The Boy Who Has No Redemption (Soulless 8)

I wanted to believe her more than anything in the world. I wanted to have her faith. I wanted…to feel better.

“I know it hurts to see your father like this, but don’t take it personally. He loves you very much. He’s just not himself right now.”

“I know. I just…” I shook my head and looked down. “Never mind.”

“Honey.”

I looked at her again. “I realize that he and I are the same. When he thinks he could lose the most important thing in the world, he doesn’t know what to do, so he crashes. I’m trying to be there for him, but he lashes out at everything I say. His pain entitles him to behave however he wants…with no regard to how it affects the people around him.” The memory hit me hard, unexpectedly, that moment in the stairwell when I turned to Emerson and told her we were done. Hot tears streaked down her cheeks, and she gripped the rail like she could collapse from heartbreak. My memory was phenomenal, but I’d forgotten about that moment until right then…that instant. “I’ve lashed out at people who’ve only tried to help me…and only cared about myself.” I stared at the checkerboard between us, having a moment of self-reflection that made me hate myself with such potency. Shame, guilt, and despair circulated in my veins and made my heart ache.

Mom stared at me for a long time, as if she thought I might say something else. “Have you tried to talk to her?”

I lifted my chin at the mention of Emerson, impressed but not surprised that my mother had figured out the person who took the worst of my coldness. “No.” When she’d walked into the warehouse the other day, all I could do was stare at her, see the way she looked at me with utter indifference. Months had passed, but now, it felt like just a week. Like I’d been asleep this entire time, and only now I was wide awake.

“Maybe you should try.”

I dropped my chin again. “She hates me.”

“I doubt that, Derek.”

“I don’t.” And she should hate me. She absolutely should.

“I think an apology would go a long way…”

I lifted my gaze and looked at her again, seeing my mother staring at me with love in her eyes, still loving me despite what I did to the woman she looked at as another daughter. Whether I was right or wrong, my mom was still there. “I don’t think an apology is enough…not for what I did to her.”

“But it’s a start. And you have to start somewhere.”

I grabbed a few of the checkers pieces and held them in my hand, my fingers rubbing the grooved edges, feeling the coarseness push back as I touched the plastic material.

“Let’s not forget how much she loved you. Love is always stronger than hate.”

I continued to look at the piece in my hand. “Yes…she loved me with her whole heart. She put up with my bullshit every day. She saw the best in me and ignored the worst. She cared about me for me…and no other reason.”

“Then that’s worth fighting for.”

“Not if I don’t deserve her,” I whispered. “And I don’t…”

The rocket program was suspended because I’d turned off my brain to those possibilities the second everything went to shit. I threw in the towel and gave up overnight. A few of my colleagues asked about it, but when their inquiries were met with hostility, they stopped asking. I put them on different projects, told NASA we were no longer partners in this task, and that was it.

But now, I wondered if I’d given up too easily.

It was a test launch.

Not the real thing.

If I got this design right, there would be an escape route for the astronauts sitting inside, and that was worth fighting for. And with the new interns who would be starting here, I needed them to have every opportunity to learn.

I worked at my bench in the warehouse when I heard the door close and then her heels start to tap on the floor. It was the end of the day, and Jerome and Pierre had already left. She didn’t stay late anymore, always grabbing dinner for me before she departed.

Wordlessly, she left the bag on the counter.

My head was raised, and I stared at her, seeing how long her hair had gotten over the last few months. She was thinner than she used to be too, less curvy, and there was a blankness to her eyes, as if her thoughts were numb and her heart was empty. Her appearance reminded me of myself, actually. “Thanks…” I didn’t know what to say to her, where to even begin, but I knew I had to make an effort. Otherwise, the silence would just continue endlessly. She would no longer put in the work to deal with me, because she’d officially checked out months ago.