Free Burn Down the Night by M. O'Keefe

right away. Something I could hold in disdain and refuse. Something I could insist I didn’t need.
    It had been the end of us and we hadn’t even gotten a chance to start.
    “But you were hungry,” she said. “You both were. Jennifer almost argued with you, but she followed your lead—she always followed your lead. And instead of feeding you I showed you to the second bedroom. And you shut the door in my face.”
    “I didn’t know what to do, either,” I said. “I was just a kid.”
    “I know. And I think about how your father died. And the time you spent alone out there. You must have been so scared—”
    I didn’t want to talk about that fear and the months I’d lived with it.
    “He loved you, you know.” I was twisting the knife, because that was the kind of thing I did with her. She was hurting me, so I had to hurt her back. “He talked about you all the time. His heroic older sister who went off to the army. Jennifer and I thought he’d made you up. You never wrote. Never visited. Never called. He had one picture. One picture of his first day of kindergarten. He was standing there all proud with his lunch box and his big sister. Jennifer and I used to joke that you were just some kid he pretended was his sister.”
    “I know,” she whispered. “I know. When I left, I left for good and I didn’t look back because there was nothing for me in that place. Nothing that I knew about anyway. And I’m sorry for that.”
    Fern was older than my father. I didn’t know by how much or how old she was now, but at this moment, she looked as if every second she’d lived had been a hard one.
    “And maybe if I had known about you, maybe things would have been different. Or maybe if you’d sat down at that table and ate the food I made—maybe things would have been different. But those things didn’t happen and so here we are. You owe me nothing, Joan.”
    “That’s…that’s not true,” I felt compelled to say. “Me and Jennifer would have been split up. And you prevented that from happening so for that I will always be grateful. And I’m sorry I was a such an ass to you.”
    “Take the money,” she said, cutting off my apology like she didn’t want it. Like it meant nothing to her. “I’ve told the Genslers that the condo was rented by a couple on their honeymoon. They’re fine with that. I’ve covered the rental fee. And I got your car detailed. So that’s taken care of. I’ve told the rest of the tenants that you two are on your honeymoon and don’t want to be bothered. So, no one is going to stop by with a cheese ball and a bottle of champagne.”
    “That happens?” I said like I wasn’t dying inside.
    “It’s Florida, honey, all kinds of stuff happens.” She tugged on the tennis skirt she was wearing. Fern still had killer legs. Killer. It was funny when Jennifer and I moved in here, I took one look at her and I’d known she was family. I looked just like her. That seemed ironic now. Painfully ironic.
    “All of that to say, you’ve got a week, Joan. Seven days. Winn-Dixie is just down the street. You keep your face down and try to go at night.” She nodded her head to the money in my hand. “That’s five hundred bucks there. That should last awhile if you’re careful.”
    “I’ll repay you.” How or when I had no idea.
    “I don’t want you to,” she said. “You have the money and the condo. Try to not cause a scene.”
    “That’s it?” I said, stunned and weirdly angry and adrift.
    “I…I would ask about Jennifer.”
    “She’s fine,” I lied and fast. And Fern knew it. She nodded like she didn’t expect anything less.
    “Then yes,” she said, “that’s it. There’s nothing else.” I had walked away from this woman seven years ago like she wasn’t family. Like I owed her nothing.
    She was doing the same thing to me right now.
    “Nothing,” I whispered.
    Fern took a deep breath. “I’ll come and check on him once a day. And I’m in the unit right