A bang on the door woke Maddie up from a deep sleep. She hadn't fallen asleep until the sun was already coming up. Before that, it was tears, snot, and her mother holding her while Maddie asked her all the questions she didn't have the answers to.
"I know you're in there, you son of a bitch! Answer your fucking door, or I'm breaking it down!"
She knew that voice. Elijah always told her when she heard it coming from outside, rather than inside his own house, to stay in her bedroom. Only Elijah wasn't here to tell her that this. He said he'd always know how to find her, but that didn't mean he would ever try. Yesterday was a goodbye, with no hope at the end.
Her dad's footsteps were heavy against the wood floor of the hallway as he stalked past her open bedroom door, then down the steps. Thirty seconds later, her mother.
While Maddie felt like she could sleep the whole day away, even though her mind likely wouldn't let her, she rolled out of her small bed and followed her parents with lazy footsteps, stopping to sit down at the halfway point of the steps.
"Where the hell is my son?"
"Not here," her dad told him, his voice much calmer than that of their neighbor.
"Bullshit! His fucking car's still here, and all his shit's gone. This is child abduction, you piece of shit."
Next came her mother's voice. Less calm than her father, with more of a bite, but not as angry as Elijah's dad, Harrison. "You know your son is a legal adult as of this morning, right? I have a fucking cake on my counter as proof. Of course, you have no idea how old your son is. You barely know what side of the road to drive on."
There was a sound of a struggle, and Maddie went down a few more steps to see Elijah's dad trying to push his way through. Then, her dad loosened the door, only to slam it against the man's head.
"That's assault, you prick. I'm going to sue you for all your worth!"
Maddie knew the man had little money. Elijah said he drank away every paycheck, and Elijah usually ate dinner at their house because there was barely any food next door. When he needed new school clothes, or money for something else, he came to her parents.
"If you want to talk about assault, Let's talk about your son. Cause I've got a shit ton of photographs from every time he's ever walked into my house with a bruise. Try me, fucker, I dare you." Her dad was no longer calm. Now his voice was scarier than Harrison's.
"Give. Me. My. God. Damn. Son. Back."
"He's. Not. Here," her dad said, matching the neighbor. "I gave him my car, because I knew his wouldn't get him far enough away from you. You will never see your son again. Let me rephrase that, you will never see Elijah again, because you are the sorriest excuse for a father I've ever laid eyes on. I'm the one who fed him, I'm the one that put clothes on his back, and I'm the one who worried about him every single minute of every single day he had the misfortune of living under your roof.
"But those days are over, you pathetic piece of shit. Even if I have to lose him forever, I'm proud as hell to say the same to you. You will never lay your hand on my boy for as long as you live. Now get the fuck off my property, and stay the hell away from my family, or I can and will make sure you regret the day your mother gave birth to trash like you."
Her dad slammed the door in his face again, only she didn't know if he hit him this time. When he turned around and saw her watching, the red in his face seemed to disappear. "Maddie, honey, how much of that did you hear?"
"All of it," she answered honestly. "Is it true?"
"Is what true honey?" Her mom asked.
"If dad lost Elijah forever, does that mean I lost him forever too?"
"If," her dad corrected. "I said 'even if I have to lose him forever'. Trust me, Maddie, that man over there is going to drink himself into an early grave. Do you know what that means?"
Maddie nodded. She had an older cousin who died from alcohol poisoning right after college, and she remembered her mom saying something like that to her dad. Except Harrison Fox had been drinking for years. If he made okay money at his job, and still didn't have enough left over after buying alcohol to afford food for the house, then he should have died by now, too. "Is it mean to hope for someone to die?"
Her parents looked at each other for several seconds before her mom took over. "Normally, yes, but a man who would treat his son like less than nothing his whole life isn't a man at all. You know Elijah better than anyone, honey. You know he has such a big heart, and so much love to give. That thing that lives next door, he has no heart, and he has no love. He was incapable of loving his son, and Elijah deserved better than that. That's why he had to leave."
Maddie scrunched her body, holding her own hands in front of her knees. "Elijah told me I have a big heart, and I love him more than anyone in the universe. That means he could have stayed with us."
Her dad rubbed the back of his neck, looking as if his heart broke almost as much as her own. "Honey, do you remember last night when Elijah told you that the only person who could convince him to stay? He told you that because he loves you more than anyone in the world, too. But that man next door, he was killing Elijah. Maybe not his body, not yet, anyway, but his mind. If Elijah stayed, he'd be broken, inside and out.
"We all have to love Elijah as much as we can. He'll feel that love, no matter how far away he goes, and no matter how much time passes. I know you love him, Maddie. I know he's your best friend, and you'd do anything, even at your age. That's how big your heart is. But what Elijah needed was for us to let him go."