FIVE YEARS LATER
Five years had passed since Levi made his first deal in the shadows of London—and seven years since he had turned his back on the town that broke him.
It was early summer in the Pacific Northwest, a time when Portland and its surrounding suburbs usually felt like a paradise.
The air was thick with the scent of blooming jasmine and freshly mown lawns.
The sun hung low and golden in the sky, casting long, honey-colored shadows over the streets of Northwood Crest.
It was the kind of weather that promised new beginnings, yet for Northwood, it was just another season of the same boring cycle.
The neighborhood was a museum of stagnation.
The same cracked sidewalks, the same faces at the local grocery store, the same delivery drivers on their familiar routes.
Nothing had changed—except for the people who had once thought they were destined for greatness…..
Nothing… except Tommy and Clarie.
Seven years had passed since Levi left Northwood Crest, vanished without explanation.
People had grown older, moved on, found new routines.
But some things refused to evolve.
Tommy and Clarie were one of them.
Their relationship—if it could still be called that—was a constant cycle of breakups and reconciliations, stitched together by desperation and resentment.
Toxic didn’t even begin to describe it.
Tommy’s parents were divorced now.
His father had left for the city years ago and never really looked back.
Tommy stayed behind with his mother, surviving off her exhausting night shifts.
____
Tommy was no longer the golden boy of the high school football field.
Seven years had stripped the shine from him.
His once-celebrated blonde hair was gone, replaced by an unkempt, buzzed cut and a patchy, ragged beard that hid a jawline softened by stress and cheap beer.
His parents had divorced years ago; his father had fled to the city to escape the debt, leaving Tommy to live off his mother’s meager earnings from her double shifts.
Across from him stood Clarie, a ghost of her former self trying desperately to haunt the present.
Her family had lost their home on the prestigious Suncrest Avenue years ago, forced into the drab reality of Bluewater Hills.
She remained jobless, clinging to a “high-class” persona that no longer fit her surroundings.
She wore flashy, cheap jewelry, bright red acrylic nails that were overdue for a fill, and clothes that were far too tight and trendy for a twenty-eight-year-old with nowhere to go.
In a cramped house in the lower-class district of Bluewater Hills, the morning peace was shattered by a familiar sound: the shrill, toxic cadence of an argument.
Their shouting matches echoed down the street, seeping into neighbors’ homes through cracked windows.
Some days it was Tommy and Clarie.
Other days it was Clarie and Tommy’s mother.
Either way, the house was never quiet.
And today was no different.
“I spoke to Ms.
Jane at the Maple Lane Diner,” Tommy said, trying—once again—to sound reasonable.
Clarie adjusted her short, wavy hair, her tone dripping with venom.
“A waitress?
You got me a job as a waitress?
Did I ever say I wanted to work?”
“We can’t keep supporting you!” Tommy’s voice rose, a desperate edge to it.
“My mom is working herself into the grave!”
“Supporting me?” Clarie laughed, a harsh, mocking sound.
“Didn’t you promise you’d take care of me?
Every time you begged me to take you back, wasn’t that the line?
‘You won’t have to work a day in your life, Clarie.
You’re too beautiful for stress.'”
“Clarie, times are hard—”
“Times aren’t hard,” she cut in.
“You’re just lazy.”
Something in him cracked.
“What is wrong with you?” Tommy yelled, slamming his hand on the kitchen table.
“You expect us to cater to your sorry ass while we’re drowning?”
“My ‘sorry ass’?
You begged me to date you for the fifth time last month!”
“I begged you?
What about when you begged—”
“Enough!”
Tommy’s mother stormed in, exhaustion written all over her face.
She clutched her head like it might split open.
“I just came back from a night shift,” she said hoarsely.
“Can I sleep in peace in my own home?”
“Morning, Mom,” Tommy muttered.
Clarie turned her face away, her lip curled in a sneer.
“What is it this time?” his mother asked, cutting straight through the tension.
Silence.
“Speak!” she barked.
“I got Clarie a job at Maple Lane Diner,” Tommy said.
“She doesn’t want it.”
She turned to Clarie.
“Why?”
“Because I DON’T WANT TO!” Clarie shrieked.
Well, I hate to burst your bubble, Clarie,” Tommy’s mother said, stepping forward until she was inches from the younger woman’s face.
You live here.
And to live here means you are broke, struggling, and low-class.
You are twenty-eight years old.
Where do you think the money for those nails comes from?”
“I wasn’t made for manual labor,” Clarie sniffed.
“Do you even know how hard it was to get you that offer?” Tommy added, his voice dropping to a whisper of disgust.
“You have nothing to your name.
No work experience.
No degree.
Nothing.”
Clarie’s eyes welled with fake tears—her oldest and most effective weapon.
She grabbed her purse from the counter, her movements dramatic and sharp.
“I know what you’re doing,” she sobbed, backing toward the door.
“You’re ganging up on me.
You want to kick me out.
Well, news flash!
I’m not doing anything, and your son will provide for me as he promised, or Or all hell breaks loose.”
She reached for the doorknob, but paused, her eyes flashing with a sudden, cruel inspiration.
She looked Tommy dead in the eye, her voice dropping to a whisper that cut deeper than any shout.
“You know what, Tommy?
Right now…
I’d choose Levi over you.”
The door slammed shut behind her, leaving a ringing silence in the kitchen.
The name hit Tommy like a physical blow.
Levi.
A name that hadn’t been spoken in years.
It was a name that carried the weight of a betrayal no one talked about.
Tommy stood frozen.
Seven years ago, Levi had simply vanished.
No note, no goodbye, no trace.
Tommy had spent months asking around, trying to find his “brother,” never realizing that Levi had left because he had seen the ultimate betrayal—his best friend and his girlfriend in each other’s arms.
Tommy still believed he had kept that secret.
He still believed Levi was out there somewhere, probably struggling even worse than they were.
But hearing the name now made his stomach turn with a toxic mixture of guilt and sudden, irrational anger.
Outside, Clarie walked down the sun-drenched street, her heels clicking on the pavement.
Mentioning Levi had been an impulse, a way to hurt Tommy where it hurt most.
But as she walked, the memory of the quiet, hardworking boy she had discarded began to haunt her.
In the golden light of the Oregon summer, the ghost of Levi Hale had finally returned to Northwood Crest—not in person, but as a reminder of everything they had lost while they were busy being petty.