WHO: Kaden WHEN: Tuesday afternoon through to Thursday night WHERE: On the road WHAT: Just keep swimming WARNINGS: None
When Kaden hung up after talking to Marcie, he didn’t have time to cry, because Lil T was doing all the wailing for him. Kaden tried everything he could think of, he warmed up some food, he changed him, he rocked him, he got out of the car and walked up and down the road, always keeping the car in sight because if someone stole it, he was even worse off.
But he would keep running. Running from Ares, from Apollo. Running to keep himself and Lil T safe. Even on foot if he had to.
(If he told Marcie he’d lost the car, would she come for him? Would she rescue him, and drive them both across the border? A sad and desperate part of Kaden wanted to lose it, so she'd have to come, so he could wrap his arms around her and let her hold him and let her lead the way out of this mess so it wasn't all on him.)
But she'd make him give the baby back and he didn't know how he'd live with himself if he sacrificed a baby's freedom for his own.
He couldn’t string more than a couple of thoughts together at a time with a baby crying in his ear anyway. Even when a couple of women stopped to ask if he needed help, he could barely come up with a cover story. He pointed at a nearby house and said he lived there, and was taking the baby for a walk so his mom could have a rest. One of the women said something about what a kind brother he was and Kaden made it all the way back to the car before bursting into distraught tears.
He was barely a brother at all any more. Tragos was dead, Cy was dead, and now Kaden was only a brother to Barak, who was never gonna get better.
Their stupid fucking names… Tragos belonged to Ares, Ronan belonged to Kaden. Or... had belonged to him once. Ronan was his brother and Ronan should have stayed his brother and someone should have saved them both, saved them both before Ronan ever started believing in Ares’ stupid fucking power.
Kaden set the baby back down in his carseat, then sat down heavily in the seat beside him. Gutwrenching sobs tore their way up from inside of him, battering his heart, gutting up his throat. He could do nothing but cry, bashing the heel of his hand against his head, grief pouring out of him like blood from a gut wound in a war movie.
If Ares caught up with him (he thought, eventually, when Lil T’s wail finally cut through his own pain) then things like gut wounds weren’t gonna just be a metaphor.
Kaden strapped the baby back in, and tucked the shark blanket around him. He wouldn’t stop crying and Kaden didn’t know what to do because he couldn’t stop crying either.
So he drove. He just drove. He didn’t think about what direction he was going so long as it wasn’t back east. Every mile was a little victory.
A hollow victory, without his brother. He didn’t make it, Marcie’s voice echoed in his head and every time it did Kaden had to fight more tears. Sometimes he needed to pull over and sob again. One time he abandoned the car and stormed into a park and covered his mouth with both hands and screamed with every bit of pain burning inside him.
One time he parked in an industrial part of some town, and curled up in a sleeping bag in the back seat, and stared at the tiny instruction printed on the side of the car seat for a long, long time, till he could see nothing, and when he woke up it was morning and Lil T was hungry again. Or dirty. Or cold. Or all of them. And Kaden felt like the absolute worst.
And then it was time to find a corner of a building he could pee against, and eat a breakfast of cold beans, twinkies and microwaved instant coffee (he was going to need to buy a microwavable bowl somewhere, hot beans were so much more appealing) he was back onto the road, for more driving. The pressure of his foot on the accelerator became automatic, the turn of each corner automatic, the change to the brake pedal automatic when the warning red lights in front of him made him slow down. Movement was all that mattered.
Sometime after Lil T had fallen asleep, Kaden drove through a toll booth, and didn’t even think about which state line he was crossing. He assumed it was Ohio because Ohio was where he was heading – why would it be anywhere else? His whole mind had gone numb to thought.
It wasn’t till he stopped for the night (it was only four in the afternoon, but he was so tired) at a place advertising vacancy that he realised he was in West Virginia instead.
Kaden didn’t know what to do with this thought. It felt like a massive sign he was fucking everything up but his bladder was a more pressing concern and then sleep, a long sleep… except he couldn’t, because every two hours Lil T kept waking him up.
