Before There Was You, There Was You

Chapter 2

Brian's POV


Breathe. Just Breathe. You know how to do this, Kinney. You taught Justin how to do it all those nights he was curled up in the corner of our … um, my bedroom suffering from panic attacks. “In, then out. That’s it, Sunshine, slow deep breaths, it will pass.” Justin … I quickly looked around the diner while holding my breath. He’s not here, good, I can breathe again.

Fuck! Fuck! When will it ever fucking end!? I knew this would happen one day, but did it have to be now? I tore my eyes from the letter in Michael's hands and looked into his face. Great. I know he’s afraid of what this means. He’s afraid I’ll go off on a bender again. So much time had passed; so many memories had been put to rest, only to be awakened again. And Michael only knew half of it.

Pull yourself together, Kinney. So she wants to see me. How does that make me feel? Fuck if I know. Angry, thrilled, excited, scared … probably all of that. One thing is for sure: there are so many unanswered questions that I will fucking wring her neck if I have to! And why is she writing to Michael? Why not contact me after all this time? There were so many thoughts running through my head at that moment, but underneath it all there was … joy. My sister, my “real” sister—not my biological sister spawn from that heartless bitch who gave birth to me—was coming home to me.

Good old Joanie had been more than happy to let our neighbor take me in. I was barely out of diapers when Rena’s mother took me. How convenient for Joanie. Living at Rena’s place gave Joanie freedom from having to be a mother to me without giving up appearances. We lived right next door, and for all the major events in my life like soccer games or school awards Joanie would show up like the good Catholic mother she wanted everyone to think she was. But the Cardie’s were my “true” family, the only real family I’d ever had, ‘til I was fourteen.

Maria Cardie, my surrogate mother and Rena's biological mother, died when I was ten, Rena was nine and her brother, Andy, was thirteen. Emilian, Rena’s father, was left alone to care for his children. His idea of caring killed his only son. I could only hope he was good and dead by now and by the most vile means possible if there was any justice in this fucked up world. Bile rose up in my throat at the thought of that animal. Over the years I'd become very good at burying that memory deep down inside, far away from where it could eat at my soul. It had already cost me part of my soul. But always, always with thoughts of Emilian there were memories of Andy … Ok, time to breathe again, Kinney.

I forced a smile to my lips for Michael's benefit and reached out and grabbed the letter from his hands, dropped it on the table and took my coat off before sliding into the booth opposite him.

“Are you going to read it?” Michael asked.

I sigh. "I’m sure you’ll tell me what she has to say.”

I lean back against the booth and look behind me for Debbie.

“Hey, Deb, can I get a cup of coffee here?” I snap.

Debbie shot me that “what the fuck have you done now, Kinney” look and muttered some response I couldn't make out.

I turned back to Mikey. “Well? I really do have to get back to the office.” I let my agitation show.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Brian! Don’t fucking act like this! Read the fucking letter!” Little Mikey was clearly pissed. Good. Let him feel a bit of what I was feeling.

“Why the fuck should I? She wrote it to you. I assume it was delivered in the usual manner?”

My curiosity was getting the best of me. Truth be told, I was dying to know every detail of what was in that fucking letter and all the circumstances surrounding it.

“Yeah, he showed up at my door at six this morning.”

“And you’re just NOW telling me about it?”

I stopped myself from saying more. I let that slip. Fuck. I didn't want Michael to know how this latest bit of news was affecting me. I never let little Mikey know just how deeply Rena affected me. He would never understand the pain we went through, watching Andy die. He had enough shit to deal with. Just being my friend for the past seventeen years was trial enough for him. He got pulled into my family drama the first week I moved to the Pitts. Truth is, Rena and I could never have made it through that first year after we moved to the Pitts without him. Well, the year I moved to the Pitts. Rena ran away with me; I couldn’t leave her in New York after Andy died. I only wished I could have saved Andy too. Not that I saved Rena. No. Fuck, I couldn’t save any of us, including myself.

