Guardian of Eden (19 page)

“Mom says you haven’t eaten all day,” she said handing me a sandwich on a plate.

“Thanks,” I mumbled before placing it on the dresser and plopping back down on the bed.

“
I went to your teachers today. You have tests in Calculus and English tomorrow, and your history teacher says you have to turn in some project before Thanksgiving break.

“
Thanks.” I returned to my familiar position of staring at the ceiling.

“I wrote it down for you.”

“I got it, thanks.” The finality of my tone should have made her leave, but it didn’t. She continued to stand at the foot of my bed and stare at me.

“You missed a Chemistry quiz today. Your teacher said he’d let you make it up if you bring in a doctor’s note and Richard said he’d write you one if you come see him this week.”

“When did you talk to Richard?” I sat upright in the bed.

“
I didn’t. Mom called him when you wouldn’t come out of your room. He really wants to see you.”

“Well, I don’t want to see him and I don’t think you should either.” Eden grew quiet. I stared into her eyes looking for some sort of reaction. I thought her eyes would reveal the truth behind her interactions with Richard, but they didn’t. They remained blank, cold, and expressionless. Come to think of it, her eyes were like that a lot lately. I remember a time when Eden’s eyes sparkled adding light and joy whenever she entered the room, but now, that formerly innate happiness had disappeared.

“I talked to her,” she said after a few minutes. I knew she meant
Maddie
. I lay back down in the bed unresponsive. “I barely understood a word she said she was crying so hard.” Eden sat on the edge of my bed. “I’m sorry I was such a brat yesterday. I didn’t want you to break up with her. I just…I just wanted…I don’t know what I wanted.” She put her face in her hands.

“I didn’t break up with her because of you. It’s complicated.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked hopefully. She turned away when I didn’t respond.

 Eden continued sitting at the foot of my bed staring off into space for about an hour. Then she quietly left my room.

I went to school the next day, not because I wanted to, but because my mother threatened to have Richard come to the house. I didn’t want that man in my home.

I knew
Maddie
wouldn’t be at school. I remember her father saying he had a press conference on Tuesday. She might not be coming back to Barton Arms at all if her father decided to take her on the road. I may never see her again. Ironically, that thought comforted me. Yes, I knew I loved her, but a part of me was embarrassed for letting myself get so close to her only to be rejected. If I never saw her again, maybe I could pretend like none of it ever happened.

That turned out to be harder than I thought.

During lunch, Eden and I sat in the cafeteria eating silently. Well, actually, I ate. Eden said she didn’t have much of an appetite so she just stared at her plate of food.

“Are you all right,
Bug
?” I asked when I noticed she hadn’t touched her food.

She nodded but didn’t start eating. “You’re not upset about
Maddie
are you? I told you it wasn’t your fault. We broke up because…because she doesn’t love me,” I said realizing the awful truth. Even though she said she loved me, she really didn’t. If she did, she’d be able to accept me into her life.

 I wanted the conversation about
Maddie
to end there, but then all the TV monitors in the cafeteria clicked on and I saw Bartholomew
McPhee
standing at a podium. He started talking about his decision to help lead this country to greatness by running for President while
Maddie
stood by his side doing her best to look confident and comfortable. I knew she must have been extremely nervous though. She kept licking her lips and gently swayed from side to side. One of Senator
McPhee’s
advisors actually tapped her on the shoulder to make her stop.

When the press conference ended, Barton Arms students cheered riotously.

“
Good job landing the next first daughter,” Troy Stanton said jokingly while patting me on the back. I don’t know how he knew about me and
Maddie
. I never told anyone and I was pretty positive
Maddie
hadn’t either. But then again, he could have just been one of the dozen kids who saw us kiss on the front steps of the building a while ago. Rumors started and traveled fast in high school. I failed to realize that as I grabbed his wrist, twisted it around his back and slammed his face into the table. Unlike public schools where a crowd would have instantly gathered and cheered on a fight, Barton Arms students just stopped and stared at me.
A few started whispering and pointing as if they knew something about my past.
I felt like a pariah as I let go of my history classmate’s arm and fled the cafeteria.

“Where are you going?” Eden asked as she caught up with me outside of school.

“Home.”

“Well, I
wanna
go with you.”

“Go back to school, Eden.”

“But, you need me.”

“I don’t need anyone,” I snapped as I quickened my pace toward the metro station.

 
I didn’t go straight home. Somehow I ended up at Richard’s office. Even though logically I knew he had nothing to do with what was going on with
Maddie
and me, for some reason my anger focused on him. Maybe it was a coping mechanism. I just needed someone to blame.

“You can’t go in there,” the receptionist Mrs. Swisher said as I stormed past her desk and straight into Richard’s office.

