“Sure. What do you need me to do?”
“You can go to my office. There are some books that need to be packed in boxes. I set them aside already, so all you have to do is pack them.”
“I’m on it.”
I JOINED MRS. BLACK in the living room and helped her out with the furniture. We spent the next hour moving her couch, armchairs, and coffee tables around, until she was satisfied with the order. Their living room was huge—twice the size of mine—luxuriously furnished, and bright, thanks to the spacious windows that provided a lot of light. It was almost two o’clock when she decided to wrap it up and invited me to her kitchen for snacks.
“I’m sorry, but I have to go home—”
“Oh please, you helped me a lot. At least take some cookies.” She looked so sweet that I couldn’t say no to her.
She and Hayden didn’t look similar at all. Carmen was short and round because of the extra weight she’d put on over the years. She had an attractive oval face and beautiful turquoise eyes, but her tiredness clouded her pretty features most of the time since she worked a lot as a hospital doctor. Her honey colored hair was always placed in a bun, her face makeup-free.
I assumed Hayden and Kayden looked more like their father, but I couldn’t say for sure since I’d never seen his picture. Kay had told me their father committed suicide when they were five, but the topic was too sensitive to ask Kayden more about.
Hayden certainly didn’t have his mother’s personality, because Carmen was kind, compassionate, and patient. Kayden had taken after her. Hayden was the complete opposite. He was like a ticking bomb ready to explode any second. He was gloomy, and his mood was volatile and unpredictable.
I sat at their kitchen table, feeling odd to be here after so much time. The last time I was in their house was on the day of Kay’s funeral. That day marked the start of the worst period of my life.
I lost my best friend, and I lost myself. It seemed impossible to pull out of the depths of darkness, despair, guilt, rage, and hate. Everything was gray. No color. No sound. No taste. No love. No happiness. No reason for me to live.
I just breathed again and again, and each breath was more painful than the last. I desperately wanted to go back and change even a tiny fragment of that day... Of course, I couldn’t. I was just one small, pitiful human being, unworthy of living.
Soon after Kayden’s death, I touched bottom and started thinking about something that was seriously messing with my mind. How about ending it all? How about giving up, giving them what they wanted all this time—my death? These thoughts twirled incessantly, but luckily, I managed to break free from that dark circle.
The following months were painted black. The world continued moving, but I was still there, still in that same hour, still next to Kayden. And at the same time, I wasn’t. I was running away from Hayden, Natalie, and their friends, desperate to save myself from their hatred and vengeance.
I’d thought I was dead inside when Kayden died. I’d been wrong. There was still a tiny living piece of me, breathing greedily, desperately wanting to live, but it was crushed day after day by my bullies.
In those days I lost my best friend, and I gained lifelong enemies. Nothing was the same after that.
“I’ve been thinking you haven’t visited for so long. I remember how often Kayden and you were spending time in his room. You were usually playing games or watching Japanese animation. You were such good friends,” she said with melancholy in her voice. “I hoped you would come sometimes—”
“I wanted to speak with you, Mrs. Black, I really did.” I played with my cookie, unable to look at her. “You know, Hayden and I were never friends, but after Kayden died... It became worse. He became worse.”
Her downcast eyes filled with sorrow. “Hayden was always a complex child. As much as I am ashamed to admit, I have to say I wasn’t a good mother to him. He needed me more than Kayden, yet my attention was riveted on Kayden.”
Worry embedded deeper into her worn out face, and I felt so ill at ease for having to witness her private moment. It was obviously something that troubled her a lot, and it surprised me that she was willing to share this with me. I didn’t think I had the right to pry into her life this way.
“I guess it was easier for me to focus on Kayden, who was such a good child. He was obedient, never made any trouble, and his grades were always perfect. He had dreams and high ambitions. But Hayden... He was different from the beginning.” Her gaze wandered into the distance, the glazed look in her eyes indicating she was recollecting something from the far past.
“Hayden is brilliant. He is highly intelligent—much more than Kayden—but he is extremely sensitive. Ever since he was a child, he’s wanted some answers I couldn’t give to him. I never could.”
“What kind of answers?”
Her eyes met mine, her face displaying defeat, and my stomach sank. “He wanted to know his true identity. He wanted to know who he was.”
I frowned, tongue-tied. I didn’t understand why Hayden would ask his mother this.
“I’m so sorry for telling you this all of a sudden. Maybe I’m bothering you. It’s just that I don’t have anyone I can talk with about this, and Hayden and I are more distanced from each other than ever. I want to tell him all of this, but I... I don’t know how.”
“Why don’t you just try? Even if you fail, at least you tried.”
“I tried so many times! So, so many times, but it ends in disaster every time.”
I remembered all those times I could hear shouting and crashing coming from their house. It was Hayden and his fits of anger, and it was horrible and brutish. I witnessed it once. Carmen wanted Hayden to sit with Kay, me, and her for dinner. He refused, and after she scolded him, he became so mad that I felt sick watching his ferocious outburst.
He was throwing kitchen utensils around, screaming at us, and calling us names. Kayden rushed to stop him and got injured when Hayden threw him against a wall. It was horrible. Kayden never talked to me about Hayden’s dark side, and whenever I asked him about it, he just justified his brother’s behavior somehow and changed the topic.
“I know how terrible he may be, but even if he doesn’t show that, I think he needs you,” I said. “Every child needs their mother. If you truly try and give your best to improve your relationship with Hayden, I’m sure that little by little you’ll reach him.”
I wasn’t certain why I was telling her all of this, because, after all, their relationship wasn’t my problem. Hayden was my enemy, so whether he could get along with his mother or not didn’t concern me.
Then again, I understood what it was like not to have a mother when you needed her. I understood what it was like to have the need to tell her something—about life, dreams, fears—but you couldn’t because the gap was too big, and you couldn’t grow wings and cross it.
“Thank you, Sarah. You—” Her phone rang, and she picked it up from the table, frowning at the screen when she saw the caller ID. “Sorry, I have to answer this. Hello, Jack. What’s going on?”
She listened intently to him, her frown getting deeper. “Jesus, can’t they do anything without me for one day? Wait, I’ll search for those documents in my office...” She looked at me. “Will you just wait, Sarah? They called me from work, so this might take a while...”