Michael had helped me keep Rena safe until her aunt came to get her, all the while keeping the situation a secret from everyone. Then when Rena left and was finally safe, well, then life changed, at first, for the worse, then eventually for the better. Hell, anything was better than that hell we had lived with, wasn’t it? The beatings my father gave me were nothing compared to what had happened to Rena and Andy.

I could give a shit about what happened to me. Fuck, pain never bothered me. In fact, I’d become quite accustomed to it. It was never an issue for me. It was always more painful for me to watch those I loved in pain than to deal with pain myself. Shouldn’t that be enough? Why did everyone I ever loved get hurt, or worse? Who the fuck cursed me? Well, knowing me, I probably fucked the wrong person in a past life and they were getting a bit of revenge in this life. I should talk to Zen Ben about karma, 'cause I got some pretty bad karma I’d like to shake.

“Here’s your coffee, Your Majesty,” Debbie announced, breaking into my thoughts as she placed the steaming cup in front of me. I noticed it was in a to-go cup. I smiled. Debbie was always eager to get me away from her little boy. She’s a smart woman—always has been. Trouble is, she was fighting a losing battle. There were events in our lives that forever bound Mikey and me together, but Debbie had no clue about them. Hell, she didn’t even know "Rena" ever existed. If Rena came here, holy fuck, all hell would break lose!

“Thanks, Deb.” I looked up at her and put my tongue in my cheek, waiting for some smart ass reply from her. None came. Good. She stalked off.

“So,” I looked back at Michael. “How does old Tom look these days? I can’t believe that prick is still alive. Shit he must have been eighty when he delivered that last letter.” In truth, he was probably no more than sixty.

“Tom? You never told me his name,” Michael said, looking hurt.

“Yeah, well, it wasn’t important.” My eyes moved away from his as the memory of the last time I saw Tom washed over me.

There were so many things I had never told Michael. Things I had never told Justin. Justin, FUCK! I had to prepare him. He wouldn't understand the truth. Oh, and the truth would come out once Rena came home.

Stupid twat, running off with that fiddler. What the fuck was he thinking? Face it, Kinney, you all but threw him into that fiddler's arms. What the fuck was I thinking! I wasn’t thinking; I was reacting, pushing him away for his own good. I’d known for some time that I’d have to let him go, no matter how painful it would be for me. I refused to let him settle for less, to settle for me. But now, I couldn't be there for him to properly answer the thousands of questions he’d have when Rena showed up—questions he was entitled to ask but probably wouldn't because he thought it wasn't his place anymore. As if there would ever be a time when there wouldn’t be a place for him in my life. And once Rena saw him he would be connected to her in ways he wouldn't understand.

“Brian,” Michael put aside his disappointment and got back to the letter at hand. His voice was soft, soothing. “She says she's writing me because she promised her aunt she wouldn’t contact you. She says she wants to come home and she’s begging me,” he paused, picking up the letter and opening it to show me what she wrote.

I looked at the all-too-familiar handwriting and my heart skipped a beat. I stared at it; I couldn't look away. Rena was on those pages, the only memory, the only connection to Andy I’d ever have. The words were all blurry, and I realized tears were forming in my eyes. Michael was pointing to the page in front of me and talking.

“Right here she says that she agreed at first because she didn’t want to hurt you anymore but”—

“What the fuck!”

I interrupted him and grabbed the letter from his hands, and started reading it. What was she talking about? Didn't want to hurt me anymore? Where the fuck did she get the idea that she could EVER hurt me? I started reading the letter, careless to how pathetic I looked to Michael at that moment.

My Dear Michael,

Please forgive me for my long absence. Believe me when I tell you that if it were in my power I would have written you sooner. But because of my love for my brother, and my duty to protect him, I had to stay away.

Though I’ve not written, I have kept up with your life, and of course Bean's. I may have promised that I wouldn’t write anymore, but I did not promise that I would abandon you completely. I hope Bean knows that I would never truly abandon him. You should know that Tom has never stopped his semiannual visits to the Pitts. He goes there and comes back and tells me how Bean and you are doing.

