The Devil Casts a Long Shadow- Chapter Fourteen: Those Who Reign Over Us

The heat that year in Meadows Parting was unbearable. The humidity felt suffocating. Jena often tried to cool off in the evening with a cold shower, but to no avail. Even as fall approached, stepping outside of her well-air-conditioned house was like entering a prison locker room without ventilation. During the summer, her work hours had increased at the daycare because the schools were out. It was a welcome avoidance of any festivities in town for her. The rumors persisted that she had been the cause of Nate and Amber's ill fate. Some of the parents of the children under her care had taken their children out of the daycare altogether due to it. At one point, even Nikola asked when they were cleaning up together at the end of a shift, "Did you see it coming?" Jena, for her part, didn't have the answers to many questions or even the accusations. How could she? Nate and she had been apart for so long, despite living under the same roof, there was nothing to see or know about him for her anymore.

Jena was well aware that her job was putting her out the door, and soon. The owner was interviewing anyone who would come in to replace her. Jena, in the meantime, enjoyed the pocket money she had while she did. She was still getting by from living off the many credit cards she had taken out in Nate's name. At first, she was paying the minimums, but these days, she had stopped paying some altogether, or in a pinch, she used cash returns to spread the money to the other cards to stop the bleed. Turner might be covering the mortgage, but her food, gas, and other necessities were not on his agenda of priorities. It was a regrettable solution to her problem of not being able to move away to find better work; however, until the court allowed her better options, it was her only means of survival.

Jena assumed that Turner had forgotten about the bills of hers, or rather Nate's, that he had taken on. Probably because Yriella had put them on his properties' autopay list. Yriella wasn't a bad secretary, merely she wasn't much of a good one either. This left a lot of room for neglect when it came to the finer details of KT Construction as a business. It was to be expected when turnover was high and the position's highest qualifiers were a solid OnlyFans account and being under the age of twenty-two at the time of application. Nonetheless, things were different now that Turner had a vested interest in Jena's affairs. She could not help but feel vindicated when she was updated on the many ways that Ivy-Mae was getting rolled in court. Not that Jena was allowed to attend the hearings. Roman made sure Jena was neither seen nor heard on such matters. Roman made himself her surrogate regarding all legalities. His word was the truth in court, even when it wasn't.

Jena didn't concern herself with that aspect of things needlessly. She had no power there, or anywhere else for that matter. Instead, she tried to maintain a relationship with her mother. Occasionally, Sue would take Jena's calls when she was away from the gruesome pair that was Beau and Thallea. Each encounter, though, left Jena more worried than relieved. It started with how Sue began to have longer and longer pauses when she was asked a question. Her answers, which were even more troubling, were uncharacteristically flat. Sue had become emotionless, or moreover wholly disinterested in the things she once would chat Jena's ear off about. When Jena would ask why this was happening, Sue would tell her that it was difficult to carry on a conversation when she was running errands. Jena found this to be unlikely because it was Sue who would talk to her incessantly, prattling away on the phone for hours at a time when she was away at college, some years ago. Now the shoe was on the other foot, with Jena being the one struggling to keep the lines of communication open between them.

That particular afternoon, Jena called Sue, whom she knew would be on her way home from visiting her father at the dementia facility where he resided. Initially, her call was sent to voicemail. Jena, though, was determined not to be sidelined because she hadn't spoken to her mother in weeks at that point, rang her again. Sue picked up in a ho-hum manner, not bothering to say anything at first. "Hi, Mom!" Jena said on the line after a pause. Sue very impersonally answered, "Hello, Jena. What do you want? I'm driving." Jena, not one to quit this rare opportunity to speak to her mother, went on, "I don't need anything. I was just checking in to see how you were doing." Sue let the airspace fill the distance, and said nothing for an extended moment before Jena continued, knowing that it was best not to ask anything about what was happening there. She fell back on what was happening in her life, hoping to engage her mother, "Uhh...Nate's still the same....court is still going on with Ivy-Mae. I thought I'd just try, you know... to talk to you." Sue immediately reprimanded Jena for speaking of herself. "So you called me to complain about your problems? That is the most selfish thing I could ever imagine. I can't believe you." Jena had noticed this side of Sue growing over time, since Thallea had moved back in with her. She simply hadn't realized how much her mother had internalized this new attitude toward her.

