Page 5 of The Other Side of Green

My travel companion reached for my hand and patted it gently, her skin soft, the smell of violet cologne drifting from her hair.

We sat in silence until she got up for her stop, pressing her bag of toffee into my hand. “Believe in the path,” she whispered, before leaving me to the rest of my lonely journey.

As I sat in the growing darkness, watching the roads narrow, and the buildings change, I thought of where my path had taken me.

From Grams to college. To Jack who I’d missed for so long. Finding him again had been heaven and hell.

I’d spoken to Grams just a few days ago, sure she’d known that I’d found him. If it had been wrong, if she knew he was my brother, wouldn’t she have said something?

There were too many pieces of the jigsaw to fit together. I couldn’t make sense of it all.

Grams knew everything. Always.

So maybe Luca was wrong?

Which meant I’d run from Jack without an explanation, without a goodbye. I’d done the one thing he’d been scared of. I’d heard the truth about why he left four years ago and then I’d walked away.

But if he was my brother, that had been the right choice.

Was Jack my brother?

Why hadn’t Grams told me?

Why hadn’t Luca told me?

If he’d told me years ago, none of this would have happened. Jack wouldn’t have climbed in through my bedroom window and I wouldn’t have tended his bruises and injuries, always waiting for him to give in and kiss me.

I would have tended them still, but as his sister; not as a young girl always hoping and dreaming for more.

I would have loved him, but in a different way, in an appropriate way. I closed my mind to the lie I told myself.

If Jack knew it would destroy him.

Better he thought I’d not chosen him, then he’d… then he’d…

I shut my memory down at the snatched images of the other night, the steam from the shower, the feel of him inside me.

Oh. God.

Yeah, he had a plan for me all right, and it involved hell.

Shadows engulfed the street as I stood at the top of the walkway and looked down. I’d only been gone a few weeks, yet everything seemed smaller, narrower.

Hiking my duffel bag onto my shoulder, with every step I prepared for what I’d say to Luca. He’d lied to me for years. What sort of brother did that? A brother who knew about another brother, that’s who.

My blood pulsed, rushing in my veins.

The drapes of the house were shut, not unusual for this time of day. Grams was a stickler for pulling them closed to stop people being able to look in, but I knew that Luca would have shut them just like Grams did after Pops died. Automatically, I aimed for the back alley and the gate, ignoring the wooden steps that led to the small front porch.

A light illuminated the kitchen through the back door, and I paused with my Doc Marten on the step. My hand gripped the wooden rail to the right of the three back steps.

I couldn’t do this.

Couldn’t.

Wouldn’t.

Grams.