A Soldier’s Family Page 11

  “What?” Manny toyed with a chain puzzle on the countertop.

  “If I let him hang with you, something like this would happen.”

  Manny tilted his head. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  How to say this without offending him. “I know you’re a good influence on him, Manny, but you’re also working against things I’ve toiled over the past five years. You represent everything I’ve steered him clear of. I don’t want him to want to do a dangerous job. Maybe it’s best you two don’t hang out.”

  “I hate to tell you this, Celia, but he jumped before he met me. He didn’t know it was illegal. He did it once and became addicted to the adrenaline rush.”

  “And that feeling’s worth getting put in jail or killed?”

  “To some people, yes. He said it wasn’t that he wanted to break the law or see what he could get away with. He loves the thrill of freefalling. He’s in an invincible phase. He has a driving need to define himself right now. To live past the edge.”

  Javier was her son. Why didn’t she know any of this? Furthermore…“Why’s he telling you all of this?” She cast a glance down the hall to the game room where Javier and Bradley waited. Sounds of pool balls being clunked by a cue stick originated from the room.

  “So he thinks it’s less bad to deceive me than defy me?”

  Less bad? There goes her grammar.

  “He feels if he tells you, you’ll make him stop.”

  “He’s right,” Celia snapped, then immediately sat when the impact of her own words hit her, as well as the implications.

  No wonder her own son didn’t feel like he could talk to her. She’d been trying to turn him into something he wasn’t. Something safe. Only this was the child who played Superman over the top of his crib at eleven months of age. Time and time again. Who’d won motocross and midget races at age seven and who’d thought snowboarding down a mountain was boring at age ten. Black Diamond was more Javier’s style, even as a preteen. Celia sighed and put her face to her knees.

  “He knows you love him, but he feels stifled by your fear.”

  She lifted her face from her lap. “I know I’m too overprotective. I’m just so scared something bad is going to happen to him.”

  “Celia, I know. I know what it’s like to lose someone I love more than anything.” Manny swallowed. “Twice.”

  True. He did. Manny’s words sobered and softened her.

  His expression turned as tender as she’d ever seen it. “I’m going to ask you to do something really hard.”

  “What?” What was really hard was subduing the sudden urge to reach out for Manny and hug that regret from his face.

  “Trust me.”

  She drew in a soft breath. “In what way?”

  “Do you believe I have your son’s best interest at heart?”

  She searched Manny’s face. Sincerity covered it. “Yes,” she whispered. She’d seen him interact with Javier enough to be convinced of it.

  He stretched his fingertips across the counter until they rested against her hand. “Then let me teach him the proper way to skydive.”

  She shook her head and her mind screamed an emphatic no. “I don’t know if I can. What if it makes him want to—?” Tears and a trembling lip clipped her words off. She jerked her hand back from his fingers.

  Manny straightened. “Be a PJ? Or enter some other dangerous career track?”

  “I’m a horrible mother for smothering him.”

  “You smother him with love. Nothing wrong with that. He doesn’t tell you things because he wants to protect you from worrying. He has a better head on his shoulders than you realize. Do you understand that in two short years he could be on his own, legally?”

  Her head snapped up. How could she not have thought of that? Two years? It seemed like yesterday she was trying to figure out when to wean him off sippy cups and Pull-Ups. Now he was trying to figure out how to be a man, where he fit in the world as far as career and his identity. How did time pass so quickly?

  “What did you say when he told you about the base-whatever?” Her hands flapped in the air in front of her, then came to rest on the counter.

  “BASE jumping. I told him I didn’t approve. I told him it’s dangerous and illegal.”

  “Can you tell me his reaction?” She didn’t want to compromise the confidentiality between her son and Manny. At least Javier was talking to someone sensible. Someone who actually cared about what happened to him.

  “He grew contrite. He confessed bragging about it to me initially because he wanted to impress me. Said he looks up to me, for whatever reason.”

