The first thing I saw when I opened my eyes was Emily’s worried face hovering over me.
“Good morning,” I said, yawning through the words. “What time is it? Did we miss breakfast?” Sitting up on the makeshift bed I’d made use of almost every other day for the last seven years, I rubbed my eyes and tried to wake up.
“Jason. Honey.” I heard Emily’s struggle with those simple words and became alert at once.
Then my gaze fell on Dylan, who was sitting on the edge of his bed, his head in his hands. I looked up and saw his father, Logan Taylor—a fireman, a man I respected more than my old man—standing in the doorway. His eyes were as hard as steel.
“What’s going on?” I asked no one in particular as something ugly started to find its way into me.
Emily, the woman I loved quite possibly more than my own mom, sat down next to me and gripped my hand in her small, delicate one. She had burn marks on that arm, almost up to her shoulder, but they never bothered me like they surprisingly bothered a lot of people, young and old.
“Jason, I don’t know how to say this.”
Another burst of silence.
“Can someone please say something? Dylan? What’s going on, man?” Still no sound. “Okay, you guys are starting to scare me.”
“Logan,” Emily murmured next to me, her eyes desperately focused on her husband.
Dylan’s father shook his head, dropped his arms, and stepped into the room to sit next to Dylan, right across from me.
When my best friend lifted his head, I saw his bloodshot eyes.
My gaze went back to his father’s steely ones. They were easier to look at. Anger was always easier to handle than emotion; I had learned that from my own family.
“I’m ready,” I said, keeping my eyes on Logan. “Please tell me what’s wrong.”
I didn’t know it, but I was not actually ready for the words he would give me. Nowhere near ready.
“Son,” he started, because that’s what I was to him. “You can handle this.”
It wasn’t a question, but I nodded anyway.
“Your mother overdosed on her sleeping pills last night. She is gone.”
I blinked, once.
I nodded.
My voice thick and rough, I asked, “Who found her?”
“Apparently your father came back from his trip this morning. He called an ambulance, but Lorelai was already gone.”
“I understand. Where is my father?”
“He is at the hospital. I talked to him a few minutes ago.”
Helpless, I nodded again. What else could I do? What else was I supposed to do?
“Thank you,” I said, giving Emily’s hand a quick squeeze. “Thank you for being the ones to tell me.”
Every single person in the room I was sitting in had been more of a family to me than my own could ever be. I appreciated the fact that I could see the concern in their eyes, their concern for me. I never saw anything even close to it in my own mother’s eyes. Her alcohol meant more to her than her own son.
I slowly got up. “I should get back…home, I guess.”
But I had never had a home, had I? This was a home. The house across the street? Not so much.
Dylan and Logan got up with me, but I looked down at Mrs. Taylor. Her eyes were full of tears. She had the same shade of green eyes as her daughter, just as striking as Olive’s. It was soothing to look at.
I leaned down and, surprising myself, brushed a small kiss on her cheek.
“Please don’t cry, Emily. It’s okay. It’ll be okay.”
It sounded more like a question to my ears.
She slowly got up and brushed a tear away, my tear. I wasn’t even aware that I was crying. Her warm hand cupped my cheek and she stared right into my eyes. “Of course it will be okay, Jason. You have us.”
I nodded.
Unexpectedly, I found myself in Dylan’s arms next. “I’m so sorry, man,” he said, holding on to me. I felt Emily’s hand at my back, a soothing caress. Logan was standing next to us, watching over his family.
I was family to them.
I’d earned that place among them.
***
“Are you sure you don’t want to stay here and finish school with Dylan? I can talk to your dad again,” offered Logan.
The Taylor family was out on their front lawn. Even little Olive had come out to say goodbye with tear-filled eyes. I smiled at her. I could see sparkles in her eyes, sad sparkles maybe, but sparkles nonetheless. She was so full of life and had the most beautiful, captivating green eyes. So rich and alive. The kind that you looked at and let yourself happily drown in. I knew some idiot was bound to break her heart very soon, but I wouldn’t be there to protect her heart right alongside her brother. I wouldn’t be with the people I considered my family.
