So, no. I didn’t understand. I didn’t understand how she could leave and never look back.

But, of course, she did look back. She looked back and tried to hurt us even more. She almost won too. That’s the funny thing about family, though. When you do stupid shit you think is for the best in the most self-sacrificing way possible, they’re there to knock you upside the head and tell you to stop being such an idiot.

I was fifteen years old when I found out. Bear took me for a drive one day. Up the coast. Just me and him. It was a pretty summer day, and there was the sun and the waves and our windows were rolled down, and we let the wind run through our fingers.

“I have something to tell you,” he said to me. We’d stopped at a lookout and we were the only ones there. “Something I should have told you a while ago. I just couldn’t work up the courage.”

My skin felt cold. “Are you okay?” I asked quickly. “Are you sick?” In my head, a million doomsday scenarios ran through my head. Bear had cancer. Bear had AIDS. Bear had a brain tumor. Bear was going to die and he was going to leave me behind. The car shook a little. A precursor to an earthquake, I thought.

“No,” he said. “I’m not sick. I’m not going anywhere. Neither is Otter or anyone else.”

That should have made me feel better, but it didn’t. “What’s wrong?” I asked nervously. “Whatever it is, we’ll fight it, okay? If it’s the courts again, if they’re trying to take me away from you because you and Otter got married, we’ll fight it. I don’t care what it takes.” By the end of my misguided little speech, I was growling and spitting, suddenly sure it’s a custody thing. Who do they think they’re fucking with? I thought to myself. Bring it. Bring it and you will see what it means to have the fight of your life.

He groaned and covered his face with his hands. “I’m going about this all wrong,” he muttered. “No, Kid. It’s not custody. Nothing bad will happen.” He reached over and took my hand in his and squeezed it. “You’re mine, okay? You belong to me. Nothing can ever change that. I promise you. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

“Then what is it!”

“Mom.”

“Oh.” And it was like I was five years old again. “She’s dead?”

He shook his head. “No. At least, I don’t think so. I haven’t checked up on her in a while.”

“Then what?”

“The hospital,” he says. “When everything happened at once.”

I closed my eyes. Everything at once.

Mrs. Paquinn.

Otter.

Anna.

“I remember,” I said. “That wasn’t a good day.”

“We’ve had better,” he agreed. “But we picked ourselves up.”

“That’s what we do.”

“There’s… something that happened there that I didn’t tell you.”

“What?”

“I only wanted to protect you,” he said sadly. “All I’ve ever wanted was to keep you safe.”