Page 69 of Rootbound
I don’t expect, nor can I make sense of either reaction when they take notice of Ava behind me, though. Charlie grows impossibly paler, and Grace’s brow crumples in confusion, devastated.
“Hi,” Ava says, and it’s clear by her timid tone she’s noting the same reactions and interpreting them the same way—not happy.
“I called her,” Henry says, and my head whips around to him. “She has a right to know what’s going on with Em. They both do.”
“What is he talking about, Dad?” I ask, my tone rising with the dread filling up my chest.
Charlie sucks in a deep breath, chokes on it, and looks up at Henry. “You should have talked to us, first.”
To his credit, Henry doesn’t back down, or even flinch. “She shouldn’t have to miss out on time with her. They both should know. And clearly, I reached out just in time.”
Grace speaks up, then. “You know I agree with you, Henry. But this wasn’t for you to tell. It wasn’t up to any of us, this was Em’s choice.”
Henry looks over at me, and I see the conflict there, something warring with the sadness in his expression. And then his words from the night before come back to me.
And I’m glad you’re here, and that you’re not wasting your time with anyone like I did. I hope… I hope you’ll continue to.
His eyes stay intent on me as he grabs my hand, and I try to read what he’s so clearly trying to convey. And then Duane and LeighAnn walk around the corner, arguing under their breath, and I pull away from that stare, pull my hand from his.
“Someone needs to clear shit up right this instant,” I say to all of them. LeighAnn rushes Ava, though, covering the last of my statement with her excited cry.
Then Duane… Duane’s faceshatters.
He coughs, covering his mouth with a fist, failing to cover tears. Before he makes it to Ava, though, Charlie lunges at him and shoves him in the chest.
“Charlie! What the fuck?” LeighAnn cries, but both men immediately begin wailing on one another. Henry’s arm wraps around my chest and he tucks me behind him as hospital security rushes in to break them up.
A little boy starts crying into his mother’s lap, and in a blur of bloodied knuckles and noses, security badges, and admonishing glares, we are all ushered outside the hospital corridor, followed immediately by a deceptively small doctor with the deepest, scariest (and most British) voice I’ve ever heard.
“Oi!!! You lot! Get your shit together! Emmaline is being released momentarily, and I’ll be damned if I’m to stitch up any uv the rest uv ya! Fuck’s sake, this is why we don’t encourage the entire family to join patients in the ER!” He shakes his head at all of us just as James, Grady, Lucy, and Caleb walk up.
“What’d we miss?!” Grady exclaims, which has the doctor turning around and growling more “fuck’s sakes, bleedin’ Yankee Doodle twats” under his breath as he leaves us and our special brand of bullshit outside.
“ALRIGHT,” I say as loud as I can without shouting, sincewe remain in public, here. “Someone needs to start talking,now.”
“I agree,” LeighAnn says.
I look over at Ava, whose head is cocked, eyes moving back and forth like she’s rapidly building a puzzle. I see when it clicks, her eyes flying up to look at… Duane?
“Tait, Ava… you didn’t deserve to find this out like this. I’m sorry. Can we please go back home, and I promise to tell you everything, there?”
It occurs to me that in movies and shows, this is always what happens: The scene gets cut and they all leave for a more “appropriate” place to have their life altering discussion. In this moment, though, I suddenly don’t want to go anywhere with these people until I understand what the hell is going on.
“No. We need to know, now,” I say, and Ava nods her agreement. I grab her hand.
“Ava…” Duane steps up, and Charlie begins to visibly shake.
“Don’t you fucking, dare, Duane. You don’t get to take this from me, too.” Duane sighs, and Charlie continues. “Tait, Ava… I never told you this before, because it wasn’t right. Your mom was a good mother, and she loved you both with such a fierceness that I would never have dreamed of getting between that. We just… didn’t work anymore. I didn’t want to lie to you, so I have tried not to…
“Tait… when I told you that your mom never knew how to fight, I meant that. She knew how to wound, though, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before, but I just couldn’t do it. It was my fault that she was so unhappy in the first place… plus, here I am now, with all my happiness. How could I risk taking away any of the respect you had for her when she’snot even here to defend herself? I still can’t. I need you to understand that this was stillmyfault.
“So, when I told you that I think, in a way, she wanted to force my hand… I meant that—that she had an affair with Duane. I don’t know if she would have ever told me if he hadn’t moved back at the time, though. At the time when we were already over in every other way.
“It happened when you were little, when I was taking on more after Dad’s stroke. And Duane didn’t even know that we’d had another baby until he moved back those few years later. He still acted so angry atmeall the time for being with her… I never would have suspected.
“Viv said it was a mistake, that it was a one-time thing, but that she was scared that he would try to separate us if he found out… that we needed to move because of it. She wanted us to all go, to start over fresh.”
“I never would have done that—separated you,” Duane says. And this time it’s me who stabs a shaking finger in his direction. “You shut the fuck up and let him finish.” I feel Henry’s hand come behind me, and I desperately want to lean into it and be held up, but I am holding up Ava.