It's All Relative(143)
Kai squeezed her hand but didn’t look at her. His eyes were locked onto his father’s back. Both men looked speculative. With Leilani following in the car behind, the small group eventually made it to one of the two homes Kai had been raised in. As Kai took in the familiar modest dwelling, the corners of his lips curved up. Jessie supposed a part of him was happy to be back here, even if it was sort of painful.
Her uncle’s house was in a pretty secluded area, with green life abundant all the way around it. The flat, black-roofed home had a barn behind it, and Jessie remembered Kai telling her about how he used to go horseback riding with his dad. At least Kai had very good memories with her uncle. Hopefully they outnumbered the bad ones.
When Jessie stepped out of the car, the humid air immediately made her feel moist with dew. Kai stepped out after her, looking perfectly at ease in the environment. Walking around the car to her, he extended his hand. Jessie grabbed it and stepped close to his side. Uncle Nate took in their closeness, but didn’t comment on it. Jessie was glad he was choosing not to say anything, and hoped he was starting to accept the two of them as a couple; she really didn’t want to create tension in her family by loving Kai.
Leilani pulled up to the house a few seconds later and also glanced at Jessie and Kai. Her only response was a smile though, as she helped Kai and Jessie get their bags from the back of the car. Uncle Nate moved to help them as well, and between the four of them, they had their things situated in Kai’s old bedroom pretty quickly.
Jessie noticed that Kai’s parents kept their distance from each other. It was clear that any love between them had died the moment Uncle Nate had discovered the truth. It saddened her that they’d each had to experience such pain and loss, but even still, she was happy about the situation. It was the only reason she and Kai could be together.
Leilani stayed for a quiet, peaceful supper, then reluctantly said her goodbyes for the evening. As she hugged Kai for the fifth time, her face shifted into sadness. She seemed certain that if she left Kai alone with his father, Kai would feel differently about her the next time he saw her. Knowing Kai like she did, Jessie was pretty sure that wouldn’t happen. He would make up his own mind about his mother.
Jessie yawned as she said her goodbyes to Leilani. When the door shut behind her, Kai squeezed Jessie’s waist. “Why don’t you go to bed. I’ll…be there in a minute.”
Knowing that Kai was probably just as jet-lagged as her, since he’d finally adjusted to her time zone, she looked past him to her uncle. Nate had his head down; he was obviously waiting to talk to his son in private. Switching her attention back to Kai, Jessie held him close. “I’m here when you need me.” He smiled and nodded, then gave her a goodnight kiss.
Hoping the conversation between the two men went well, Jessie shuffled off to Kai’s childhood room to get ready for bed. After changing and brushing her teeth, she climbed onto his small mattress and looked at all the signs of young Kai’s life around the room. While it wasn’t a child’s room anymore, there was plenty of evidence that it had been once—old stickers on the dressers, army men shoved in a gap between the window frame, a poster of a bikini clad girl on the wall. Smiling at the image of Kai as a boy, Jessie closed her eyes and let the exhaustion flow through her. As she started fading into sleep, she heard low voices coming through the wall. Realizing that Kai and his dad must be right outside the bedroom window, Jessie fought through the fatigue to listen to their conversation.
Kai’s voice broke through the stillness of the night. “Dad, why didn’t you just tell me? I mean, I can understand not wanting to let me know when I was young…but I haven’t been young for a while now.” He paused for a second and Jessie shifted to face the direction of the open window. “Why keep me in the dark? Why send me to Mason?”
Uncle Nate let out a long, beleaguered sigh. “I tried to tell you, Kai. You have no idea how many times I stared at you and tried to tell you.” He sighed again and paused long seconds before continuing. “But every time, the anger, the betrayal…it all resurfaced, and I…I just couldn’t make the words come out.”
Feeling sympathy for her uncle sweep over her, Jessie sat up. None of this could have been easy on him, and he’d been dealing with it for so long. He must have been a wreck. He must have been desperate for it to end, and at the same time, terrified. Nate continued in a soft voice, and Jessie pressed her head to the wall to hear him better. “After years of that, of not being able to talk to you like I wanted to talk to you…it ate at me. I needed you to know, but I still couldn’t tell you.”
He paused again, and Jessie tried to picture having a conversation like this with her own father. She couldn’t. “I figured, since I physically couldn’t get the words out around you, and Leilani absolutely refused to tell you…maybe he…maybe Mason could finally do something right…and maybe he could tell you.” Her uncle sighed heavily again. “Once I had that thought, it consumed me, and then I needed him to be the one to tell you. In my mind, there were no other options.”
Jessie looked down at the black and white sheets of Kai’s bed, torn for the both of them. For all of them really. Kai exhaled, not speaking for long moments. “I wish you had somehow found a way to tell me, Dad. It hurt so much to have a stranger do it.” Jessie closed her eyes, remembering how she’d found Kai. She’d never seen someone so shaken up.