  Manny did seem baffled. As though the weight of responsibility of someone idolizing him was almost too much to bear. For once, she saw Manny in a new light. A humble bear of a guy who had a heart for troubled youth.

  Where was someone like that when she’d needed them as a teen?

  “I told him it would impress me if he would obey and respect his mother and her home. I told him it would impress me if he came back to his roots as a Christian and understand what a blessing it is to be raised in that kind of home. I told him it would impress me if he went against the flow of peer pressure and became a leader instead of a follower. If he steered clear of drinking, sex, drugs and truancy.”

  “Sex and truancy? Never mind. I don’t want to know.” Celia wished she could express to Manny how thankful she was that he influenced Javier to do good. She knew precisely why Javier didn’t come to her with his secrets. Still…

  Disturbing images of Javier in a pine box draped in a parachute like a flag with dirt being shoveled over it shattered her peace.

  “No. I forbid him to skydive. Period.” She dared Manny with her eyes to protest or to cross her by ignoring her wishes. Her folded arms and tightly clenched teeth must not have fazed him.

  In fact, his face held no detectable emotion other than a flicker of something intense in his eyes, and one eyebrow lifted. “If this is his destiny, you’re getting in God’s way. Besides that, you’re being stubborn.”

  “I don’t know any other way to be in order to protect him.”

  He reached out and took her hand, unfolding her arms, but otherwise kept a safe distance between them, dispelling her fear of him having anything but pure and noble motives. “He has it in his makeup, Celia, to live on the wild side of life. To push the envelope past danger. Now, would you rather him do that in a safe and controlled environment with licensed people you trust and who know what they’re doing? Or people on the underground circuit who may only be slightly more experienced than Javier with his seventeen jumps?”

  “Seventee—eek!” Her tongue lodged in her throat. “Seventeen times?” She stood. “Off where?” She sat. “Never mind.” She stood and pulled a half turn. “I don’t want to know.” She spun back around. “Do I?” Celia didn’t know what to do with herself.

  “Probably not.”

  Suspicious anger brought her hands to her hips. “How long have you known about this?”

  Manny chewed his lip. “Uh-oh, here it comes. Hurricane Celia makes landfall.”

  She pressed palms to her hips and narrowed her eyes at him to the point her upper and lower eyelashes tangled. She blinked to free them. “Well! How long?”

  A sigh heaved from him. “Does it matter?”

  “Of course it does. If you knew, you should have told me.” She jabbed a finger at the tip of his nose with every word. “Manny Péna, I better not find out you knew about this without telling me immediately because that’s the worst kind of betrayal.”

  He leaned back, not wanting to get poked in the eye with her claw of a fingernail. “I think you’re being overly dramatic. I was put in a tough position, Celia. Please try to understand.”

  “What’s so hard to understand about the fact that you lied to me by omission? How can I trust that you’d have my son’s best interest at heart?”

  “In my opinion, I didn’t lie. I made a judgment call according to what I thought
best for Javier.”

  She stomped. “That’s not your job. You’re not his parent. I should have been the one making that judgment. Not you.”

  He lifted his hands and let them drop. “I’m sorry. That’s all I can say.”

  “You have no idea how angry this makes me, Manny. How can you expect—”

  “You promised.”

  Manny and Celia turned at the sound of Javier’s strained voice. Immediately, Manny rose and ambled toward him.

  Javier shook his head, a look of hurt and betrayal twisting his face into someone Celia hardly recognized. Bradley stood behind Javier, eyes wide. He darted back into the game room. Celia suddenly wished Amber was here. Her peacemaking demeanor could diffuse this. But she’d gone to jog and to pick up Bradley’s meds from the pharmacy.

  “Javier, listen—” Manny chanced another step forward.

  Javier stepped back from Manny, and shook his head. “No. I trusted you. Dude, you promised not to tell.” Tears bubbled in the corners of Javier’s eyes and his voice cracked the way it did when he’d entered puberty.

