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“Calm down. You just need to let off some steam. Why don’t you let me handle setting something up to help you out with that? A belated bachelor party should do the trick.” He gets more annoying the more he speaks.
“I’m good.”
“You know I’ve got connections. Did you see that girl I brought home last weekend? She’s a wild one. I’d bet good money she’d be down to take care of you.”
For fuck’s sake. “Are you suggesting I cheat on my wife? My wife, who happens to be Libby?” Disdain drops from my voice, making damn sure Tyson gets the fucking point.
“Well, when you put it that way,” he shrugs.
“Tyson, I’m not going to be with anyone other than Libby. No bachelor party. No connections. Nothing.” I go back to what I was doing before all of this bullshit started, hoping it’d shut him up.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see him lean against an unfinished kitchen counter. “No shit?” I don’t entertain that with a response. “Dude. I didn’t know you were actually into her.”
“Why the fuck would I marry her if I weren’t into her?” The pretty little redhead has been consuming every piece of my mornings, days, and nights. Even my dreams. She’s everywhere. And it’s beautiful torture. Because I want her to be everywhere with me. Not just in my mind. But it turns out that getting married out of the blue puts a minor hindrance on getting the living situation settled.
“Well fuck me sideways, Gibson.” Tyson huffs out a laugh.
Stopping what I’m doing, I put my hands on the counter in front of me. “Why do you always have to say weird shit?” It’s a rhetorical question, but Tyson loves talking, so of course he’s going to answer it.
“I can’t help what comes out of my mouth anymore than you can help your love sick dick.”
Pinning him with my eyes, I make sure to enunciate my words. “That’s enough.”
Nodding, he agrees. “Yeah, that was too far, huh? I forgot we were talking about Little Bird for a minute.” Things go silent as we recover from his dumbass commentary. “You for real going to tell me what’s going on though?”
I wipe a hand over my mouth and stand up straight again. “Nothing to tell. We both knew what we felt. No reason to waste time when we know what we wanted,” I say, sticking to the explanation we agreed to use when people questioned our sudden marriage. Though there wasn’t much convincing that had to be made on my part. I knew the moment I saw her that I needed to be everywhere she was. I needed her thoughts, her touch, her attention. So while Libby may be using a line when defending our imaginary vows to each other, everything I’ve said is the absolute truth.
“So you’re telling me you’re really married?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, but you better be good to her or I’m going to have to kick your ass.” I give him an unimpressed look. Height means nothing if you don’t have the muscle to back it up.
“I’m being serious. You know why I call her Little Bird?” The lack of response is enough for Tyson to continue. He finds a five-gallon bucket and flips it upside down, sitting on top of it. “The six months before her dad left were pretty bad. From what Blake told me, he had been beating her for a while, and emotionally abusing her for even longer.”
The always-on Tyson Miller fades away, replaced by a man with the weight of the world on his shoulder. I knew Libby meant a lot to him and his sister, but I don’t know that I ever realized just how much until now.
“I found out about it when she forgot to leave her window open when he kicked her out of the house. He locked the door on his teenage daughter in the middle of the night and she walked to our house. We lived four miles from each other. I’d never spoken to her before that night. I saw her around school and knew she was Blake’s friend, but I was a Junior jock and didn’t care who my sister’s friends were. I wish I would have. I should've pulled my head out of my ass long enough to notice that the girl looked like a punching bag.”
My stomach sours at the words. I know about Libby’s childhood, but hearing it in detail from someone else is a hard pill to swallow.
“I thought my life was hard. Making sure I lived up to my parent’s expectations on the court. We lost a pretty big game that night, and I was sulking about it when Libby found me outside. We shared a cigarette, but didn’t say a word to each other.” The shadow of a smile that appears on his lips doesn’t escape me. “When I saw her the next morning in broad daylight, I noticed all the bruises. Some were new, others were faded, but they covered a good part of her.” His eyes glass over.
“I don’t know why the teachers didn’t say anything. There was no way nobody knew what was going on in that house. Hell, the few times I saw her mom, she looked worse than Libby did.” Ty is quiet for a few minutes, but I wait for him to continue. This is hard to hear, but I want to know what it was like from someone else's perspective. It kills me I couldn't have been there for her. But I need to know someone else was.
“She came to our house a lot after that night. It was rare that she didn’t show up before I went to bed. And I found myself staying awake until I knew she was under our roof and safe.” I have a newfound appreciation for Tyson. “Blake noticed a few times and called me out on having a thing for her friend. It wasn’t lost on me how gorgeous Libby was, or still is — Stop. Put your claws away.”
I clear my throat and do my best to loosen my clenched fists.
“Anyway, it’s never been like that between us. I’ve never wanted to pursue her romantically. I’ve only ever wanted to make sure she was safe. But being a dumbass teenager, it pissed me off that my sister gave me shit. So I did what any douche bag would do, and I started teasing Libby.
“It started with me making bird sounds each night when she would show up. And eventually she got the balls to confront me about it. I gave her some stupid excuse about when she’s faced with hard shit, she always picked flight.”
He must have been able to see the confusion on my face.
“The body’s natural response to stress is either fight or flight. And I picked on the girl who got beaten by her father about never putting up a fight.” I wish I could unhear what he said. I don’t want to know that he was ever so cruel to Libby. But I try to remind myself that he was a kid too.
“I felt like shit after. I didn’t talk to her for weeks, but that only made me feel worse. So one night I waited on the porch for her to inevitably show up. And when she did, I apologized. I told her what happened and why my dumbass responded the way it did. But I’d never been that vulnerable, so when I told her goodnight, I tried to end the mood on a lighter note and Little Bird just slipped out.”
