70. Dollie—present day #2
Another feeling comes to me, something familiar I’ve always felt in Shane’s presence. After the last few nights with Ambrose, I recognize it for what it is.
Loneliness.
My eyes drift across the hall to Ambrose’s room, though I know he’s not home. He hasn’t left my thoughts since the diary entry. My eyes move back to the yellow book, and Shane’s phone on top.
Switching the lamp on first, I place the phone aside, and I pick up the diary. Using the ribbon bookmark attached, I flick to the page Shane last read.
We’ve made the biggest mistake of our lives. We should have been better parents.
A tear falls and stains the page, amongst all the age stains.
They should have been better.
They should still be here.
It hurts my straining chest, but I continue reading.
Ambrose is still in the hospital, still fighting a fever and waiting on tests to prove what I know in my gut.
He’s HIV positive. I can’t stop crying—it’s been three days.
Seeing him in that hospital bed, skinnier than he should be, scarred and unable to be touched—it is our fault. Our fucking fault.
Ronan can’t face any of it. He clings to Dollie because she still looks at us without judging eyes, but I don’t think he’d touch our boy, even if he could.
The sexual abuse shouldn’t have happened.
None of this should have happened. Ambrose shouldn’t have to feel like we failed him. I see it in his eyes. He knows we did.
I wish we could go back in time, be better parents, and be what he deserves. I would do it. I’d do anything to take away the lost and distant look in his eyes every time I try to reach out to him.
And waiting here to be told his life will never be the same as everyone else’s, that he’ll be on medication that will hopefully control this awful disease and allow him to live a semi-normal life, it’s torture.
The first test was inconclusive.
But that tells us everything because it wasn’t negative.
Our poor boy is going to be diagnosed tomorrow, and I can’t take it.
Flipping to the next page, I hunt for more information but come to a dead end. Three or four pages have been ripped out, leaving only a few letters from each page that are cut off near the spine.
The pages that follow talk about something else—a half-assed distraction project Mom was working on.
I close the book, my eyes shutting at the exact same time.
Mom felt guilty… so damn guilty. Like I do.
Needing something to distract myself with, I let my eyes wander the room, over all the dated furniture that I can’t bring myself to throw away. That Mom would have brought new life to if she were here.
So many accessories and toys from my past are missing, and missed by me, due to Shane’s last cleaning spree.
Setting the diary back on the nightstand, I pick up Shane’s phone to return it to the book when it lightly vibrates in my hand.
Taking one last look at the door, I flip it over and unlock it. I find it open on the only app he decided to keep after deleting all the ones that got him in trouble last time.
A skinny woman triggers anxiety in my stomach, and I feel it swell that little bit more.
The anxiety isn’t over my relationship or knowing that it’s definitely over.
It’s over being stupid enough to trust a word that he said and giving him another chance to make me unhappy, when I could be away from him already.
Seeing her, a girl who resembles one of the girls from last time, dancing on the screen, wiggling her ass at the camera as she plays golf, I roll my eyes and place his phone down, not caring about her or him in this moment.
I’m sure to put it back at the odd angle he had it, because he probably did that to see if I would look at it while he was gone.
If he paid more attention to me, he’d know I make mental notes of my surroundings constantly.
He steps back into the room, his eyes on his phone before they land on me.
“Got us snacks, and I brought this up for you.” He smiles, thinking all his dirty secrets are still hidden as he gets in bed, layering the sheets with my phone, and some chocolate and sodas that I don’t remember either of us buying.
It’s a good thing my appetite hasn’t returned yet, because I can’t eat any of the things he brought, as none of them are my safe colors.
My eyes leave the snacks to my phone below, and I bat away Baby Ruths to tap the screen.
“Expecting a call?”
“No, just checking.”
There are no text messages under Lucky’s name, nothing from Annabelle, either. A few emails, mostly shopping spam, remain unread, the tiny icon alerting me to them. I click it, noticing a single one from Ambrose.
Clutching my phone, I angle it away and read it quickly.
AmbroseLa’[email protected]:
If you need anything, I can be home within 10 minutes. If not, I finish at eleven. Shall I bring you a pizza? Some places will be open until midnight. I’ll even share a soggy one with you, that you’re probably still not meant to eat, but I’ll turn a blind eye if it means you’ll have food tonight.
I want to ask him so badly if he’s okay. To know if he needs someone to look after him the way he’s always cared for me.