Kaden slept through the checkout at ten and painfully parted with more money to stay longer because the thought of getting back into the car was too much. He was so tired and Ronan was dead. For a while, even the fear of Ares couldn’t compete with the shock and the accompanying exhaustion.
He was so tired and Ronan was dead.
He was so tired and Ronan was dead and Lil T needed food and a bath and a hug.
When, around sunset, a knock came at the door, Kaden froze. He had just finished feeding the baby and was doing loops of the small room, trying to get the hang of burping him. There was a woman outside his door and for a long moment he thought about ignoring her, even though it was obvious he wasn’t asleep – all the lights were on, and the TV. It was just too lonely without the TV, he needed the voices. But she knocked again, and… her silhouette definitely wasn’t Ares or Apollo and… he was worried it might be more suspicious if he didn’t answer.
Look like you belong he reminded himself, and tried to imagine what he would look like, if he did belong.
“Good evening, honey,” she said, looking him over. “Took it upon myself to check in on you. Not many young men we get traveling with a baby! Look at hiiim,” she leaned in, eyes on Lil T as he spat up an impressive stream down Kaden’s back. “How old is he?”
“She’s twenty four days,” Kaden said, fudging the details in case there was a global manhunt for a missing eighteen day old boy. “This is Tallulah, say hii, Tallulah,” he swung round a little, to show off the baby, because any proud young dad would show off a baby.
She grimaced in embarrassment, trying to quickly cover it up with enthusiasm and Kaden realised he’d accidentally stumbled onto a technique to keep anyone asking questions on the back foot. “Tallulah! A beautiful name. I’m Riley, Riley Jacobsen, me and my partner own this place. Is this your daddy, eh Tallulah? You giving him a hard time?”
“She keeps spitting up half her dinner,” Kaden said. Talking to this woman felt like he was having an out of body experience. He was sure his face still showed the signs he’d been crying more than he’d been sleeping. Was death written all over his face? Was prey?
“Mine were all very burpy babies,” Riley said sympathetically. “Where’s her mom?”
“She’s… she’s sick. Really sick,” he said, falling back on the cover story they’d worked out in the Walmart carpark back in New York. “We’re heading down to stay with my parents in – Knoxville,” he had to grope for a place, somewhere he knew a little about, somewhere he wasn’t actually going.
“Ooho honey, sorry to hear that,” Riley said, sidestepping easily into a story about her own sick mother and the trips she took up to visit her, before remembering why she’d come by. “So – are the pair of you holding up alright? If you want someone else to hold the baby any time, just come round to the office, you hear me?”
“Thanks, thanks, we might, totally,” Kaden nodded, his nerves growing quickly at the thought of anyone else taking Lil T away from him. “I better get to changing her now, though. Thanks for checking in, though.”
“No problem, honey. You let me know. God bless the both of you.”
Kaden would really rather all divinities stayed out of it. “God bless,” he said, hiding behind a smile.
He closed the door behind her, and the growing nerves exploded into panic.
He’d stayed here long enough to be noticed. Too long. Far too long.
Tiredness wasn’t allowed to matter anymore. The gutpunch he felt whenever he thought about Ro wasn’t allowed to matter. They had to pack up, and they had to go.
When the cover of night fell, Kaden packed quietly, waiting for all lights in the office to go out. Creeping quietly out to the car in the dark, he buckled the sleeping baby in, then, whispering “please please please please please” under his breath and, riddled with anxiety, he dashed back to get his bags. Holding his breath, he posted his room key in through the letter slot in the office door.
Put the car in neutral, kept the headlights off, and let it roll down the hill to get moving, only starting the engine when he had to.
He hoped that no one heard him leave. That if anyone came looking for him, asking when he left, they wouldn’t be able to say.
He didn’t know if this would help. If this was necessary. If his actions would change a damned thing.
But it gave the panic monster building in his chest something that wasn’t him to chew on. Next time he called Marcie he could tell her I was sneaky and careful instead of I wasted a whole night and a day crying in a motel after disassociating while driving over the wrong state line.
And he was moving again. That had to count for something. And Neither Ares nor Apollo showed signs of catching him yet.