To try to bridge into any subject that might pacify the now aggravated Sue, Jena told her that she had found an old questionnaire that Sue had sent her. "Mom, remember when you sent this 'what kind of bird are you?' quiz?" Sue, on the other end of the line, mumbled a quick "I think." Jena using all her effort to keep the conversation going. "Well, it says I'm a quail. What were you?" Sue, trying to exit the conversation as quickly as she could, answered, "I don't have time for those silly things." Jena, holding strong, "It's something to do on your way home. I'm sorry I wasn't thinking of you earlier, but I'm trying now. Come on, it's harmless. Here, I'll ask the questions since I have it right in front of me." Sue reluctantly complied as Jena continued, "What did you have last night for dinner?" Sue quickly answered, "Beans on toast." Jena was feeling like Sue was perking up as she went on, "When was the last time you were startled?" As soon as Jena spoke the question, she regretted it. Sue took a deep breath. "Beau startled me. I woke up in the middle of the night when the boys were gone. He had pulled his chair up to my bed and was watching me sleep. In the dark, he looked like your father. Scared me real good."

This response unnerved Jena, who could not fathom a reason for Beau to do something so bizarre. Jena didn't know what to say, but she knew that this would likely be the last time in a while that she'd be able to speak with her newly evasive mother. Jena, wanting to move forward, continued with the grade school questionnaire that Sue used to spam her with. "When did you last laugh?" Sue searched her mind for a reply, "...I don't... don't... know... What's the next question?" Jena wished Sue would talk to her about what was happening in her life, but realized this was the only communication Sue was willing to have with her. "When was the last time you cried?" Sue, without hesitation, answered, "When I saw Beau...he got so drunk, I thought he was going to die." Jena broke, "Mom, that's horrible! When did that happen?" Apparently, Sue hadn't wanted that to be a secret from Jena. She downplayed, "Oh, it was a while ago. Everything is fine now. I went to my doctor and he prescribed me some nice, heavy pills, so you don't have to worry about me letting my emotions get the better of me anymore. You know, Jena, these kinds of things would do you well, too. I'll ask my doctor to reach out to you unless you want his number now." Jena ignored Sue's fishing.

Then it clicked for Jena where Sue's indifference had taken root. Jena wanted to know more, but Sue ended the call with a weak excuse by saying, "Jena, what are you doing? I can hear you moving in the background." Jena was not sure where Sue was going with that answered, "I'm just walking from the living room to close the window." Sue, acting offended, snapped, "Here, I am wasting my time talking to you, and you're not even listening! I raised you better than that! The gall you have, especially when I've got a million things to do! Don't call me again until you get some manners!" Then the line went dead. Sue had hung up on Jena. The rift in her family life had caused a great void in Jena's heart. The person she had known as her mother was erased. This realization made a lump in Jena's throat as if she were choking on her misery. She was beside herself knowing it. There were so many things in her life that she could take and not be affected. This one hurt. This one she was not ready for.

The emotion was like a burning wire pulling her in every direction. Jena was so upset she couldn't sit down any longer. She went into the room Thallea stayed in and began to destroy everything and anything to ease her anguish. She finally lost her cool. She, for the first time in her life, didn't have an underlying sense that somewhere, somehow, she would get through all she was up against. She kicked the walls, pushed over the dresser, pulled down the curtains, and smashed the framed photos to the floor. She hit and screamed until she was hoarse from the activity, then she got up and did it all over again. Ivy-Mae's holdings over the assets be damned for all she cared in that moment. Jena was at her limit; nothing could have stopped her from venting out all of her unhappiness right then. In one final act of rage, Jena threw a marble bookend at the closet door. It knocked the door off its hinges, revealing where Thallea had craved "STFU Bitch" into the closet wall. Jena was so taken aback by this newly unveiled act of stupidity by Thallea that she sat down on the broken glass on the ground and took a deep breath, and came to her senses once more.

She could hear her birds fluttering in the other room. Jena had forgotten about them. She had forgotten about everything for a split second. Upset with herself, she went to her beloved pets and opened their cage, then to the window and opened that too. She wanted them to be free. They were too precious to tuck away from the world. She might never be free again, but at least something she knew and loved could breathe freely elsewhere. They flew off, never looking back. Jena, in a quick rush, felt her head get dizzy, then nothing. Blackness. She woke up on the floor of the room. She had passed out from the strain.

