Relapse

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Emmet lays with me for hours, just listening, and it helps more than I expect. He only leaves to call Chase to make arrangements for him to pick Lilly up and I call the daycare to get him authorized to pick her up.

“I need to talk to Tanner,” I say finally, my fingers still fidgeting from craving nicotine to ease my nerves.

“Are you sure you’re ready to? If you need a little more time to just… get straight, it’s no problem. Nathan should be getting off soon and he can take care of him for a couple of hours if need be.” Emmet reassures me and I can’t help but to note this serious side of him. Gone is the typical laid back demeanor and as he looks down at me, his long hair pulled back into a bun and those topaz eyes full of concern, my heart feels like it’s going to burst out of my chest.

I shake my head, breaking his gaze. “No, I need to handle this, I’ve already let it go on for far too long,” I say lowly.

He nods, “Okay, well I’ll be here if you need me, unless you want me to leave?” The question hangs in the air between us.

Even though I need to handle this alone, I don’t want him to go yet. “No, stay.”

I stand and head into my bathroom to clean my face up and adjust my hair. I need to look all business when I go speak to Tanner, I can’t let him see how much his words hurt me.

I walk out of the room and Emmet’s gaze follows my movements. I shake my head. “I don’t even know what to say. I realize that I need to put my foot down, that maybe I’ve been too lax with him, but this behavior…” I never expected it from him and I won’t let it continue to go on.

Emmet nods in understanding and slides off the bed, walking over to me and placing two big hands on my shoulders. “You go in there and you be firm.” He clears his throat. “My mother used to come into my room and she wouldn’t yell, she’d speak real low and calm and I swear that scared me more than any yelling could have.”

I nod, not imagining myself being able to yell at Tanner anyway. It’s crazy considering that Grandma was firm in discipline, so it’s not a stranger to me, but it just doesn’t feel right to do it to Tanner.

No, there’s more to him acting out, and I need to figure out what it is before I punish him.

Emmet gives me a light peck on the lips. “Be strong.”

His words ring through my head as I make my way down the hall to Tanner’s room. I can hear the sound of his tablet loud and clear and I cringe at that.

The first thing I should have done was take away his electronics, yet I was too busy having a fucking breakdown.

I push the door open and find Tanner reclined on his bed, his tablet propped on his knee. His gaze lifts to mine before he returns it to his tablet.

Stay calm.

I move into the room and close the door behind me. “Tanner, give me the tablet,” I say, keeping my voice low.

He finally brings the tablet down from his face as he sits up in the bed. “But-”

“No, don’t argue with me.” This is the moment when I prove to him and myself both that I can do this, that I can be the parent he needs and not the aunt he wants. “I am your guardian and I take care of you, you will do what I say and you won’t talk back. Now hand me the tablet.”

His head falls but he holds the tablet out to me and I take it from him, placing it down on his nightstand.

I take a seat on his bed beside him. “Tanner, tell me what happened at school today.” I look at the band aid on his face that’s already falling off, showing more of the scratch on his face.

Tanner lets out a sigh and he shifts on the bed. “I was in the pencil line and Ben came up behind me and he kept saying stuff. I got mad and I hit him.”

“What stuff was he saying, Tanner?” I ask.

He presses his lips together and for a moment I think he isn’t going to tell me. “He started bringing up my parents being dead. He said that he heard his mother and another parent talking about it.”

My heart skips a beat at that and I frown, looking down at him. “And how does he know about that?” I ask.

Tanner shrugs. “I don’t know, but he’s on the baseball team, so…”

Of course the child belongs to one of the gossiping biddies on the team. How the fuck do they even know so much about our life? “Tanner, what else did he say?”

“He said that you were a hooker and that I come from a broken home.”

The words are a shock and send a pang through my heart. How could an eight year old say such a hurtful thing? But I already know that it was a child listening to grownups talk and repeating what he heard. Still it doesn’t make it better and as I ball my fist, I decide I don’t give a fuck who it upsets, I’ll find out who the parents of this child are and I’ll put them in their fucking place.