”

I twist as he holds up a few battered books, turning my head to see the spines. “Biographies?”

He tucks them under his arm. “I like reading about people’s lives. Who they were, what they did.”

I’m smiling as I turn back. “I’m more of a romance girl. I like the idea that there’ll always be a happy ever after at the end. No surprises.”

That only happens in real life. My smile slips slightly, and I distract myself, seizing a glass statue I’ve been eyeing up for the last few minutes and waving it at a bemused Jared. “I mean, look at this.”

He grimaces, reaching for the tiny clown. The eyes are glued on separately, giving it a bug-eyed look. “Have you ever spoken to anyone about this?”

I snatch it back, cradling it against my chest. Jared stares as I stroke it, trying not to laugh at his expression. “He doesn’t mean it. Don’t listen to him.”

“I can’t tell if you’re joking.” Shaking his head, he looks at the owner. “How much for the clown?”

I blink at him as he hands over cash and steers me away. “Quick, before you see the seven-legged dog.”

I almost twist my head to see, but the lift in his lips gives him away. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know. But you looked like you desperately needed a clown statue in your life. And I wouldn’t want Geraldine to be lonely.”

We stroll down the path. Carefully, I slip the clown into my coat jacket. “You can laugh. But I bet that if you were a knick-knack that nobody wanted, you’d want me to rescue you too.”

Grinning, I turn to face him. “Jared?”

He clears his throat, offering me a quick smile. “Yeah. I would.”

I think back.

Shit.

But the teasing air of a moment ago is gone. We pause to buy coffees from a street cart before I draw him over to a free bench. “I’m sorry. I didn’t even think about what I was saying.”

They grew up in the system when their mom died. It’s not hard to draw a parallel directly to how my words might make him feel.

Jared sighs. “You didn’t say anything wrong. I love that you collect the most random shit because nobody else will want it. Even though Geraldine will feature in my nightmares from now on.”

I wait, nudging him. “But? There’s definitely a ‘but’ in there.”

Jared swallows. “I… I lied to Ben about something. You just reminded me of it.”

He stares at the people across from us. A little boy argues with a little girl while their dad tries to separate them. “About what happened to our mom.”

“Okay,” I say carefully. “You don’t have to tell me—,”

“She walked out.”

It takes me a second to understand his words. “On you? And Ben?”

He looks away from the family, down to his lap. “I was ten. Ben was five. She had a lot of problems. I think she needed help, but she didn’t know where to go or how to get it. Not that we could’ve afforded it.”

I inhale sharply. “God, Jared.”

He coughs. “She left us a lot, but she packed her bags that time and left while we were sleeping. She was gone for a long time. Weeks. I managed to get Ben to school, make do with what we had in the cupboards, but someone must have realized after a while and called CPS. They put us in a few different homes after that. We moved around a lot.”

Horror swamps me. “Did they find her?”

Jared nods. “She just… she couldn’t do it. Couldn’t cope. That’s what she said. She was arrested for child abandonment, but nothing really came of it. She voluntarily relinquished her parental rights.”

“Your dad?” I ask gently. My heart is aching.

“No idea.” Brown eyes linger on the father opposite us. “I don’t think they ever tracked him down, whoever he was.”

“So she’s still out there somewhere.”

“Yeah,” he says hoarsely. “I just… Ben kept asking me where she was, and I didn’t want him to feel like he wasn’t good enough for her to stay, or that something was wrong with him to make her leave. He was more than good enough. So I made it that she couldn’t have come back for us. That she wanted to, but she couldn’t.”

My eyes are burning. I look up to the clear sky. No rain today, only a pale winter sun. “Both of you were good enough, Jared.”

“Maybe.” He doesn’t sound like he believes it.

“What happened when you got older?” He’s five years older than Ben. “You’re twenty-eight?”

“I worked with a social worker to petition for custody when I turned eighteen. It took a while. I had to get an apartment, a job, prove that it was in his best interest to keep us together. We were separated for around ten months. But it worked out.”

I try to understand. Try to imagine a teenage version of Jared working to give his brother a home. “And it never came up? Your mom?”

He shakes his head. “Not from me. And we talked about her, especially after his diagnosis. Ben would have said if he’d found out from someone else.”

I sit back in my seat, trying to digest the information. “He wouldn’t blame you for trying to spare him from that. You were kids.”

Jared was a kid. A kid who tried to take responsibility for his little brother.

Don’t cry.

“It wasn’t right.” Jared’s jaw is tight. “It took me a long time to realize. He deserved to know, but I never told him. And I didn’t want to put it on him at the end. It would have been one more unresolved burden for him, and one less for me.”

We sit silently for a while as I digest.

Holding a piece of Ben’s life that he never got to have.

“Did you open your letter?” His question jars me out of my thoughts.

Breathing in, I shake my head. “It’s the last words of his that I’ll ever hear for the first time. I’m not ready for that yet.”

“Yeah,” Jared says quietly. “I feel the same way. There were a lot of conversations we didn’t get to have.”

Something tugs. A knowing . “You didn’t leave him, did you?”

Because I’m slowly seeing all the little parts that make up Jared Bennett. And with that, I realize that there’s no way in hell that this man would have left Ben to face his illness alone.

He studies his empty coffee cup. “Not the way you think. He refused to have any more treatment. There were things we could have tried – medical trials. Non-traditional routes. We had options. But he wouldn’t do any of it. Said he’d had enough of being the dying one, and he wanted to live before he ran out of time.”

He looks at me, then. “I was so damn angry with him. It felt like giving up. There was a lot of yelling, and I… I left him. Just for the night. I needed to think. I hadn’t slept for days, trying to come up with choices when he didn’t even want any. And when I came back, he’d gone. Left a note, so the cops wouldn’t help me find him. And I tried. That was six months before he died.”

And three months before he met me. “I’m so sorry, Jared.”

Ben left him. Exactly like their mom did.

His eyes look damp. “I think he was exactly where he wanted to be, at the end. There’s a lot of comfort in that. And I got to see him again. I was petrified that I’d get the call one day, and he’d already be gone.”

He smiles. A wobbly smile. “There was never going to be enough time. But I got more than many. I got to say goodbye. It’s enough.”

It has to be.

He blows out a breath. “This is a tough conversation to have on a hangover, Emilia.”

I study his profile. “Then let’s talk about something else.”

A different topic enters my mind as he walks away to grab us another coffee. His hands shake as he hands me mine.

Today isn’t the day to ask him about how much he drinks. Even if it’s a lot. Every day, at the bar.

Besides, it’s none of my business.

Even if it feels like it could be.

Even if it feels like he could be.

But I say nothing, and we sit quietly on a bench on a Sunday afternoon, talking about Ben, and books, and dolls with potential cursing abilities.

Until we both feel a little less alone.