  Celia felt horrible. Horrible. The look of hurt and dismay on both their faces, and this was all her fault for badgering the truth out of Manny. “Maybe Javier and I should go,” Celia said to Manny, and cast a tempered glance at Javier, who visibly trembled. Hopefully she could calm Javier down, and Manny would return the next week to work out with him, and everything would be back to normal. Dream on.

  Javier bolted for the door in a blazing huff. Celia cast an apologetic look at Manny and raced after Javier, who paced at the bottom of the outside stairs.

  Manny approached the porch, looking past her to Javier. “When you’re a parent, Javier, you’ll understand what I did for you was with your best interest at heart. I’ll see you around.”

  “I doubt it.” Javier sneered and booked it out of the yard.

  She followed then, torn, turned back to Manny. Above her, the front door closed with a soft click, leaving her to stand in the cold wind, alone and reeling with the fact that she’d gotten what she wanted.

  Manny’s influence out of Javier’s life.

  She didn’t need him, right? She could raise her son by herself and prod him to do good just as well as Manny. Then why did she suddenly feel like finding the nearest bathroom and throwing her socks up?

  Hopefully she could apologize to Manny and to Javier and that would smooth things over. Just a little glitch, she told herself. This is an easy fix.

  Except that old 1970’s Aerosmith song played in her head again.

  Dream on.

  Chapter Twelve

  Two weeks with zero contact between the two shot Celia’s hope of reconciliation between Javier and Manny all to Havana. Celia set her lesson plan satchel down after returning from school and peered at the answering machine. Disappointment inflated. Manny wouldn’t return her calls, and Javier would stalk from the room with even a mere mention of Manny’s name.

  She’d had complaints from every one of Javier’s teachers, and last night he’d come home from work reeking of alcohol. He threatened to run away if she made him quit his job. What could she do, toss him out on his ear? He certainly wouldn’t seek refuge at Amber’s with Manny there. That left the shelter or the street. Celia knew how treacherous the latter could be.

  She had no choice. For some reason, his restaurant job was the one thing that meant the most to him right now. She’d just have to sock it to him where it hurt and hope for the best.

  The garage door creaking signaled his arrival home from after-school detention. Since she taught at the Christian elementary school, she couldn’t keep an eye on him. Armed with Javier’s cell phone, she squared her shoulders and went to do battle.

  He sauntered in, avoiding where she stood near the kitchen counter. He veered toward his loft room.

  “Not so fast, buster.”

  Javier stopped on the stairs but didn’t turn around.

  “Down here. Now.”

  He huffed and tromped down, toting a scowl that she imagined matched her own.

  “I smelled alcohol on your breath when you came in last night.”

  “Someone spilled beer on me. Besides, everyone drinks.”

  “No.” She jabbed a finger at the carpet. “Everyone doesn’t. Especially not underage kids who do stupid things to impress each other like drink too much so they can do stupid things stupider.”

  He scowled. “Stupider’s not a word, Teach. You’re too old-fashioned. Riding around on dinosaurs screeching in the dark ages.”

  She pursed her lips. Maybe if she’d grounded him in a decent church, this belligerent back talk wouldn’t be happening. Gone were the days when she could simply sentence him to a time-out. “God sets the standards, Javier. Not contemporary morality.”

  “You’re a fine one to talk. When do you go to church? Try never.”

  What could she say? He was right. Maybe she should take Amber and Joel up on the offer to attend theirs.

  “You gonna make me stand here all night?” He sulked against the stairs.

  “Just might.” When all else fails, try distraction. “Better yet, let’s decide what your punishment will be. For starters, I’m taking your phone.” She lifted it up and removed the battery, placing it in her pocket.

  His eyes narrowed. “So? I hardly talk on it.”

  “No? You went way over the limit on text messaging and you know the rule. When you pay your part of the bill, you can have your phone back.”

  He huffed and swooped past her.

  She grabbed his sleeve. “Not finished, Flash. I also changed the computer password. When your grades come up and your teachers stop calling me with misbehavior reports, I’ll tell you what it is.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Big deal.” He slouched.

