Two Hundred and Thirty

John’s POV

I backed my truck into the driveway wishing that a satellite would fall from the sky and obliterate me when I stepped out. My heels crunched on the gravel and the sun beat down on the back of my neck. I knew I didn’t need to knock, so I just walked straight in, but I partly felt like I had to knock and I was being rude by not doing so.

“Is that you John?”

“Yeah” I yelled in reply, closing the front door behind me.

“In the kitchen” She said bluntly.

I swung my jacket off my back and draped it over the arm of one of the couches as I made my way through the living room into the kitchen. Considering this was the house I grew up in, it made me feel incredibly uncomfortable as of late. I walked through the door, my eyes catching sight of the scribbles I’d done when I was little, scribbles that my father insisted on keeping stained on the door frame because it gave the place character.

“Where is everyone?” I said, trying to avoid topic as much as possible.

“All out” She turned to face me, drying her hands on a dish towel “We need to talk”

The look in her eye turned my stomach, it wasn’t enough for her to just say the words, the look had to come with it as well; slightly sympathetic but pissed as hell. To be 24 years of age and still receiving nerve shredding lectures off my mother, I should have been ashamed.

“Hold on, before you start” I said “Why couldn’t you have called me yourself, why did you get Ross to do it?”

“Because… because I was worried that if you saw it was me then you wouldn’t have picked up” She slapped the dish cloth down on the counter “And don’t act like you don’t do that John… I know full well that you do”

I should have probably felt guilty but I didn’t.

The bar stool scrapped along the floor tiles when I pulled it out to sit down. I didn’t look but I knew my mother’s expression would have been one of disgust.

She didn’t sit down. I clutched my hands together on the counter and mentally took a deep breath… I couldn’t do that physically anymore, like there wasn’t enough space in my lungs to even attempt it.

“This has gone on for far too long now and you know it. I’ve stood back for as long as I can but I can’t watch this anymore” She could have sucked the life and soul out of everything I had about me.

The feeling when you know you’ve hurt your parents… I mean, I had it a while back and it’s been a constant occurrence since, but that doesn’t make the reminders any easier to take.

“Things have to change” Her voice was cracking “You can’t carry on like this… I can’t let you carry on like this”

“I’m fine!” I shot my eyes up for a second to look at her.

“No but you’re not!” She yelled and began to cry. And then as if I didn’t already know it, she began recalling everything that had happened and everything that was now different about me.

“Why can’t everyone just let it go?!” I interrupted her and stood up from the seat, knocking it to the floor “I made a choice, why can’t people just accept that? This is it now, this is me, it’s been over a year , God damn it, yet I’ve still got everyone on my fucking case”

I’d never sworn like that in-front of my mother before, sure I’d said ‘this tv show’s crap’ and stuff, but never like that. Even if I wasn’t already storming out the front door, I couldn’t have stayed around after that, her face would have killed me.

I’d barely even pulled out of the drive when I wanted to turn back. I couldn’t remember whether I’d shut the front door. I had an image burned into my head of her sobbing into her hands at the table. Although I’d never had done it, I needed nothing else but for to hold her.

That’s the worst part. At the stage in my life that I was at, I wasn’t even sure if my mother would let me hug her. I disgusted myself, not for what I’d done or what I’d become but because this was hurting her.

Rather than do anything about it though, I stalked up the stairs to my apartment and made my way straight to the liquor cabinet. I don’t know why I bothered, but I got myself out a shot glass and placed it next to the bottle on the counter, I may as well have just drunk it straight and saved using a glass. After the fourth or maybe the fifth shot, my hand grazed over the newspaper as I put down the glass, moving the paper to the side and revealing a torn bit of bandage that had frayed at the edges.

I shoved everything to the side and examined it in my fingers. I was so nervous that she’d make a sudden movement and I’d make it all worse that I hacked at the bandages frantically, hoping for the best. I moved the paper further, lifting it up and letting it fall to the floor. My counter was covered in frayed clippings from the bandage.

A dry chuckle escaped my lips and memories from last night replayed themselves over in my head.

