Let Go.

“Hey mom, I am home but just to change quickly.” I said running up the stairs.
“What where are you going?” She asked sitting up from her window seat where she was reading.
“I am going to meet…” Before I got done she walked closer to me.
“Emma, you reek of marijuana and cigarettes and alcohol!” She shrieked.
“Oh, the alcohol, was from going out with Luna last night, and uh the cigarettes from Travis anyways I am going to meet his parents and I need to change he’s waiting for me in the car.” I explained quickly and opened my door with her in tow.
“Who smokes weed?” she asked sharply.
“You?” I asked mockingly and taking off my clothes and finding a dress I bought a couple months ago but had nowhere to wear it. It was a black dress that just hit my knees with a peach/ beige under layer and a black lace bottom to cover up the peach. I smiled and quickly started doing my makeup. My mom walked in again.
“Where are you going?” she asked eyeing my dress.
“To meet Travis’s parents.” I told her smearing foundation on my face.
“Oh, I see I just got a hello but they get an actual meeting.” She grunted sharply.
“Mom, you won’t like him.” I groaned smoothing my makeup.
“Oh well, I doubt that.” She got louder.
“You don’t like anything I do.” I grunted truthfully.
“That is not true!” she said lowly.
“It is! You will never get over me not going to school, or still working at the coffee shop or still living here or my tattoos, or my piercings, or my opinions, I mean, fuck, I doubt you’re going to love my pot smoking, boyfriend, with tattoos and stretched ears, who doesn’t really work but has money, oh wait him having money is okay for you right? Fuck I am so done with you!” I shouted I didn’t stop to breathe or look at her I just grabbed my bag and started walking down the stairs.
She came down the stairs behind me.
“Don’t even talk to me like that. I am disappointed, you have no idea what it feels like when your sisters call and tell you their son or daughter is going to school and is going to be a doctor and how they have always been “A” students and how they are top of their class and how they have internships already lined up and all’s I can say back is yeah Emma is still making coffee she graduated with a high c average and is now dating some disgusting guy who she has been fucking for a week and has tattoos and trashy piercings and will never go to school or be successful!” she blew up and yelled at me as I gripped the door knob. I turned around to look at her. Her face was frozen and cold looking.
“That’s them, not me, fuck you.” I spoke evenly and my voice was cold and hurtful.
I opened the door holding back tears and getting in the car with Travis.
“Fuck, that took forever, you look good though.” He smiled and kissed my cheek and noticed my expression.
“You look upset.” He noted and turned the engine off in my driveway still.
“Babe, I really don’t want to talk about it.” I shook my head lightly and felt tears brimming.
“Okay but don’t let it kill you.” He nodded and advised backing out of my driveway.
The car ride was quiet and my breathing became steady about twenty minutes into the drive.
“Emma remember what I said about my parents. I am apologizing in advance… Okay?” he squeezed my knee and kept driving. He looked nervous. He had in solid plugs and his nose ring was slight crooked his hair was messier than usual because he kept running his hand through it.
“You look nervous.” I said to him without looking at him.
“Well I don’t want you to meet them so yeah.” He nodded sounding edgy.
“It’s going to be okay.” I assured to him the best I could.
“Yeah right.” He spoke slowly and lit a blunt while he was driving.
“Want some?” he asked already sounding a little bit relaxed.
“No, I'm good.” I shook my head.
And with that the drive continued, with nothing but deep breathing and smoke releases.
Finally we pulled up to this house. Well not even a house a mansion. It was gray stone and had two garages the house had three floors and was unbelievably expensive looking.
“So, wow.” I breathed instead of saying.
“It’s a waste of money.” He turned down the music in the car and looked over at me.
“Please don’t make me go in there.” He pleaded.
“You have to get your stuff.” I reminded him.
“Fuck my stuff.” He pleaded again closing his eyes taking big puff of smoke.
“Fine.” He agreed without another word.
We got out of the car and walked to the big mahogany door that was solid as can be. Travis took a deep breath, before knocking.
A maid answered the door taking us into a siting area with a coffee table and a couple couches across from each other. The couches were so soft and everything around me was so elegant.
“Travis dear, are you here already?” A woman’s voice rang through the room as I looked up from my lap. Travis tensed next to me. The woman was familiar, I knew her from somewhere. I just couldn’t place it. “Dinner doesn’t start till five.” She said matter of factly.
“No, mom, you said four.” He sounded drained already.
“No, Travis, I said come get your stuff at four, not dinner, dinner has always been at five sharp.” She smiled sweetly. So sweet it was bitter.
“Oh Mom, this is Emma.” Travis grabbed my hand.
“Oh. I see.” She said nothing more.
“Travis would you like a drink?” She asked.
“Vodka.” He answered quickly and sharply.
“Straight vodka? Right, how about scotch?” she asked rolling her eyes and making her way to a bar in the back of the room.
“And Emily?” She asked briskly getting my name wrong.
“Mom, her names Emma.” Travis said just as brisk.
“Oh right well at that darling coffee shop she works at I could have sworn that rude employee, called her Emily, my mistake.” She smirked and said this as an insult especially with the word darling emphasized.
Then it hit me. She was the woman the other day that ordered coffee while she was on the phone and Luna got an attitude with her.
“You know her?” Travis piped up.
“Yes, well not really kind of.” I shrugged at a loss for words at how awkward I felt.
“I got her coffee.” I cleared my throat.
“Oh.” Travis sighed.
“Oh yeah she did it sucked but it’s no Starbucks.” She laughed lightly handing Travis a drink.
“Your father should be home soon.” She smiled.
“Fantastic.” Travis responded harshly drinking his drink in one sip.