  “And I called your boss. You no longer have a job. I resigned you.”

  That got him. Straightening, rage stormed from his eyes. “You can’t do that.”

  “I most certainly can. And did.”

  “You don’t understand why I need that job!” Javier gritted his teeth and took a lumbering step toward Celia. It took everything in her not to flinch. If he laid a hand on her, she would call the police, and he would spend the night in jail.

  As if sensing her resolve, Javier slunk back on his heels and shoved his hands into the pockets of those jeans that drove her nuts because the crotch drooped to his knees.

  “Why you doin’ all this, Ma?”

  “Why are you doing all you are to mess up your life?”

  “I’m not—never mind. You won’t believe me, so who cares.”

  “If you’re not going to care about it, then I will.” She jabbed her finger at the floor multiple times for good measure.

  “I do care about it. You don’t understand.” Javier paced one end of the small living room to the other, chin jutted, fists clenched.

  “Then help me understand, Javier. Talk to me.”

  “I miss Manny, and—and I miss Dad, and I hate you for making them leave me.” He turned and stomped into the garage.

  What? Making them leave? She stormed after him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Javier spun. “You always griped at Dad to ‘work overtime, work overtime. We don’t have enough money. Work overtime.’ Well, he did, and he got shot.”

  Celia’s knees went weak. She grasped for the doorway, sliding down to the steps. Had he secretly blamed her all these years for Joseph’s death? Is that why he rebelled now?

  “Javier, I—I just wanted to have enough money for you to go to college. Don’t you know that I—”

  “I don’t care. Whatever it is. I. Don’t. Care. It won’t bring him back.” In one powerful motion, Javier flung his arm in a backward arch, knocking an entire row of tools off the wall shelf. They clattered to the concrete like thoughts in her mind.

  Don’t you know I go to sleep with regret in a lonely bed every single night for pressuring him to work overtime that day?

  Di
zziness swarmed Celia. She stumbled backward, falling into the house. She stood on wobbly legs, so badly wanting to change the past.

  Don’t you know if I could, I’d die in his place so he could be here with you?

  Leaning against the kitchen wall for support, Celia lowered herself to the floor, heaving air and brushing damp hair from her eyes. The garage door opened, chinking up the rails.

  She lunged to standing. The floor tilted. She clung to the wall.

  Don’t go. Javier, please don’t leave mad. Your dad left mad and he—

  Her feet wanted to run after her son but they felt like cinder blocks. She forced herself blindly toward the garage door.

  At the heart-wringing sound of him sobbing, she stopped. One hand clung to her chest, one to her mouth to keep from wailing. She hadn’t heard him cry since the day of the funeral. Not once.

  Maybe he needed to. This was long overdue. Yes, Celia decided, she needed to let him cry it out or to walk off some steam. She no more than finished the thought when her heart lurched in her throat. Did she just hear the car start?

  A four-cylinder vroom spiked her pulse. “No!”

  Tires squealing on her garage floor confirmed her fear.

  Javier had taken off in her car. And he had no clue how to drive. Celia bolted to the street in time to see him weave through the intersection at a high rate of speed. “Javier!”

  Panic seized her, setting her block feet into motion. She sprinted into the house. Gasping for breath, she reached for the phone, dialed 9-1-1 then phoned Joel at the DZ since Amber took Bradley there after school to watch the guys jump.

  Joel’s voice calmed her. “I’ll call Manny to wait with you until we get there.”

  “No—” She gulped.

  “He’s right down the street.”

  The door chimed. Celia went to answer it. “No. Joel, I don’t want Manny knowing about this. He already—” Thinks I’m a bad mom. Manny’s frame on her doorstep broke her words off.

  “Never mind. He’s already here.” Maybe he picked up the call on a scanner.

  Celia hung up as she opened the door. “How did you know—?”

  When Manny turned, the enraged look on his face brought her up short.