Instead, I would be in Los Angeles living in an unfamiliar house with a stranger I called Dad who I had never had the chance to get to know. For a quick second I wondered if he was blaming himself for her death. He certainly hadn’t been there when his presence could’ve made a difference. Maybe the ending wouldn’t have changed, maybe a few years down we would’ve still ended up in the same situation, but we would never know. It was too late for everything.
As for what I thought…I blamed life, and him. He was the one who’d chosen to leave us behind when he could’ve been a lawyer in San Francisco just as easily. He was the one who’d chosen to ignore my mother’s quickly deteriorating mental health, or depression, whatever you wanted to call it. And then he’d been the one who’d ignored me when I said his wife was becoming an alcoholic.
In the end, the choices they had made were changing my life.
“He isn’t changing his mind. Believe me, I tried,” I said finally.
I shrugged. Everything had changed except my dad’s decision: we were leaving. Or, more accurately, he was forcing me to leave everything behind.
Kicking at the grass under my foot, I stopped in front of Emily, the kindest, most caring human being. A mother who could never be truly mine.
“I don’t know what to say,” I admitted, words burning in my chest as my eyes continued to look down at my sneakers.
“Jason?”
Warm, gentle hands cupped my face and looked into my eyes.
“Do you remember what I said to you the first time we met?” She smiled, her eyes shining just like her daughter’s. “You’re always welcome here. That will never change. Los Angeles isn’t that far away; I’m expecting you to come back whenever you want to or need to. Do you hear what I’m saying?”
“Yes.” I nodded. “I don’t know how to thank you for everything you’ve done for me, for everything you’ve been for me.”
“I don’t need a thank you, Jason. Just make sure you come back to us.” She hesitated, only for half a second, then pulled me down and kissed my cheeks. “Make sure you take care of yourself.” One last look in my eyes, and she let me go.
I wished she wouldn’t.
“Son,” Logan said as he gave me a quick, unexpected hug. “You heard what Emily said, this is your home too. And you always come back to your home. Don’t forget that. We will miss you.”
It seemed like I wasn’t capable of doing anything other than nod that day.
I glanced at Olive and despite my situation, my lips tipped up.
“Cat got your tongue, too, huh?” She just stared at me with those sad, sad eyes. Olive Taylor always had something to say—always. “You’ve got nothing to say, little one?” I asked, chuckling, the sound completely wrong and rough.
“I’m really sorry about your mom, but I hope you’ll be happy in LA.”
The cold tone and what I was seeing in her eyes didn’t match, but before I could say anything, Dylan got up from the steps he was sitting on and Olive hugged her dad’s waist, shutting me out.
Even so, I reached out and gently touched her soft hair, tugging it gently before letting it go for the last time.
“I hope so too. And thank you, little one, I will never forget you.”
A tear slid down from her eye, and before I knew what I was doing, I reached out to capture it with my fingertip.
She closed her eyes and hugged her dad tighter when I touched her, but didn’t say anything.
I looked at the teardrop that rested on my fingertip for a long time and felt a tug on my heartstrings.
“Man,” Dylan said, saving me from my confusing thoughts.
I released a big breath and dropped my finger.
“This sucks,” he said.
I chuckled. “You’re tellin me.”
“I want you to come back the first chance you get, and you are keeping in touch.”
I snapped a sharp salute, causing his mouth to twitch.
Hitting my chin with his knuckles, he groaned. “Oh, man. I can’t believe I’m gonna miss seeing your shitty face every day.”
“Dylan!” Emily admonished.
“Sorry, Mom.” Rubbing the back of his neck, Dylan looked at me sheepishly. “We’ll talk?”
“We’ll talk,” I promised.
“Jason,” my father called out from the car waiting across the street.
“I better go,” I said, taking a few steps back.
Giving Dylan a quick hug and a slap on his back, I said, “Take care of your family, man.”
“You make sure you take care of yourself, too.”
My chest heavy, I looked at all of them one last time and walked away. I wasn’t strong enough to stride away from them without turning back. In the time it took me to cross the street, I looked back three times.
Did it make me a bad person to be happy to see them sad? Happy because I felt loved? Loved and welcome as I’d never been before?
How they stood together as a family was burned into my mind as a happy memory, and then I got into the car and disappeared from their life.
