“Izzie?” I whisper.
Bear, she’s… amazing. She’s like me. Smarter, even. I don’t know if I have words to even describe her. No, I take that back. She’s like us. She’s you and me.
We can’t….
She nods. “Ty said to find him if I needed help.” She sniffs again, and I can tell she’s trying to keep it together. But it’s a losing battle. “And I need help.”
I know. There’s nothing… bad happening. I don’t think. She wasn’t bruised. But Julie was never like that.
There’s more than one type of abuse.
“Are you sure?” Otter says from behind me. “How could they never see that…? I don’t—there’s two… oh fuck.”
“What happened?” I manage to ask.
I told her the same thing. Julie.
Will she listen?
I don’t know. Bear, we can’t forget about her.
But I did, didn’t I? To an extent. Out of sight, out of mind, and I have a life, I am building a life with my husband. We are having a child, and things are finally going our way. We are happy, we are healthy, we are whole, and I haven’t had time for things that I’ve pushed away in an attempt to keep my sanity.
There’s not much more we can do, Ty.
And maybe that had been a lie.
Julie would never let us see her.
She said as much. But there has to be some way, right?
We can ask Erica Sharp, but I don’t know how many rights siblings have when the parent is still involved. Even one with a history like Julie McKenna.
I’d left a message for Erica Sharp. She’d called back a day or so later. It’d gone to voicemail. I’d gotten distracted with life after that.
And I didn’t call her back.
I promised Izzie too. Just like you.
What?
That I wouldn’t forget about her.
We won’t. I just… I don’t know what we can do.
A tear spills over her cheek. Just one. She looks up at me, and even before she says it, I know. Somehow I know. And in the darkest corners of my heart, there is only relief, and I can’t be bothered to feel any guilt because of it. Maybe that’ll come later. But right now, it’s just relief.
“She’s dead,” Isabelle McKenna says. “Mom. She’s dead and I have nowhere else to go and Ty said if I needed help to find him and I need help! I need help so bad.” Her chest hitches, and it’s that, that little action, a little girl on the verge of tears standing in front of me, looking up at me like I’ll have all the answers that causes my knees to buckle.
And for the first time in my life, my little sister launches herself into my arms. The weight of her reminds me so much of Ty that I can barely breathe around the lump in my throat. She sobs bitterly against my chest. The blood roars in my ears.
You and me. That’ll never change, Papa Bear.
But it will, won’t it?
It’s already happening.
“Twins,” Otter says from somewhere behind us. He sounds just stupid with awe, and through the haze, I am barely grasping what he’s saying. “Jesus Christ. We’re having twins?”