“Travis, you seem thirsty.” His mom joked.
“We’re going to grab my stuff so when were done eating we can leave.” Travis spoke slowly grabbing my hand and leading me up the shiny marble stairs.
“So I am sorry already.” Travis pulled me towards him still tense as ever. He led me to a room that was huge but empty all that was left was about five boxes all labeled, in Travis’s handwriting.
Every box said something like, “MY FUCKING SHIT” and “MY BABIES” And “Fucking cd’s” and etc. I opened the “my babies” one to find grinders, bongs, and bowls.
“So are these your babies?” I laughed picking up a grinder.
“Yes, the ones I couldn’t take with me, when I left the first time, even though it killed me!” he spoke quickly taking the box from me and holding it close jokingly rubbing the box. We heard a door from downstairs open and heard two voices talking.
“Oh and here comes my two favorite people.” Travis mumbled grabbing the boxes; I followed Travis with a couple boxes as well. We made our way down the stairs, and there we saw a man, I assumed to be his father and another man I guessed to be his brother.
“Hello Travis, who is this?” His father spoke first getting himself a drink at the bar and sipping it slowly after.
“That’s Emily.” His mother spoke for him.
Travis opened his mouth as he put down the boxes.
“E-M-M-A.” He spelt my name for her annoyed that she kept calling me Emily.
“Hi Emma.” His father didn’t look at me as I put down the boxes I was carrying as well. We sat across from his brother and mother, his father already refilling his drink.
“So, Andrew where is Trish tonight shopping?” Travis asked in a condescending tone.
“That is none of your business; she is not here that is all.” Andrew, his brother fired back quickly.
The maid came into the room quietly. “Dinner is ready.” She spoke softly barely making eye contact. She seemed so nervous. We followed her into the enormous room with a table that could seat up to at least twenty five. Travis sat next to me and looked puzzled at the soup on the table. The others sat across from us.
“What the fuck is this?” Travis spoke annoyed.
“Well, Travis, this is soup.” His brother spoke slowly as if Travis was an idiot. I studied his face to see if they looked alike, they had the same intense brown eyes that could switch to green, and the same nose. His mother looked nothing like him and his father was tall, taller than Travis, he had a round red face and thinning grey hair and a pointy nose, just like Travis and his brother.
“We have six course meals now.” His mother spoke next in an even tone as she dipped her spoon into her soup.
“Also, watch your filthy mouth.” His mother advised without hesitation.
“Fuck, sorry.” Travis sarcastically apologized. His father’s lip twitched out of annoyance.
I ate some of the white colored soup.
“So Travis what have you been up to?” Travis’s father asked sipping the soup off his spoon.
“You know, just thinking.” Travis spoke nonchalantly.
“Well that means sleeping, smoking pot and fucking this girl.” Andrew spat in my direction.
“Oh Travis, will you ever get your life together?” his mother asked as if the end of the world was near.
“I knew you’d blow your grandfathers money, as soon as you got it.” His dad didn’t hold back the tone of anger.
“And he’s got two more tattoos since we last saw him, he smells like drugs.” His mother talked as if we weren’t sitting there, like they were having a closed discussion.
“I have three more tattoos, and my girlfriend has one too.” Travis sounded strained.
“Well you never bring home a girl, so we assumed she’d be trash anyway.” His brother laughed.
I looked at my lap hurt. I heard Travis throw his spoon down on the expensive table, spilling his drink as well.
“Fuck you guys, Emma is the only thing I have done right, and dad, no I haven’t blown grandfathers money I can sell drugs for what I need, fuck you mom for being a bitch, and Andrew your girlfriend is a gold digging whore who tried to suck my cock three months ago, I should have let her, I will never ever be what you people what me to be because then I would be you dad!” Travis screamed at them. I had never heard him get that loud or that angry.
His brother got up and leaned over the table. Yelling at Travis, “you will always be a fuck up and are worthless, don’t ever talk about Trish like that!”
Travis leaned over and I heard a sickly crack and then I realized Travis punched his brother straight in the nose. Blood was everywhere. His mother shrieked. I turned around to look at them, his mother holding her hands over her face, his brother holding ice to his nose, his father taking gulps of scotch out of his cup. I spoke my voice quivering in anger and hurt.
“I think you are all horrible people, and I am sorry I ever met you people.”
Travis grabbed my hand and took me to the front door.
“Get your shit and your bitch and leave!” His mother cried.
“You and her are never welcomed here ever again!” His father bellowed through the home as we opened the door with boxes in our hands.
“That’s the way we want it.” Travis mumbled and slammed the door.
We walked to the car in silence just the sound of our shoes in their stone driveway that matched their house. We loaded the boxes and I felt their insults sticking to me like a wet shirt. My chest hurt form trying to not to cry from their insults accompanied with my mother’s all at once. I took a steady breath as we started driving back to where we lived. Where I would have to face my mother again. I felt tears brim and they all broke loose as I cried hard into my hands looking out the window, too embarrassed to face Travis. I made him go in there. Even though he said he said how much he hated them. I felt Travis look over at me.
“Emma don’t cry, those people are big bullies it gets them off to treat people like shit.” He spoke quietly trying to watch the road and me at the same time. He placed his hand on my leg. I stopped crying just as a thought occurred to me.
“I don’t want to go home, let’s go somewhere.” I spoke evenly.
“Where?” he asked looking at me confused.
“The airport.” I spoke lowly.
“Where do you wanna go Em?” he asked casually.
“California?” I asked still processing what I was saying.
“Okay.” He agreed without another question. With him he didn’t ask questions he just did what he wanted.
California here we come.