Washed Up (Bayside Heroes)

“You want to kill him.”

Her words are soft, quiet, but they jolt me from my thoughts.

I turn, finding Mrs. Parks staring at me, her cheek resting on her knee and a sad smile on her lips.

“I wouldn’t.”

“I know,” she says. “But you want to.”

I swallow, not confirming, not denying, either.

She sighs, shaking her head as she relaxes back a little, her weight resting on her palms. She faces the yard again, the streetlights reflecting off the tear stains slowly drying on her cheeks.

“I want to, too, sometimes,” she admits. “But he’s not always like this. There was a time he was never like this. He used to be just a boy, playful and silly and charming and sweet. He used to drink for fun with his buddies, or with me.” She bites the inside of her cheek. “But somewhere along the way, he started drinking to numb himself. And it’s not every now and then anymore. It’s every night. And it’s not just a little bit. It’s until he can’t speak or walk straight.” Her eyes gloss over. “I think he resents me. I think he resents the life I’ve trapped him in with…”

She doesn’t have to finish that sentence for me to know the trap is her son. My best friend.

And she doesn’t have to say another word for me to know he’s a blessing in her eyes and a curse in Josh’s.

She shakes her head, forcing a little smile. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’m telling you all this. You’re just a kid.”

A kid.

I frown, cracking my neck.

“He’ll be better in the morning, and he’ll apologize. He’ll make it right.”

I let out a breath of a laugh through my nose, unable to hide my disdain for that excuse. It’s the same one David gives me after a night like tonight.

She turns to me, brows pinched together, and her eyes well with tears.

Shit…

I didn’t mean to upset her, but before I can offer an apology, she nods, shoulders lifting in a shrug.

“No, you’re right,” she says. “It doesn’t make up for what he did tonight. What he’s done many nights.” She sighs, folding in on herself again. “I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.”

That last confession is just a whisper, and it seems to break her, because the sob that rips free from her next is the most gut-wrenching sound I’ve heard in my entire life.

I can’t fight the urge to reach for her, my hands moving before my brain can think better of it. I pull her into me, wrapping my arms around her as much as I can and holding her tight to my chest.

She’s stiff for only a moment before she’s clinging to me, her tears soaking my t-shirt, hands fisting in the fabric at my waist.

“It’s going to be okay,” I promise her, my lips against her hair. I want so badly to kiss that same spot, but I close my eyes, instead, inhaling her scent.

Earthy and warm, like fresh cut grass on a summer day.

“I always tell myself that,” she whispers once her sobs have quieted. “I’m beginning to wonder if it will ever not be a lie.”

Leave him.

Kick him out.

You can do better.

You deserve better.

Thought after thought assaults me, but I just hold her tighter, unable to speak them out loud.

It’s so hot and muggy, we start to sweat a little where we touch, and it does nothing to cool the desire simmering under my skin. Amanda Parks is more than just the cliché hot mom or MILF, as my douchebag friends would say. She’s thirty-one with a body built like no girl I’ve ever seen, that’s for damn sure, complete with curves that I’m ashamed to admit I’ve fantasized about far too many times. But more than how she looks, she’s kind, and funny, and somehow still just a kid like she just called me. She has the same wild spirit as her son does, the same need for fun.

Josh just sucks it all out of her on nights like this.

“You know what I think?” I ask after a while.

She shakes her head against my chest.

“I think you’re strong,” I tell her. “I think you’re brave. And I think it’s admirable, what you’ve done for your son, for your family.”

She winces, fisting my shirt again as she curls into me tighter. I hold my chin high, fighting the emotion strangling my throat at how badly just hearing those words makes her hurt.

“But I also think it’s okay to put yourself first sometimes,” I add. “I think it’s okay to demand what you need.”

She somewhat laughs at that, pulling back far enough so that she can look at me. Her eyelashes are thick and wet, little droplets of tears hanging onto the edges. “Why do you sound so grown up? You’re only eighteen.”