Chapter 14
LENI
Dean drives me home, where a big van from the moving company is already waiting in our front yard.
I fired off a text to Mom after breakfast to let her know to expect them because my fiancé was relocating her and Ethan.
That earned me a barrage of questions. Not one asking if I’m okay or why I didn’t come home last night.
No, my mom’s priorities are crystal fucking clear, and my wellbeing isn’t on the list.
“I’ll be waiting out here for you,” Dean says as I climb out of the car. I nod, steeling myself.
The plan seems simple enough—go inside, pack my meager belongings, and take them back to Romero’s place while the moving van transports Ethan and Mom and their stuff to their new house in Flatbush.
Inside, it’s bustling with activity. Three professional movers are moving about, boxing up the few things we own while Mom hovers nearby, watching them like a hawk. All four heads turn to me when I walk in. And as if they know me, the three movers incline their heads in greeting.
Mom peels away from her surveillance mission and heads towards me, and I’m not sure what I expect from her. For once, her eyes aren’t bloodshot and her blonde hair actually looks relatively clean, the strands hanging limp but washed over her shoulders.
“Come on.” Her gray eyes sparkle with something I can’t name as she links her arm with mine and steers me towards my bedroom.
I fish my keys out of my purse and unlock the door—only to find Ethan lounging on my bed, tapping away on his phone. He doesn’t even look up as Mom and I walk in.
“How the hell did you get in here?” I snap, slamming the door behind me. The door I just unlocked. The door that should have been secure.
“Broke in through the window.” He shrugs, pointing towards the window I’m sure I closed before leaving last night. “No big deal.”
“Get the fuck off my bed. Get out of here.” I wave my hands at him, but he remains planted like a stubborn weed. Mom fidgets behind me, her nervous energy radiating through the small space. “Ethan. Now.”
“Chill, Leni. I just have some questions.” He groans, finally dropping his phone to look at me properly. “This might be my only shot to get answers before you disappear into your new life.”
Heat flashes through my chest. “Great. So you both have questions for me.” I’m going to take a wild guess that this is probably about the fact that I didn’t sleep here last night. I throw an impatient hand in the air. “Let’s have it.”
“Is the new boyfriend that fancy lawyer from the police station? The one with the Maybach?”
“A Maybach!”
I glance back at Mom’s breathy exclamation, and I swear I can see the dollar signs flashing in her eyes. “Ethan,” I warn.
“What are you talking about, son? What Maybach? What police station?” Mom’s voice rises with each question, but Ethan clamps up, now realizing he might get in trouble if he lets it slip that he was arrested and got me arrested as well.
“We’ll continue this later,” he grumbles, rolling off my bed and heading for the window. That boy has absolutely no shame. I shake my head as he clambers out, leaving me alone with Mom and her hungry stare.
“Tell me everything about this new man. Is that where you spent the night?” Her hands start their familiar tremor, and she clasps them together to hide it from me. She probably hasn’t used yet today because of the movers and the disruption of moving to a new place.
A pang of pity squeezes my heart. “It must have been hard on you.”
“What?” She frowns.
“Raising Ethan and me alone after Dad left. Learning about his death.” He was missing for about two weeks before the police declared him dead, even though they never found his body.
Something flickers in her eyes—there for a heartbeat, then gone so quickly I can’t decipher it. “I made do. Now, tell me, since your beau is doing all this for us, is he going to give us allowances? We need cash, Leni. Tell him it has to be cash.”
“Mom!” The warmth in my chest ices over, then explodes into white-hot anger. I spin away from her, marching to my closet where I yank out my tattered travel bag.
Did I really think for one moment that she might try to act like a normal mom? That she might ask why I didn’t come home last night? That she might wonder who this mystery man is and what he wants from me in exchange for all this generosity? That she might worry about me at all?
I scoff, tossing the bag on the bed and unzipping it with an excessive amount of force.
“Just saying,” she goes on, not noticing that she just hurt me—again. Or maybe she just doesn’t care. “A new fancy house is all fine and good, but we need to eat and buy stuff too.”
A host of harsh, angry words crowds my brain, fighting to escape my throat, and I bite down on my lip so hard I break the skin, the tang of blood spilling onto my tongue.
