My mother stepped out onto the front step beside my father and even from the corner I could tell she glared at me. My father grumbled something at her and motioned for her to go back inside. It looked like she said something back at him then she disappeared into the house.
“Call me if you need me, honey,” my father called out and my chest tightened.
I was going to leave him to deal with my mother, alone, but I just couldn’t hear anymore. I knew there was more to what was going on, and for the love of everything, I didn’t want to know. It was their business. What I had already overheard was enough.
I nodded and waved my hand at him. Then I picked up my overnight bag and slung it over my shoulder. Turning back around, I dialed Brett.
“Hey beautiful, what’s up?” his cheery voice greeted me.
Holding the tears at bay but just barely, I asked him to, “Please come get me.”
I need you.
Brett
Hearing Mandy’s voice have that small shake to it unnerved me. I jumped into my mom’s Volvo and tried to get there as fast, and as safely, as I could. I didn’t know why that small waver in her voice was there, but I couldn’t imagine it was anything good.
I saw her hand waving to me at the corner of her street, she was standing there with a small bag between her feet. That was even more strange. I felt like her not being at her house when I was picking her up was like she is running away from home. Then again if she was doing that I imagine she would have had a much bigger bag than the overnight one she had.
Pulling up to the corner, I put the car in park and opened my door to get out and help her in. I didn’t make it past my backseat door before she plowed into me, burying her face into my chest. Her entire body began to shake with huge, heaving sobs. I looked all around me to see if I could at least understand what she was hurting so badly from, but the street was silent and even her home was quiet from what I could see.
Holding her tight in my arms, I wished I could do something. “Fairy girl, whatever it is, it will be okay.”
I mean seriously what could be so damn bad, I didn’t know, but it was starting to scare me.
She only sobbed harder before pushing me slowly away. “Can we go to your house now? I need to get away from here right now.”
Nodding my head, I led her around the car and opened her door for her. “You bet, I will get us there as fast as possible.”
We barely made it out of the subdivision before Mandy began to talk in quiet tones. “My mom and dad are getting a divorce.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah, I know it will happen. My mom wants it, and she always gets what she wants.”
“Wow, I am so sorry Mandy.”
“Me too. I’m so sorry for hearing everything they said to each other… for what mom has done to my dad and for me even being born.”
I was at a stoplight thankfully when she said that beca
use I know for a fact my shock of hearing someone say that would have caused me to wreck. I stared at her open-mouthed as she stared down at her hands, and it was only the honking of a horn behind us that got me to focus back on the road and moving again.
“What the fuck?” I asked, disturbed as fuck by it. “I mean how the fuck could you be sorry you were born? It’s not exactly like you had a choice in the matter.” I reached over and grabbed a hand tightly, holding hers in mine. I wished I could push my physical strength into her and make her better. But what the fuck? How the hell could anyone even have that thought?
“I know, Brett, it’s a fucked up thought, but all my life I have felt like my mother blamed me for not being able to achieve all of her goals, and it was me who held her back from becoming a famous model or something.”
“Yeah, but that’s fucking stupid. You can’t blame someone for existing,” I said, unable to wrap my mind around such self-important selfishness.
“I know, and I know logically it isn’t my fault. But right now it sure feels like it. I just…” She shakes her head and buries her face into her hands.
Fuck. Me.
“Just hold on, baby, we will be to my house soon.”
I didn’t really know what to say to her. Divorce is a fucked up thing and never easy, and cheating… Well, wow, that was just fucking horrendous. My parents had never gone through anything like it and I didn’t really know what to say. We pulled into my garage and just sat there for a moment, me pulling her over the console to me as I tried to hug all of my love into her.
Chapter Eleven