My chest stopped aching for a little while. Maybe if my mother knew how I was last night, she wouldn’t be so upset. But, I didn’t have that in mind when I did it. Nor did I think about how Rae was my neighbour and that I should help her because it’s convenient… I would have done what I did even if she lived three states away.

I took another shot to drown away the unfamiliar feeling that nagged at my throat.

My attention shot to my phone that had just lit up on the table.

Mom; Sweetie, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have acted the way I did, it’s my fault. You just have to understand that I love you and sometimes that makes standing back and watching you be your own man very hard for me to do. I’m just worried. But anyway, Dad, Shane and I are going out for dinner tonight, you know that Italian that Dan used to work at, it’d be great if you came along. I promise that we won’t talk about anything other than the weather and baseball. The table’s booked for nine x

She knew I’d come, there was no way that I wouldn’t after I’d shouted at her like that.

…

After taking a shower, having a nap and playing for a few hours on the balcony, I was ready to go.

When I played, I glanced up to see if I could see Rae listening, but no, her apartment looked pretty dead so I came to the conclusion that she wasn’t home and did some covers of really nasty chart hits. It seemed that she liked some of the stuff I did, not that I wanted to impress her or anything, I just had the urge to do them covers and would have preferred it if she had not been there, which luckily she wasn’t.

I shrugged on an old plaid shirt with a plain white undershirt and slipped on my jeans before wrestling on the bed to try and get my boots on. The place we were going didn’t require anything other than everyday attire, although if it was a little fancier, I would have probably worn the same thing. I carried my leather jacket over my arm and climbed into the truck.

I felt oddly positive about this. Maybe because my mother made it sound so positive and I truly believed that she would let us have a night of normality.

Pulling into the parking lot, nostalgia hit me square in the face.

Antonio’s.

It might have looked like a shit hole but everyone knew that the was the best place to get Spaghetti Bolognese in the whole South. The ‘t’ was hanging lower that the other letters in the sign, like a slight breeze of wind would knock it straight off and the paint of the exterior was peeling and crumbling all over.

For the entire three year period of which my cousin Dan worked here, every single Friday my family would get discounted meals. So, without fail, we were there every single Friday until Dan got fired for putting the chef’s hat in the pizza oven.

I grabbed my jacket from the passenger seat and threw it over my arm again as I locked the truck. It was a warm breeze tonight and I let the air run through my hair and clear my thoughts the best it could. But it was no good, by the time I’d reached the door, I was no longer relaxed about this dinner with my family. They were going to bring it up, they had to. Shane wanted to know exact details to how it happened, my dad always wanted to know why it happened, and then my mother wanted to know how it was going to get resolved.

I really had no chance.

I walked in and the strumming of the live Italian band shot through my ears, making me uneasy.

There was literally no way on earth that this Italian band wouldn’t spark some sort of conversation and therefore bring up that topic.

Breathing slowly in my head but fast in my chest, I scanned the room until my eyes locked onto my dad who raised his hand to wave me over. I weaved in and out of the tables, being sure not to make eye contact with people… being infamous around town gets people looking at you, so I tend not to look at them so that it’s as if they never looked at me because I didn’t see it.

I sank into the spare chair beside my mother and father and opposite my brother.

“How’s school stranger?” I directed at my brother straight away.

“Shit”

“Shane!” My mother scolded him.

“Lying is bad mom, it’s better if I’m truthful” He smirked and I laughed with him.

After that, true to my mother’s word, we talked about baseball and the weather. Until it was time to order and then after that until our food came.

Every time my dad talked, I didn’t make eye contact. I couldn’t. I avoided it like the plague. He knew the reputation I had and made me feel bad about it without even speaking. Every time he spoke, I looked at my food and replied to it like the Bolognese was what I was having the conversation with.
I sensed that he’d started to notice so when he next opened his mouth, I directed my gaze to the right to look at him.

But when I did, I still didn’t look at him.

Staring right at me with eyes wider than I’d ever seen. Rae sat a few tables away, but in direct eye line with me when I looked that way. The second my eyes locked on her, all the blood in my body rushed to my chest.

She smirked and looked down at her plate, pawing it with her fork. I involuntarily let out a light chuckle, smirking myself.

I dragged my gaze back to my own table, only to snap them back a split second later.

She was with a guy.