Page 123 of His Turn

“Bad things happened when you run from your problems. Isn’t that what you’ve been telling us? That one day we’ll have to account for all this.” I can picture her waving her arms in the air. All this… meaning the family. “We can’t run from it. We know that. And even though people up here leave us alone, they know how we live. Someone tried to burn the barn down last Thanksgiving.”

“What?” I say.

“We got it put out in time. Not too much damage. Abrem and Benjamin fixed it already. And we found seven calves gutted in the field last spring. We tried not to think too hard about it. And no one could fix that. But we know why it happened. So you’re right. All things come due eventually.”

“Mom,” I say.

“I am your mother. You were my first, Elias. Charity got pregnant before me. Many times. So you came fifth. But you were my first and only child, Elias. You are my only child. And I love you. I don’t want this. I don’t want you to feel bad about this. It’s not your fault we live a life you don’t agree with. It’s not your fault I chose this and brought you into this family. So I want you to know, I won’t hate you if you walk away and never come back. I won’t.”

I rub my hand over my eyes and hang my head.

“We love you. But we know how we choose to live isn’t… conventional. So if you want us to leave you alone, we will.”

I am broken. And they didn’t do this to me. I did it to myself.

“No,” I say, my voice hoarse and cracking. “No, that’s not what I want. Not at all. I’m sorry for how I behaved last weekend. I really am. It’s just… Luc,” I say, unable to keep my voice level. “And that girl I brought.”

“Nadia,” she says. “We like her.”

“Yeah.” I sigh. “Me too. I think.”

“You’ll figure it out, Elias. You always do. You were always going places. Never content to sit still for long. Always looking for an opportunity.”

Fuck. Is that how everyone sees me? Bric the user? Elias the opportunist?

“And look at you now. Such a successful businessman. We’re all proud of you, no matter what, Elias. Your father’s here. And he’s nodding his head.” I hear my father grunt out something that might be, We love you.

Pieces of me are shattered all over this fucking club. I am the broken glass under my feet. Because they accept me for who I am. And I have done nothing but punish them for what they are.

But that’s what I do to everyone who gets too close, right? I punish them. Push them away.

I break them.

And now I’m about to break everyone I’ve ever loved just to keep this dirty secret inside me.

I am Bric the user. I am Elias the opportunist.

“Then… that’s it, I guess,” my mother says when I don’t respond. I can’t respond. I don’t trust myself not to break any further. “Will we see you at the Labor Day reunion?”

“Yeah,” I say, barely managing to get the word out. “I’ll be there.”

“I’d appreciate it if you could do something about that music,” the building manager says as we walk down the hallway towards Nadia’s apartment. I knocked for ten minutes but she never answered. And the music is so loud, I doubt she even heard me.

“I think she’s dancing,” I say to the guy.

He shoots me a pissed-off scowl as he searches for the key to unlock her door. “Obviously. The neighbors down below have been complaining all day about the thumping on their ceiling.” He finds the key.

“She’s a ballerina,” I say. But yeah. I can only imagine what pointe shoes on a hardwood floor sound like from that perspective.

He opens the door and the classical music pours out from the dark apartment. “Thank you,” I say.

“Just make her stop. I’ve already gotten six calls from the police and while the Mountain Ballet own several units in this building, they’re not the only people who matter.”

“Got it,” I say, starting to get annoyed. He turns his back to me and walks off, fielding complaints from neighbors as he passes them peeking out their doors.

I close Nadia’s door and shut them out. It’s no use calling her name. The music is way too loud. I can hear her in there. Jumping and whatever else ballerinas do when they are… broken.

I close my eyes for a second. Try to massage the building headache. And then I open them, take a deep breath, and walk down to the studio towards the only light in the whole apartment.