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Author's Note: Picture used with permission from *lavonia on deviantart.

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Chapter 104
 

Jem…Chapter 104

Chapter 104

*** Remy Powers…

I knew something was up when Angel was making a point of hanging with this girl and her friends and there was this thing between them…like distance. It was definitely a social thing…Jase might have known her before or something from just the way that they talked together.

They had these clothes, this way of dressing that had that money thing to it all.

But Angel was still talking to them, to that girl.

And then there was the fact that they seemed to have a moment…Angel with that concerned look, the other girl with that controlled pain look.

That’s something that you get used to seeing in your own face when life keeps kicking you.

It’s something that I used to see on Jason’s face.

Angel’s face not so much.

And as a parent seeing that there for so long and not being able to do something about it, get a handle on it. Having your child be happy, and living.

Parts of us died when Angel’s mother died.

I watch my girl do her thing and I enjoy the show. She’s really talented and she’s so into it. And from seeing Jason who sort of just shut life out as much as he could and still function to Angel as she is now is actually like seeing a miracle.

For some of you parents out there that have trans-children don’t hold back because of your own fears.

I guess that should go for everyone that has someone they love that is going through transition. That grey there, that troubledness that you see in them…it goes away…or it has with Angel. It has with some of the kids that the other parents in my online support group.

Johnny’s Jenna is just an amazing girl…young woman.

And Angel showing this girl that has stuff definitely going on some friendship, understanding. I’m so proud of my little girl.

I look at the others up there with her.

I can’t help but to smile because they’re my girls too…

Being a parent sometimes doesn’t stop with your own kid.

And with that I finish my Coke and I head over now that the girl has had a chance of some space after talking to Angel.

“Hey.”

She gives me this really skeptical look and then she sees my shirt with the band logo and security on it.

“Oh…uhm hey you’re with the band right?”

“Sort of I’m a volunteer and chaperone.”

She looks me over. “Wait…you’re…”

“Angel’s uncle, Jason’s dad.”

“Oh…I mean…uhm…shit…” She seems to sort of deflate a little.

“I take it you know my son?”

She is looking down. “No…actually not really.” Then she looks up at me. “I was one of the people that had a laugh while others did stuff to him though.”

You know it’s not honesty that has her telling me.

I’m looking her in the eyes and she’s sort of got that look. That I need to hurt look. Jase used to have that look sometimes, me a lot from my own teenaged years. I wasn’t one of those Emo cutter kids but I was the fifteen year old with a pint of Rotten & Raunchy a semi-permanent mad-on and a tendency to punch things.

I grew out of it after a while and meeting the right girl; woman.

I look at her and I nod. “High school sucks it’s hard to get your footing.”

“Not just high school.” She says.

“No not just.” I nod and then I smile a little. “Look you’re here and from what I can tell whatever was there about what happened with you and with Jason you’re sorry about it.”

She blushes and shrugs. “Kinda…Mister…”

“Well whatever you’ve been doing you seem to be doing alright by Angel.”

“I…I don’t know, kinda just trying to be less of a bitch…”

“I not sure if you’re really that much of a bitch.”

She smiles this kind of rueful smile at me. “Oh well trust me, I’m a bitch.”

“Well bitches aren’t all bad y’know.”

She smiles and this time it’s a little genuine. “Oh really?”

“Yes, really Bitches keep assholes in their place.”

She gets sort of frowny looking…mad thing and she sort of works her jaw.

Uh-huh…I smell Marshal with that.

“C’mon let’s dance, this is that kind of a show y’know.” I offer her my hand.

She looks at me. “I don’t know…”

“Then I can show you that’s the advantage on being old.”

She sort of smiles and she takes my hand. “I was saying I don’t know if I’m fit company to dance with Mister Powers.”

“Jeremy.”

“You’re too old for me to just call you that.”

I smile and nod. “As long as it’s not sir then we’re fine.”

“Okay…fine, I’m Carmen.”

“San Diego?”

She gives me this look and I groan. “You have no idea…gah I’m so old.”

Okay that gets her to smile just enough.

I pull her out and we get moving and I am showing her how since a lot of what the girls are playing her is sort of the stuff that I grew up on. It’s bad that stuff from my pre-teens in over thirty years old.

It’s actually pretty fun showing her this stuff I don’t get the kind of tremors the kinds call dancing and some of the other stuff. I mean there are times at the shows the girls put on for Wednesday nights I get so reminded of the scene where Patrick Dempsey is learning how to dance in *Can’t by Me Love.* and he’s learning from some show on African tribes instead of american bandstand.

There’s a couple of times that she’s smiling and that makes me smile too.

I don’t know what’s going on but there’s no reason someone so young should look so sad.

So old in the eyes.

We hit that part when Angel and the girls hit the slow dance stuff and she stops. There’s this look of uncertainness in her eyes.

“Carmen…look at me.”

She looks at me and she’s kind of scared.

“It’s okay, it’s okay to just let it go and to be yourself…without the bullshit.”

Her lip does the lower lip tremble. “No…no it’s not…”

I look at her. “Yeah, yeah it is kiddo. It might not feel like it, it might just feel like every time you open up you get hurt but it’s not always like that.”

“Yeah, yeah it is…you have no idea…”

I take both her hands gently. “My son’s MIA out there because of the same thing…” I wait just long enough for her to say it’s something different but she doesn’t. “Angel knows the score, I know the score and I’m telling you it’s not always going to be like that.”

“Yeah well I’m not in that lucky category y’know…some of us don’t have the option of fighting back.”

“Yeah you do.”

“No we don’t.”

“And you’re not here because of a giant fuck you to him?”

“Him?”

“Adam.”

She looks at me and she then looks down. “Maybe…even if it’s just a little kind of one maybe…”

“Then it’s not going to be like that, because you say it a little and the next person says it a little and it will get bigger, it will get louder.”

“And then what? He’ll wreck my life, he’ll wreck the lives of my friends and my family and there won’t be a damned thing I…we can do about it.”

She’s tearing up and she’s crying now and I pull her into the slow dance and I look down at her. “You can do what you need to do Carmen…you’re strong enough to do that.”

“Am I? I don’t think so….”

“You’re here right?”

“So…?”

“So inside I think that you know that in the end if you don’t do something yourself it’ll never end…or if it does it’ll end on his terms.”

“See…It’s too much…I can’t take something like him on.”

I go from that holding her in the dance style to just holding her. “Who said that you’d have to do it alone?”

(Sniffle.) “What?”

“You don’t have to do this alone.”

“But…my family?”

“He won’t let his hold over then go unless he’s made to.”

(Sniffle.) “Him or me huh?”

“No…him versus us.”

“Us?”

I smile down at her. “Yeah…us…” I offer her my hand and my pinky.

She looks at it like she’s never seen anything like that before.

“………………….” (Sniffle.)

I keep dancing with her and Carmen leans her head on my shoulder. (Sniffle.) “My…my dad would never do something like that…”

“Yeah well some people really don’t know what they have…I lost enough to know different.”

She looks up at me. (Sniffle.) “Yeah…that’s right you’re a widower right?”

I nod and swallow my own lump. “Yeah…”

“And Jason’s….”

“Yeah…”

We dance for a while longer into two other songs and she takes my finger and she hooks her pinky into hers.

(Sniffle.) “I want out Jeremy…I want out please…”

I hug her tight. “Done, I promise.” And I tighten my finger in with hers.

It’s going to be a long night…maybe more but I won’t let him hurt her anymore and I won’t let him hurt my girls anymore.

And that’s a promise.