He looked up abruptly when I entered the room. “Garrett, what are you doing here?” He quickly shuffled some papers around trying to cover up something.

I looked at the mess on his desk and noticed pictures scattered about. I looked more closely.

“Why are you looking at pictures of my sister?” I yelled. He didn’t have a chance to respond. The last thing I remember is leaping across his desk and punching him in the face.

When I came to, I sat handcuffed in the waiting room.

“Do you want to press charges?” I heard someone say. I looked up and saw a police officer talking to Richard.

Richard pulled a bloody cloth away from his mouth and said, “No. He’s my patient. He needs a hospital not a jail.”

“Well, we can keep him in custody until you get the paperwork ready to have him committed.”

Richard dabbed his lip with the cloth. He didn’t respond to the officer immediately. He seemed pensive. Oh my God, he was actually contemplating putting me in a mental institution. If he had me committed, no one would believe me when I accused him of inappropriate behavior with Eden. I wanted to scream. I wanted to tell that police officer that Richard should be the one to be arrested, but I had to be extremely careful of how I proceeded. Richard held my future in his fat, grubby hands.

“
No,” he said finally. “I don’t want to separate him from his sister. I don’t think she could handle that. He’s emotionally unstable, but I don’t think he’s a real threat.”

Richard had no idea how much he underestimated me.

When I got home, I tried to watch some TV, but it didn’t help. Every station seemed riveted on the fact that Bartholomew
McPhee
was running for president. Over and over the newscasters harped on the fact that he had lost his wife in a car accident 16 years ago and that his only daughter suffered from a debilitating heart disease resulting in a transplant two years ago. The way they focused on the tragedies in his life, I thought sure he would be elected just on sympathy alone.

“What are you doing home?” my mother asked when she came downstairs as I flipped through channels searching for anything that didn’t have ‘
McPhee
’ scrawled across it.

I shrugged and continued pressing buttons on the remote. Holly stared at me strangely. She probably thought it odd not only that I was home in the middle of the day, but that I was watching TV. I rarely watched TV, but I wasn’t interested in doing the things I normally enjoyed.

“What time is it?” she asked looking at her watch.

“You have the watch. Why don’t you tell me?”

My mother looked at her watch again then glanced at the door.

“Why don’t you take my car and go pick up Eden from school?”

“I just got here. Why don’t you pick her up?” My mother looked at her watch again. “Are you expecting someone? Are you trying to get rid of me?” I asked.

Holly sighed and said, “Someone is coming…and I think it might be best if you’re not here.”

I clicked off the television and looked at my mother. My curiosity had been piqued. Who was coming that made my mother so nervous? Why
was I
suddenly not wanted in my own house?

When the doorbell rang, my mother froze with fear giving me time to bolt off the couch and beat her to the door. I wish I hadn’t. I wish she would’ve warned me that the Devil himself had been invited over.

“Long time no see, little buddy,” Joel said as he dropped his cigarette on the front step and snubbed it out with his foot. He said it sarcastically. It had to be sarcastically. We were never buddies. I remember him telling my mother one time that he thought I was crazy and that I would end up killing him in his sleep. He wanted her to send me back to foster care, but my mother wouldn’t do it. That’s ultimately why they broke up the second time. Looking back now, I should’ve done it. I should have killed him in his sleep.

The lit cigarette moved in slow motion from his fingers to the ground as I stared at it having lost all ability to speak. My chest ached, no, it burned. And that burning grew with each second he stood in front of me. Why was he at my door? I’d hoped to never see him again.

For a moment, I felt like I had transformed back into that powerless child that let him burn me over and over. His face looked exactly the same as it did that night. Even though now I could probably take him out with one punch, a latent fear of him resided in me. But that fear quickly morphed into anger. A fire-like anger that could only be doused by giving back to him the pain he had inflicted on me. I felt my body lean toward his to seek my revenge when my mother grabbed my arm and said, “Come in and have a seat, Joel,” as she pulled me into the kitchen.

“Garrett, let me explain,” she began. I only half listened to what she had to say. I couldn’t take my eyes off Joel in my living room. He looked almost exactly the same. Even with his coat on, I could still see some of the tattoos on his neck and hands. He was still bald by choice making him look like one of those Neo-Nazi’s or skinheads. He wasn’t as tall as I remembered, probably because I had grown so much in the five years since I’d last seen him. “When I asked Joel to relinquish his parental rights, he decided he wanted to be a part of Eden’s life and sued for joint custody. We’re in negotiations right now and I’m considering letting him take Eden for Thanksgiving.”

This caught my attention. “He’s not taking my sister anywhere.” My jaw tightened and my hands clenched into fists.