"If only..." Jena thought about her situation, "If only things could be better." She wished, but she did not know how to mend the splintered life she was so entrenched in. She dragged herself to her feet. Still sucking in the air as if to cry but nothing was coming out. She took a broom and began to clean up. She left the window open, though, maybe one day Tiki would come back. Tears running down her hot eyes, she was completely numb as she put everything back as it was, as much as she could. The only things she could not fix on her own with what she had were the closet doors. To replace the broken picture frames, Jena took old pictures of her and Nate from around the house and put the pictures from the guest room over them. The pictures were so bland, Jena thought as she looked at them. Photos Nate had picked of empty beaches they had never been to and fields from stock photos he had downloaded. Jena decided now was as good a time as any to look through their old photo albums to find something more personal to replace those with.

In Nate's office, in the back of his built-in file cabinet, were where he kept their old photos. Jena had calmed down as much as she could, not without her still sniveling, though. Jena leafed through the memories of the days passed of supposedly better times. There were pictures of Nate when he was in his prime, looking strong and happy. Jena looked at the pictures when the house was being built. There were birthday and Christmas photos from the years when they were first starting off to when they were too well off to tolerate each other anymore. Each year, Jena's smile in the pictures was more fake, her eyes elsewhere in thought. An onlooker would see it as an innocent couple's photo, but Jena remembered Nate pushing her shoulder down to keep her from looking taller than him. He hated that they were the same height. After that year, he had her sit in all of the photos while he stood behind her. One year, he made them pose over and over again and again until he was happy, but he never was truly happy with her. In those photos, Nate would personally photoshop them to the images he wanted out of her, never of what was actually between them. Jena had to flip past those photos quickly to avoid becoming upset by the memories she suppressed.

She had almost given up on finding anything without Nate placed front and center in it when she stumbled across an old picture of Misty, Tawny, and Beau at a New Year's party from when the boys were still babies. Misty was Tawny's mother. She was a warm and honest woman who would see the boiling confrontation between Nate and Jena and would politely act as a social buffer. She had a high standing in Jena's mind as a decent person. Jena had forgotten about her when Tawny had fallen off the deep end into addiction and lost custody of her sons. Jena wondered what had happened to her, going so far as to put aside her task of redecorating the guest room to look her up on Facebook.

Unfortunately, judging by the time stamp on Misty's years-old last update, Jena could tell the account was all but abandoned. Jena, now comfortably in her bed, having recovered from her panic attack, clicked around to see what clues she could put together. It was a grim fall from grace that Jena found. Tawny started so happily, then she took up with Beau. The pictures reminded her of her relationship. The smiles that hollowed over time, echoed eerily similar to what Jena had just taken note of. For Tawny, her health, too, started to fade. Poor Misty watched in real time her daughter's fall from a functioning member of society to cheap parties and vile men, to nothing at all. From the looks of things, Beau was the worst thing to happen to Tawny. Wanting to know what had become of Misty or what Tawny's state of mind was these days, Jena messaged a mutual friend of Tawny's and Nate's, Gretchen.

The exchange began innocently enough with Jena messaging a simple greeting when she noticed that Gretchen was already online. Gretchen, however, left the message on "read" for a few days. Jena, ever persistent, messaged her once more, assuming at worst that she would be blocked. She asked, "Do you know what's going on with Tawny?" Again, she was met with no response. Jena, while she waited in the days in between, took note of Gretchen's friends. One of whom was a friend of a friend of Amber Coates. Gretchen had no bad blood with her that she was aware of, yet this once-acquaintance was dodging her for reasons she did not understand. Gretchen never did message her back, she didn't need to. Jena found all she wanted to know from the years of long-spanning message boards through the cliques that intersected. Even the private accounts had profile pictures that spoke volumes and connected the dots.

Jena was shocked to see that it was Beau who had enabled Tawny when she needed help the most. He had been the one to introduce her to that lifestyle. Jena scrolled through the posted photos showing Tawny's decline. Worst were the images of Beau picking up with Thallea when Tawny was in a downward spiral. The nail in the coffin was the vacation photos of Beau and Thallea when Tawny was missing on her first bender. It was at a time when they were still supposed to be a couple. Jena saw the images of Thallea posting her expensive gifts from Beau, when Tawny was without, unable to care for her boys, leaving her to have to run back to men who exploited her for a place to stay and extra cash. What Gretchen's account revealed about Beau tore down every story Jena considered to be the truth about her brother. She was ashamed for not realizing the truth sooner. Jena wondered if Tawny was living on the streets. She had no way of knowing. What she did know was that this would not go without being acknowledged. This was not going to be swept under the rug. Jena was on a mission to set this all right. No matter the means.