Protect Her: Part 10 Read Online Free Page A

“I was supposed to be home late that day because I had soccer practice after school. I wasn’t feeling well, so I came home earlier than expected. I didn’t call them to tell them though. I figured I’d just show up out of the blue. I knew it hurt my mom’s feelings when I treated them that way, but I was a full-blown teenage bitch complete with hormones and temper tantrums.”
    “We all go through it.” I wanted to lighten the mood, but that wasn’t what she needed from me. Her tone was practically hypnotic. She wanted me to see this, and I would do it for her. This was likely the most painful night of her life. The fact that she wanted to share it with me made me want to wrap her up and take all of that pain away. But I couldn’t. These memories were the kind that haunted you for a lifetime.
    “My mom told me to call home every afternoon when I knew I was going to be late to check-in, but this day I didn’t. I was usually so good about it that I knew not doing it would cause her to worry. I didn’t care. It made me happy to think that she was going to be worried about me. That’s the kind of kid I had started turning into.”
    “I ran away for a week after my mom and Alice told me what I was,” I said. I knew that my experience wasn’t going to make her feel any better, but I had to try. “My mom was worried sick about me, and when I finally came home, she grounded me for a month.”
    Paige turned toward me then. “What made you come back?”
    I shrugged with a sheepish half-smile. “I was hungry.”
    She nodded. “I was thinking about running away then. I thought I could go back to my old town and stay with my best friend, Clarissa. I’d re-enroll back in my old school and star in the play, and everything would be hunky-dory. God, I was so stupid.”
    I took her hand. The more we delayed, the more painful I thought this memory would be for her. “You came home early, and you didn’t call your parents like you normally did to tell them you were going to do that. What happened then?”
    “It was so quiet,” she said. She looked at the house, and I sensed what she meant. Despite the fact that it was dusk, there weren’t any lights turned on inside the house. The street was eerily quiet. No dogs barking or kids laughing. It seemed like a strangely empty world almost more reminiscent of our time at Slinky Pete’s on the other side of the veil than the memory of a living place.
    “It didn’t really dawn on me until I came through the gate.” She paused and looked back at the metal gate as it swung closed behind us. “I was so focused on all the smart things I was going to say to my mom when she scolded me for not calling her that I missed some of the obvious signs.”
    “Like what?” This whole scenario had ‘proceed with caution’ flags all around it. I felt a pit of dread growing in my stomach. I knew the outcome, but that didn’t stop the irrational sensations of knowing that something bad was about to happen.
    “My dad would take his whiskey out on the porch after work.” Paige pointed at the two white wicker chairs sitting on the porch. “He’d bring the newspaper out with him because he left so early in the morning that he didn’t have time to read it. My dad always preferred to read the news versus watching it on TV.”
    I could tell she had drifted backward in time and was relating more to this memory than the present time with each passing second. I didn’t want her to have to go through this again, but I wasn’t going to interrupt it either. It seemed important to her, and if bearing witness to it was what she needed me to do, then I would gladly do it for her. I just hoped that on the other side of it, I’d be able to talk some sense into her.
    She stepped away from me toward the porch. “From five-thirty until seven my dad was a permanent fixture on the front porch. Around six-fifteen or so my mom would come out with a fresh drink for him. She’d kiss him on the side of