I ask Kim to take Tommy so I can speak to my parents and Robby and ask them for something I never thought I would.

Help.

I need help.

And I need them.

I sit down on the same chair I’ve always sat in, only now I pull it to the side of his bed, because I need him to hear me. I need him to see me.

“He’s a great kid—my son. He’s kind and respectful and a little crazy but I love him with everything I have,” I tell him, the pain of the past few days finally consuming me. “He’s smart, Dad. Smarter than I ever was. And he’s so funny. He gives me a new reason to smile every single day.” I pause when my mom sits on the bed by his legs, taking his hand in hers. She nods, asking me to continue. “He’s into dressing up at the moment. Chazarae, the lady who took me in and gave me a home when I had nowhere to go—”

My mother’s cry cuts me off but she nods again. “Go on.”

“Chazarae buys him all these little outfits and Becca—my girl—my ex, she’d take these pictures of him. She called him a little poser.” I reach into my pocket and pull out all the photographs she’d taken of him and hand them to my mom. She lets go of Dad and starts flipping through the pictures, her smile now overshadowing her tears. My dad stays silent, his gaze at the wall in front of him.

“It’s been hard—being seventeen and being completely alone to a raise a child. I didn’t know anything about being a dad—only what you taught me,” I tell him. “And somehow, it was enough to get me here. And Robby and Kim—they’ve helped me through a lot of it, but there’ve been times when I needed my parents. And no more so than I need them now. I wouldn’t ask…” I choke on a breath, fighting against my pride.

Robby steps up behind me, his hand on my shoulder.

“Natalie—she came back. She wants full custody of him. She has money I don’t. She has family I don’t. She’s his mom and she’s going to win. She’s going to take my world away from me and I don’t know what to do. I can’t live without him.”

“Fuck,” Robby whispers.

I rear back when my dad slowly sits up, his eyes on mine. He tries to speak but nothing comes out. Then he looks at my mother. “Ella, call Jack Newman.”

“Our lawyer?”

Dad nods. “Set up a meeting for all of us.” He turns to me now, but I can barely see him, not through the tears flooding my vision. “Your son has your smile, Josh.”

★★★

I get the papers from Natalie’s lawyers the next day and the first thing I do is take them to my parent’s house. We sit in my dad’s room and go through everything we know. The next day, we have an appointment with Jack Newman at their house. My dad sits in the living room with us, dressed in a suit that hangs off his now thin and gaunt frame. He stays quiet while the lawyer explains everything to us. Natalie’s lawyers are good. Really good. And they’re going to take their time finding evidence and character witnesses who are going to be willing to lie on the stand for the girl who was lost at seventeen, found at twenty, and wants the best for her son. In her mind, and in her lawyer’s, she has a case. A good one. Especially since she’s using my actions and temper from New Year’s Eve night for her personal gain. Jack says he’ll do his own digging into her past and try to find what she’s been up to. I tell him to have at it, but I don’t want to know about any of it until I have to. “How much is this going to cost?” I ask him. “I have money that I was saving to put toward a house but I don’t know if it’s going to cover it.”

Mr. Newman glances at my dad quickly. “It’s covered,” he says.

I look at my dad, but he’s looking down at his lap.

“Your first step is to gather character witnesses, which is what she’ll be doing. Anyone you can find who will vouch for you. We need all the help we can get,” Mr. Newman says.

“What are my chances here? Be honest. Please.”

“We need time, Joshua. We all need to be patient. It could take weeks—months even—before a court date is set.”

“And in the meantime, what happens to Tommy?”

“I’ve called her lawyers already. Nothing changes in the meantime. Natalie doesn’t want to do anything to jeopardize her case.”

Mom huffs out a breath. “The little bitch,” she whispers.

My eyes widen. So do Jack’s. My dad doesn’t seem surprised at all.

Then Jack chuckles. “Remind me not to put your mom on the stand.”

★★★

Weeks pass while Jack’s law firm gathers the evidence and I gather character witnesses. The only ones I have are the same people who I’d tried to push away the night that started all of this; Chazarae, Hunter, Chloe, Rob and Kim.

I make the most of every day—between work and meeting with the lawyers, I spend every waking second loving the absolute crap out of my kid. Then, one night—out of the blue—I get a text.

From her.

Becca: SK8F8 in two days.

I hold my breath and stare down at my phone, my heart thumping a thousand miles a second. Endless scattered thoughts race through my mind while I try to come up with a response.

I’m sorry.

I love you.

I miss you.

I need you.

Instead, my fingers skim the screen quickly and come up with the only thing I feel safe enough to send.

Joshua: I’ll go if you go.

Seconds, minutes, hours pass while I grip my phone tight, waiting for her to respond. Finally, it comes.

Becca: If I go, you talk. I listen.

Joshua: Anything.

Becca: Okay.

33

-Becca-

break

breɪk/

verb

separate into pieces as a result of a blow, shock, or strain.

Josh freezes mid-step when he sees me waiting by his still half beaten truck the morning of SK8F8. I came home, or at least the closest thing I have to a home, yesterday when he was at work. I didn’t tell him I was there. I asked Grams not to tell him either—but I knew she wouldn’t. She wasn’t happy about me being here, neither were the nurses—apart from Nurse Linda—at the psych hospital. Or, as they liked to call themselves, “the home for personal development.”

He clears his throat, his eyes on mine, and his lips pulling to a half smile. I look away because it’s already started—the stirring of old feelings that I don’t want to feel.

I get into his truck the second he unlocks it and put on my seat belt, my gaze on the dash in front of me. After getting in, he starts the engine, but he doesn’t do anything else. I sit up a little higher, preparing for what he’s about to say. “Hey,” he says, his voice so low I almost don’t hear it.

I don’t respond. I wasn’t kidding when I told him that I’d go if he talked and I listened. Apart from not actually being physically able to speak, I don’t have anything to say to him. At least nothing I want to share.

He exhales loudly and changes gear, then reverses out the driveway.

For the entire two-hour drive to the SK8F8 grounds we sit in silence. It’s not until he finds a spot and parks that he turns to me. For seconds, he just looks at me. I keep looking at the dash. Then he shifts, moving closer to me and I flinch, pressing my side against the door. He curses under his breath before reaching into the back seat and placing a black backpack between us.