“Enjoying the movie?” Shane distracts me by asking, but his attention remains on his phone, already in his hand.
“Not really.” I lose my phone to the bedsheets without answering Ambrose because I can’t say all I want to in an email.
“What are you looking at?” I probably shouldn’t question Shane, given what happened last time, but I really do want this over. And if he can’t keep his distance from randoms on the internet, I’m clearly not what he wants, either.
“I was just watching some videos. Sport stuff.”
“I looked,” I admit, for no reason other than I want him out of my house.
“At my phone? While I wasn’t in the room?”
“Yes.”
“I fucking knew you would. I knew you had. That’s why I tilted it.”
“You knew nothing until I admitted it. I put it back in the exact right place.” I stare ahead at the movie I don’t want to watch, as a group of teenage girls walk down what looks like the longest street in history.
“No, I knew.”
“No, you didn’t. Let’s be honest with each other.”
“Sure. I am.”
“So, who is she?”
“Who?”
“The girl playing golf in little more than a pair of panties.”
“I don’t know. I was watching it for the golf.”
Shane has never watched golf in his life.
“You don’t like golf.”
“Yes, I do.”
No, he doesn’t. He’s made a point of criticizing the sport each time he thinks it’s hogging a TV channel.
“No, you like the girl in the short skirt and her ass.” So, tell me why I’m trapped in this relationship? “And I’d like this to end. We really aren’t working.”
“We fucking aren’t, are we!” Anger flows through him as he jumps from the bed, yanking off the sheets in a tight grip, so fast that the soda cans fly through the air and explode against my pink painted walls.
Wet brown stains appear instantly on the floor and the carpet that’s always so soft below my socks.
He’s in therapy. His moods shouldn’t be so extreme, but his pupils are blown with a manic look in his eyes. The sweat from his anger shouldn’t be enough to stick his long hair up in devil horns as he runs his fingers through it.
I fall from the bed, knowing where this is going, knowing that what happened last time will repeat itself.
And I can’t go through that again, even while I feel like I deserve it.
My heart pounds in my chest, echoing in my ears. Thump, thump, thump, thump. I need out of this stuffy room that feels like it’s closing in on me. Fast feet take me forward, then back because he jumps in front of the door, arms spread wide and sealing me in.
The fear in my eyes feeds him, and he rushes forward.
That same tight grip clutches at the headboard, yanking on the statement edges, stud-embedded and soon to be damaged, as he pulls at them with such force my bed creaks.
“Stop,” I plead, drifting back to a corner where I can turn away and hide from all he’s doing. “Breaking my stuff hurts me.” It physically hurts me, and I feel a pain inside that dwells as another creak seeps from my bed.
“This is your fault! I don’t know why you’re hiding. You want a fucking argument! Admit it!”
His words are exactly the same as the ones he gave me before we left our apartment.
Running across the hall, I throw my weight against the bedroom door. Keeping myself firm to the ground, I attempt to keep it closed as the handle twists. The metal digs into my back as the door opens an inch before my weight pushes back against it again.
The heavy thud of Shane’s weight on the other side sends me flying, the door coming off the top hinge and twisting until the bottom one breaks free also.
I scoot back on the ground, the carpet burning me.
Shane stomps in, a pretty floral dress scrunched in his hand.
“I only said I couldn’t wear it.”
“No, you said we could stay in, but I’m sick of staying in.”
“Then I said I’d come if I could wear a hoodie.”
“Because you’re so fucking ungrateful. The dress isn’t good enough!” The dress barrels towards me, the shape and speed making it hit much harder in my stomach.
“It’s not baggy enough,” I cough out through tears. “I can wear my satin one.”
“No, Lancie, you’ll look like an idiot. Dressed up for a night out while having a casual dinner with my parents. Don’t make a fucking fool of us.” Shane’s foot slams into the wall, a small dent appearing on the first hit.
The dent grows when his sneaker meets it again, the crack spreading up the wall.
“You don’t have to be like this! Calm down.”
“Calm down? This is your fault! I don’t know why you’re hiding. You want a fucking argument! Admit it!”
I sit silently, pulling the dress out of the ball that leaves it with hundreds of creases.
Maybe I can make it work… to keep the peace.
“Admit it!” he shouts, kicking the wall again.
Cream-colored plaster flakes onto the carpet.
“ADMIT IT, LANCIE!”