Congratulations on the comic book store! I still have the Captain Astro you gave me as a parting gift when Aunty Viv came to get me. It fills my heart to know you are living your dream. Oh, and Tom says he’s seen you on a few occasion with a very handsome man! I’m so very happy for you! If all goes as I plan, I will be meeting your new beau soon …

If you can forgive me, Michael, for not staying in touch, and I hope with all my heart that you can, I need you to do something for me. Michael, you need to get Bean to contact me. Please, whatever it takes, I’m begging you, get him to contact me.

He knows I can’t break my promise. It’s the one thing we both swore never to do, break a promise. Not unless someone’s life was at stake. The only reason I made that promise to Aunt Viv was because Tom and she told me that Brian was holding onto our past. She told me that the letters I was sending him were keeping him rooted in the hell we lived as children and stopping him from moving past it and getting on with his life. At first I didn’t believe her. I mean, his letters were always so upbeat, and full of his plans for his future. His life at college, meeting Lindsay, getting his degree, working at the agency. But then, six years ago Aunt Viv and Tom showed me documents stating that Bean was in a rehab center a year after I left! He never told me that. She told me he ran away back to New York after I left, and that his father was forced to sign him out and take him home. I know that had to be hard on him.

Aunt Viv said that things didn’t get much better from that point on, and that his letters were filled with lies to protect me. I felt so guilty. I didn’t know what to do. But if letting go of Bean meant giving him a chance at making a life for himself without the ghosts of our past hanging over him, then I had to let him go.

Tom held back the truth from me for so long. That first year, when I started writing my letters to you and Bean, Tom told me Bean was in rehab. That he had visited him there in New York to give him my letter and he waited for Bean to write one back to me. Bean never mentioned in that first letter where he was. I was so angry at Tom and Aunt Viv for not telling me, but the truth is, they both knew that if I knew, I would have run away, back to New York to find and help Bean. I believe Bean knew that as well. That’s why he didn’t mention it in his letter. I can understand that they were protecting me, but I am his sister. I had a right to know!

Tom agreed to continue his visits to Pittsburgh to check on you and Bean. And for the past several years it seems that Bean has been doing well. He made partner at the agency he was working for, and recently left to start his own agency, Kinnetik. I know about the many Clio awards he's won. I’m so proud of him.

Tom also told me that about two years ago Bean had a son with Lindsay and had also started seeing a young man. He said he seemed so happy, so I kept my promise. God, you can't know how it fills my heart to know he has finally found happiness! And at the same time, it hurts me to be separated from my brother and not be able to see my nephew. I have so little family as it is.

I feel it’s time for me to come home. That is, if Bean wants me to. Michael, I’m asking you to explain to Bean why I stopped writing him. I know he is very angry with me. Six years is a long time, he must think I’ve abandoned him, and after Andy… Well, I don’t think he can handle that.

Please let him know I love him and I want to come home to my family. I’m living at the Hilton in New York City right now. You can reach me on my assistant's phone, 212-555-5555. I don’t own a cell phone and don’t use phones in general if I don’t have to. Long story. Shane, my assistant will give me the call.

I shall never forget what you did for me seventeen years ago, Michael. It seems you are destined to always be there when I need your help. I hope that one day I can repay the favor.

With all my love,
Rena Cardie-Kinney

Rena Cardie-Kinney? Not Rena Cardie. Rena wouldn't have signed her name that way if she hadn't legally changed it to Cardie-Kinney. Funny that that’s the first thought that popped into my mind after reading her letter.

I pulled out my Razor and dialed the number written at the bottom of the letter. I suddenly remembered Michael was still sitting across the table from me. I looked up at him, phone to my ear, and watched the myriad of emotions play across his face. As the phone rang the first time, I said to him, “Rena’s coming home”. After the second ring, I heard a woman’s voice, low with a husky quality to it.

“This is Bean Kinney," I informed the smoky voiced woman on the other end of the call. "I want to talk to my sister.”

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