Control, Leni. Control. I inhale deeply.
“You’re not getting any cash.” My voice comes out deceptively calm.
“We’ll stock your house with groceries and everything else you might need. But no money.”
“What? Why not?”
“Did you just ask me why not?!” My control snaps, my voice spiking into a near-screech.
I close my eyes, inhaling deeply again. When I open them, she’s glaring at me.
“Because I don’t trust you not to blow it on opioids.
Seriously, Mom, you need to stop this. If not for yourself or for me, then for Ethan.
Have you seen the crowd he’s been running with lately?
I’m hoping a change of environment will help him. ” And you too.
“Oh, is that what you think of me now?” She scoffs, crossing her bony, needle-scarred arms over her chest. “You and your new man sit around giggling about your drug addict mother?”
“The last thing Romero and I discuss is you.” I meet her glare with one of my own. “Be for real, Mom.”
She takes an angry step forward, lifting one shaking finger to point at me. “I’ll have you know I’m still your mother, and I won’t tolerate this disrespect from you, Charlene.”
“It’s Leni. Now get out of my room. I have packing to do, and I’m not in the mood to go at it with you right now. My patience is hanging by a thread.” I turn my back on her and walk to the closet, grabbing an armful of clothes to dump into my bag.
“Excuse me?”
Her tone grates down my spine, throwing gasoline on the fire already burning in me.
“You heard me.” My voice is tight from holding back.
“Do you even care about me? About Ethan? I come home and tell you I met a man, that I fell in love and I’m getting married, but you don’t even bother asking what the hell his name is or how we met!
” The words keep spilling, louder, sharper. I can’t stop them anymore—I just snap.
My entire body shakes with the force of my rage as I take a step towards her, every ounce of the resentment, hurt, and betrayal I’ve ever held against her surging to the surface.
“Ever since we lost Dad, I’ve had to step up because you dissolved into…
this.” I gesture at her, at the hollow shell she’s become.
“I had to become a mother and father for Ethan when I was still a child myself. I made sure he took school seriously. I paid the mortgage. Bought the groceries. Fixed things around the house only to find more furniture gone that you’d sold to fund your addiction. ”
I’m yelling now, past caring if I’m making a scene.
“Do you ever wonder what I’m going through?
How I’m getting the money?! I fucking paid off a forty-grand loan you and Ethan blew on God knows what, and yet you never once thought to ask how I, an unemployed girl with just a GED, managed it.
All you care about is an allowance, cash so you can get the next hit from the drugs you snort and shoot up your arms! ”
The slap is unexpected. And it lands so fast my brain needs a second to catch up, to register that the sharp sting on my cheek is real, as my head snaps to the side. For a moment, the room spins, heat searing through my skin. But my shock stuns me more than the physical pain.
I press a shaky hand to my face, eyes burning with tears I refuse to let fall as I stare at Mom in complete disbelief. She has never raised her hand to me. Ever.
She’s staring at me too, her hands clasped together, regret flickering in her eyes—but she doesn’t apologize. She doesn’t take it back. “No matter what,” she says in a brittle voice, “I’m still your mother.”
And then she’s gone, leaving me alone with the echo of her words and the sting of her palm print on my cheek.
My lips part as I stare at the empty hallway. The tears come hot and fast now, blurring my vision. I wipe at them furiously, my throat aching around the lump lodged there.
I’ve always suspected that the mother I had before everything went to shit was gone, but this confirmation hurts like hell. It hurts in ways I didn’t know were possible. To have a mother and yet have no mother.
Would it be better to just be an orphan than having this hollow shell pretending to be my mom? I push the awful thought out of my head, drop my hand from my stinging cheek, and turn back to my wardrobe.
I need to pack. I need to get out of here.
The sun is already setting as I drag my single bag of important things towards the front door.
Everything else in the house has been emptied into brown boxes and stacked by the movers, who are now carrying them out to their van.
Did they hear my argument with Mom? How could they not? By the end, I was screaming.
Humiliation burns my face, and I keep my head down as I exit the house for the last time.
Dean gets out of the car as soon as he sees me and jogs over to take the bag from my hands. His frown lingers on my face, but he says nothing as he carries my belongings to the trunk.