Page 3 of Honeyed
It wasn’t until much later that I figured it all out; my mother’s death and my father’s subsequent media campaign were on the national news. He lied for weeks about not knowing who killed her, about being distraught that his wife had gone missing. Thinking back, it’s psychotic that he let me live in the house for a month after her murder, which had taken place in our living room.
Ten-year-old me had not grasped a single thread of this. From the true crime junkies who just wanted to be close to my mother’s funeral, to the wicked ways of my father, to the absolute discombobulation of my life after she died and he went to prison for it. Her funeral was a blur and a purgatory I desperately wanted to escape from, yet it still played in my nightmares all these years later.
Then there is Clara, my adopted mother, who passed a few years ago. She was a sweet, if not reserved, woman who never truly knew how to emotionally care for a child. That could have been her upbringing in a wealthy British family who moved to the US when she was a girl or because she’d suffered two traumatizing miscarriages and was never the same in terms of children afterward. But she always showed me kindness and took care of me monetarily if it was the only way she could show her affection. Her death saddened me, but we weren’t close like Arthur and I had gotten in the years since she passed.
And finally, some would call the day my father stood up in court and was sentenced to prison for life a funeral. It is to me, as I have no intention of ever seeing that man again. The day he was taken away in handcuffs was the day he ceased to exist on this earth to me.
Being here, standing next to the man who had become a close confidant in my adult years, is by far the saddest, though. Because not only am I old enough to remember and grasp what this grief feels like, but Arthur’s death also symbolizes that I am now a true orphan.
None of my parents are left; I have no family to speak of.
That thought has a knot sitting in my throat as I stand near Arthur’s casket and shake hands with people I only know by name because of my conversations with my adoptive father.
“You doing okay?” Alana asks, and I can’t help but glance at her as if she’s a lifeline.
Even with our rift, she’s been by my side since the phone call came in on the trail just four mornings ago. It wasn’t like I had to do much; Arthur had his entire end-of-life plan, will, and burial decisions made and accounted for. All that was left was signing on the dotted line, and I’ve done that for most of the checklist so far. I’m the only living “relative” he had left since Clara and Arthur’s families were pretty much gone or so far removed from their life that it wouldn’t make sense to give them the responsibility. The only thing left was meeting with his lawyer today after the funeral.
I want to get this all over with so I can grieve privately and try to figure out my next move. Not for the first time do I feel untethered and unsure of where I’m at in my life, except this time, I’m going to do something about it. I’ve been waiting too long to make a real and lasting change, to follow a path that feels right, and Arthur’s death has given me that final push.
“I’m fine.” My tightlipped answer doesn’t seem to satisfy her, but she stays quiet next to me. “Where’d you go before?”
While I can small talk and placate with the best of them, today is not one of the days I want to do so. It’s why I’m so good at my job, being the manager at Hope Pizza. I can calm an angry customer, smooth over a disagreement about reservations or food outcomes, and keep the whole place oiled like a machine so that no one sees the cogs behind their romantic evening out.
But today, I don’t want the pitying smiles or quizzical looks. It’s no secret that I hadn’t lived with the Waybornes after graduating high school, and we’d fallen out of touch for a bunch of years even though they lived in the same town. Not a lot of people knew that since Clara’s death, I’d reconnected with my adoptive father and he’d become a mentor of sorts. So it was probably jarring for them to see me standing up here.
“Needed a break. All the expensive perfume was getting to me. I thought my choice of scent today would be okay, but of course, money always proves me wrong.” She shrugs, and I love that even at a funeral, she hasn’t lost her charm or humor. It’s what I need right now. “I wouldn’t stand out around these designer labels and rich folks anyway.”
That kind of attitude makes it seem like she’s not the most stunning woman in any room. Like she doesn’t steal my breath randomly throughout the day when she comes around a corner.
Alana Ashton isn’t some small-town bumpkin. On the contrary, she’s so beautiful it hurts to know she isn’t mine when I’ve had ample opportunity to make her just that. Dark inky hair the color of midnight falls in loose curls around her shoulders, all the way down to the middle of her back. Sometimes, when she’s so sleepy while watching a movie that I don’t think she notices, I curl the silky strands around my fingers. Those eyes, the ones that always seem to see right through me, are a shock of aquamarine. Looking into the depths of her gaze is like staring at the most beautiful Caribbean water.
Today she has on a short-sleeved black dress that floats around her waist and clings to the breasts I’ve been obsessed with since she showed up one day in eighth grade, and it was like her chest had grown three sizes overnight. They’re round and perky and would fit in my hands like my palms were shaped for them. Her toned runner’s legs are bare of any tights or sheers, and I’m sure her Nonna had words with her about that. Alana always was one to shirk rules or etiquette. The black heels on her feet are far from the ones she wears when we’ve gone to clubs or had a night out in Philly, and yet, I can’t stop picturing what they’d look like on my bedroom floor.
Even at a funeral, even after years of pining, even after our big fight four months ago, this woman is still the center of my universe.
And while everyone in the room might see a beautiful woman, I know the other things that make her so much more than that.
“I didn’t realize you were still in contact with Arthur.” She interrupts my thoughts as there is a lull in the line giving me condolences.
“There are still some things you don’t know about me.” My answer is meant to cut, and when I hear the tiny inhale of breath from Alana, I know I’ve struck a nerve.
I turn forward, needing to focus on something else. Anything else.
“Clearly.” Even without looking at her, I know her eyebrow is doing that raise it does when she’s pissed off.
Blowing out a breath because I’m tired of being in a fight with her, and I want nothing more than her touch on my skin, I lean over so that our hands brush. Sparks ignite under my skin, and a warmth I’ve been missing since our fight rushes back into my heart.
Like I was missing an essential part of myself.
Even if she is mad at me, she doesn’t move away. No, Alana simply winds her arm in mine, running those bright pink nails up and down my arm, creating a delicious set of tingles that spring up under the fabric of my button-down.
How I’ve fucking needed her comfort.
“Since Clara passed, I’ve been checking up on him. More like … well, friend lunches. He became a mentor of sorts. Maybe it was always supposed to be that way; they had no idea what to do with a child, but he turned out to be a father figure in my adult life.”
Alana nods as if she could see that idea having merit.
“Was he sick?” she asks, and I realize just how much I’ve been keeping from her in the last year.