NEVER GOODBYE (An Albany Boys Novel) by Kerri Williams Read Free Book Online Page B

at his own equivalent speech of ‘I’ll respect you in the morning’ and selfishly I wish I didn’t know. “I was going to pass on that one,” he says.
                  “At some level, I’m glad you didn’t.”
                  “But at another you wish I did, huh?”
                  “Yeah, but that’s not what best friends do.”
                  “Yeah,” he breathes. I realize he’s going to ask me the very same question and I don’t want him to feel the disappointment I felt for his. We asked for honesty, we want a relationship even if it has some major limitations and now is where it gets a bit gritty.
    I decide to tell him my answer before he even asks because I know he’s struggling with whether he should or not. “She can hear you. Mom’s the same person she was before, only a lot quieter.”
                  Again, Vaun braces himself on his elbows and looks down into my eyes. The sun has almost disappeared over the horizon and the orange and purple hue halos his body. He’s so angelic and the urge to kiss him tugs at me.
                  “Harper?”
                  I know what he wants to know. We speak about my mom like she’s dead when, in fact, she isn’t. She might as well be, though. Closing my eyes, I can picture her in the window of the home Dad works to keep her in. I wonder what, if anything, she can see through her ghostly eyes. I know that’s the most bitchy thing to think or say, but it kills me to see her like that; a shell of the vibrant musician, wife and mother I knew growing up. She would hate herself if she was aware.
                  “I don’t know why I told Benny that. Maybe to a point I wished it to be true …” I take a steadying breath before continuing. “About three years ago, my mom and Dad got into a car accident on their way home from their anniversary dinner. Mom suffered extensive brain damage and she now lives in a home where she can be looked after. We used to visit her all the time, now I see her once every couple of weeks. Dad goes to see her every chance he gets. It’s like he thinks she’ll snap out of it. Benny, which is who I told my lie to, doesn’t really remember what she was like before. He was only seven.”
                  “Jesus. I’m so sorry.” He strokes my hair and my cheek and suddenly I feel a small amount of the burden lift from my shoulders. I’ve never told anyone before. “Come here.”
                  He falls onto his back, pats his chest where I lie my head and he strokes my hair in silence. I don’t know how long we lay here without a word uttered and I don’t think either one of us cares. It’s natural and comforting. And nothing I pictured best friends would be doing.
     

Vaun
     
                  I don’t want to be her best friend. I want it all and I want to tell the whole world. But that’s the bastard in me. My father’s the same and I hate him for it, which goes to say — she deserves a better guy who isn’t weighed down by a dark history.
    Her hair feels so incredibly soft under my fingers, like a petal. So smooth and soft and I’d stroke it till death if she’d let me. I don’t think she would, though, but I can’t help smiling at the possibility and I’m damn glad she can’t see me and the stupid goofy grin.
                  “Why does April not like you?” she asks me and I feel my goddamn heart race to her sweet song voice. It’s like music from heaven and that just sounds corny. But she’s my freedom from this life, my song bird, and I’ll fight anyone who wants to take her from me; including April.
                  “She thinks I’ll be a bad influence on you, I guess,” I say and she chortles. I feel it against my ribs.
                  “Are you?”
                  “Pass.” This time she laughs and tries to