I scroll through my phone absent-mindedly looking through the pictures I couldn’t bring myself to delete because that’d be the final removal of Ruby from my life.
Dylan’s here, I should’ve called him weeks ago. I had a chance to talk to him about this in Germany, but I’m unsure he understands anymore. I lost him like I lost everybody else—pushed and pushed until I became such a pain in the ass that he gave up on me. I swallow hard and look to the concern in his eyes. If there’s one person in the world I can share this shit with, it’s Dylan.
“This happened.” I click over to my messages and throw the phone back. Dylan’s brows tug together as he reads.
“Marie? What the hell, Jem. Why screw around?”
“You too? People have such a high opinion of my morals,” I say sarcastically.
“So who’s this?” I cross my arms and wait for the penny to drop. His eyes widen. “Is this… Jem, is this your mum?”
I clap my hands slowly as Dylan carefully puts the phone on the coffee table. “Good guess.”
“You seen her?” he says in a low voice.
“Yeah, but won’t be seeing her again anytime soon.”
Dylan rubs his forehead, the concern softening the frustrated anger he had a few minutes ago. “Whoa. No wonder your head’s fucked. Does Ruby know?”
“No. Why would she?”
“Because when you’re in a relationship you kinda discuss this shit!” he says in exasperation.
“We’re not in a relationship anymore.”
“Because of this?”
“No. Leave it. You have your answer.” I stand. I can’t discuss Ruby as well as my mum; this is too much.
“A clusterfuck like this, Jem? Why the hell didn’t you call me before?”
“Dealing in my own way.”
Dylan stands too. “I’m here, Jem. I understand this. You know that.”
Dylan was the first person who ever found out what was happening in my screwed up childhood. He was in a bad place too, his dad had left, and he shared my anger. Everything came out one day and the next time Mum went away, Dylan told his mum he was staying over at mine. And the next time, and time after that, until Dylan was always there for me when she wasn’t. We’d go back to my place and get drunk. We were twelve years old.
One night Dylan picked up my guitar and I started to teach him with the aid of one of my ‘how to play guitar’ books. Our shared bond over the hurt surrounding us found its way into another outlet, the one that bonded our lives forever after. Music. We were shit when we first started playing covers of classics, but three years later we began writing our own stuff.
Not long after, we discovered Liam, Bryn, and Blue Phoenix. Then we found drugs and fame until eventually me and Dylan frequently lost each other. He’s the only person I’ve ever let in and that’s only through a lot of shoving on his part.
“Mum is dying.”
Worried he might hug me, I step back.
Dylan chews on the corner of his lip. “Shit, Jem,” he says softly.
“Pretty much.”
“And you’ve seen her?” Dylan sits again, watching me with the old concern.
“Yeah. First time since she left me.”
All those years ago, I never knew Mum had left for good this time, not for a while. The days after I realised she was never coming back were numb. A week later, I fell apart, and so began the pattern for my life: switch off and if I can’t numb myself, I use something to help me. I think I was drunk for two weeks straight. Right now, I’m close to stepping back to that place.
Dylan was there, all those years ago, supporting, channelling my destructive needs into writing new songs and pushing me into music as my salvation. One person in the world knows who I am behind the Jem Jones mask, and I’ve also pushed him away when he’s grown too close.
Two people, Jem.I shake the thought away.