And it would've been even better if she hadn't chosen to do it right in front of my little sister.
I looked over at Chloe. Her look said it all. She was horrified, not only because of the way my mom had died, but also because of my attitude.
Nice people pretended. I wasn't that nice.
But I wanted Chloe to understand, so I said, "I know what you're thinking."
Obviously, she thought I was heartless. In some ways, I guess I was. But I'd brought Chloe here for a reason – to see the real me, where I'd come from – and maybe, show her why I wasn't always the most civilized guy on the planet.
In this neighborhood, too much civility could get you killed – or worse, get someone in your family killed.
Chloe's voice was carefully neutral. "I'm not thinking anything, just taking it all in."
"Let me ask you something," I said. "Your brother. He's thirteen, right?"
She nodded.
"Well, I'm the oldest," I said. "My sister, she's maybe three years younger than me." I couldn’t help but smile. "Probably about your age, come to think of it." I felt my smile fade. "When she was thirteen, Mom tried to sell her."
Chloe grew very still, and her face froze in a carefully blank expression. "What do you mean?"
I gave her a serious look. "You know what I mean."
She blew out a long, unsteady breath, but said nothing.
So I went on. "That's when Grandma kicked her out for good, told Mom if she ever came back, she'd be dead before she hit the door. And Grandma meant it. She never said anything she didn't mean. She had this old Remington. She was a hell of a shot too. Took me deer hunting up north once."
Chloe gave me a faint smile. "She sounds like an amazing person."
"She was." At the memory, I felt some of my tension slide away. "She'd been a widow forever too. I never knew my grandpa. Neither did my mom, come to think of it. He died in some factory explosion a month after she was born. So I guess my mom didn't have it so good either."
I shook my head. "Anyway, even with Mom out of the house, I couldn't let the thing with Kara go. I mean, what kind of man does that? And why the hell should he get away with it? So I ask around, and I find out who the guy is."
"Then what?" Chloe asked.
This is where things got dicey. But I'd brought her out here to be honest. For better or worse, I needed to go through with it. "Then," I said, "I go after him."
"So were you what, about sixteen?"
"Yup."
"So what'd you do?"
I still remembered that night. It's not like I put a lot of thought into the plan, but I hadn't been completely stupid about it. "I showed up at his house, knocked on the door, all nice and polite. And then, when he answered, I beat the piss out of him. The guy was in I.C.U. for a week."
"Good," Chloe said.
"Oh c'mon," I said, trying to smile, "no warnings about vigilante justice?"
She shrugged, and something in her eyes made me wonder if she was thinking about her own brother. That night in the hospital, she'd talked about him a lot, sounding more like a mom than my own mom ever had. She looked out for the kid. I could tell.
Chloe glanced toward the street. "At least you didn't kill him."
"Yeah. But it didn't end there. The guy was a city councilman. Had a wife, a couple of grown kids." I heard the sarcasm in my own voice. "A regular pillar of the community."
"So he pressed charges?"
"Yup."
