Losing Him (Mitchell Family #8)(2)

I’d done my share of crying and pleading with him to forgive me. After all that I’d done to other people, I was getting it back ten times worse. I didn’t deserve to be happy and nobody knew it more than me.

I tried to smile. “Good! I bet she’s happy about that.”

“Yep!” He was always so short with me. Every time he spoke, it was harsh and without emotion.

Once we got on the road Jacob filled the quiet car with ridiculous nonsense. “Dad, when I grow up I’m going to hunt sharks and be friends with dolphins and when I jump in the water, I’ll be so fast that they won’t catch me.”

We both laughed, but I refused to look at Jessie. I couldn’t piss him off in any way. Even if he wasn’t going to touch me, or hold my hand as I buried my mother, him just being there was enough support. I couldn’t exactly lean on my brother, since he was doing sixteen years in prison for bank fraud. It seems that his computer hacking skills landed him in with the wrong group of people. I’m not exactly sure of all the details, because it happened when I was pregnant and having my own problems, but the FBI got involved and my brother was basically caught red-handed.

The saddest part was that he didn’t even know our mother was sick, and finding out she’d died in a letter couldn’t have been easy for him. He’d called me last night, and I could hear the pain in his voice. My brother wasn’t a bad guy, he was just too smart for his own good and people took advantage of what he could do for them.

“Can we stop at McDonalds?” My son’s little voice asked loudly from the backseat.

“Jacob, we just started driving. How about you play your game and wait a little while?” Jessie had a way with Jacob. He could get him to listen when it was damn near impossible for me.

“Okay, Daddy.”

Jessie looked at me and I could see him doing it out of the corner of my eye. “I can drive whenever you want to take a break. You should probably rest up as much as possible. It’s going to be a long couple of days.”

I looked at him and smiled. “You sure you don’t mind?”

“Yeah, I wouldn’t have offered if I wasn’t sure about it!” He was short again. It hurt so much that he hated me.

We switched places at the next bridge and I got as comfortable as possible in the passenger seat. Jacob had already fallen asleep, so it was easy for me to doze off.

With my head pressed against the window, I opened my eyes. It was dark out and I could hear Jacob talking, so I knew a bit of time had passed. What came out of my son’s mouth shocked me, so I didn’t turn around.

“How come you don’t love Mommy anymore?”

Jessie cleared his throat and spoke low, trying not to wake me. “It’s complicated, buddy.”

“What does complicated mean?”

“It means that things have happened that caused problems for us.”

“You can fix problems. Why don’t you just move back home? Mom will let you. She says you don’t love her anymore.”

“Jacob, your mother doesn’t know how I feel. I never said that I didn’t love her. Right now isn’t the time to talk about this.”

“So, you still love her, right?”

The car was quiet and I prepared myself to hear him admitting it to our young son. He’d made it quite clear that I was the devil incarnate on several occasions. “Yes, now can we drop it?”

“Okay!”

I didn’t want to get too overexcited, considering that he could be telling Jacob a lie to make him feel better. God knows I lied to people that I loved in the past. A parent would do anything for their child, even if it’s stretching the truth to keep them from being sad.

I waited a couple minutes before sitting up and pretending that I’d been sleeping. “How long did I sleep?”

“About two hours. We’re almost there.”

I looked in the backseat. “You need to get a bath as soon as we get to Nana’s house.” As soon as I said it I realized that Nana would never be there again to greet us at the door. She’d never spoil Jacob, her only grandson, with hundreds of kisses. She wouldn’t see him grown up to be a handsome man. She was gone.

I covered my face and started to sob. A warm hand touched my shoulder briefly and then pulled away. “Jacob, I’ll help you get your bath and get settled. Your mom has some things to do when we get there.”

I reached for his hand, but he lifted it and put it on the steering wheel, clenching his jaw to prevent saying something he would regret. I looked out the passenger side window, trying to hide the pain of rejection in my eyes. At least he was there with me. That’s what I needed. It had to be enough.

When Jessie pulled up at my mother’s house, it took my breath away. My chest felt heavy and I could feel my heart pounding at a rapid rate. I tucked my head between my knees and tried to regain composure. “Jess, I can’t breathe.”

He turned off the car and reached over, touching my back and holding his hand there. “It’s just anxiety. You knew this was going to be hard. That’s why I came. You’re in no condition to go through the motions of burying your mom and being able to take care of yourself and Jacob. I’ll carry everything inside. You just take a couple minutes and come in when you’re ready.”

Jessie and Jacob climbed out of the car and carried their bags with them, leaving me sitting in my mother’s dark driveway all alone. I was so depressed that I couldn’t look out into the yard. I didn’t want to think about all the times that she’d been there waiting for us. I didn’t want to think about her hugging me and telling me that someday I would be happy. It was too bad she never got to see that day.