“You.” The loud voice is directed at me and it makes my body jump. Director Stevens points right at me, his voice bellowing in the confines of the set as he shouts, “Get off the set!”
Chapter 6
Nathan
Ten years ago
January 1
* * *
She can’t make up her mind.
One day Hally loves me and I feel it. Down to the very core of who I am. And then I do something like say the wrong thing, and all of a sudden I don’t appreciate her or whatever the hell she’s prone to saying when she yells at me.
I don’t know how to react or handle her. All it does is turn me on if I’m honest with myself. I hate the outcome though. It’s easy for her to say things that hurt. Just as easy as it is for her to say the words that make me feel like I’m worth something to her.
She’ll say she’s sorry. She’ll say she doesn’t mean it.
She does all the talking, and that’s the problem.
I sit in my car outside my house and think about the fight over and over. I know I could have just said I was sorry and I don’t want to see her upset. That would have made her pause at least. That’s my problem though, my dad made sure I learned not to speak up when I’m being yelled at.
The heat from outside is already leaking into the car, so I pull the keys out and make my way to 2204 Winston Street. I ignore everyone else as I get out of the car and walk inside. The steps are old, made of rough stone and uneven. I’ve fallen down them a few times as a kid, and they’re the reason for the scar on my upper thigh.
I’m quiet when I walk in, listening to the sound of the TV playing in the living room. Taking a quick look in, I see Ma passed out in front of it. I don’t know if she has night shift tonight or not, but I don’t wake her up. I never do.
Not unless I want the shit beat out of me.
I thought Dad was bad until he split, but that’s when Ma just took his place. Before I turn to go up the stairs, I see bottles lined up on the table in the kitchen. The pizza box from last night is there, open and empty, so at least I know she ate. Even though it looks like she had an entire case of beer along with it.
The old wooden stairs creak as I make my way up, two steps at a time. The higher I get, the hotter it gets, like stagnant heat.
I don’t know why I even came home this early.
My bookbag smacks against the wall of my bedroom, right next to the nightstand. Along with my bed, they’re the only furniture in the room. Even with the fan still going, it’s hot as hell in my room.
If Hally hadn’t snapped, I’d be with her. It’s fucked up that I miss her; I know I can’t keep her. Maybe one day if I come back to this town, like years from now, when I have a chance to do something with my life, we can be together again. Maybe then I could come get her and hold onto her.
But she’d still get pissed, and I still won’t know how to say the right things.
I used to wonder if it was my fault that I didn’t get along with my mother. I thought maybe it was the same as it was with Hally. That I just didn’t know how to do the right thing. I tried though.
I swear I did. I thought maybe there was a silent truce between us, an unspoken love. My mother went through phases, with the drugs, the boyfriends. Whatever it was, I was quiet and stayed out of it, unless she needed me.
She kicked me out when I stopped her fuck-of-the-week boy toy from beating the shit out of her. He wasn’t the first to smack her around. Just like Dad used to.
She didn’t even give me clothes, nothing. Just kicked me out and then let him beat the shit out of me on the street. It was only days after what happened to Hally. It was my fault for reacting, I think. But I couldn’t let him pull her hair and smack her around.
For months I tried to go back home; I didn’t have a place to stay and just moved from one friend’s house to the next, looking for a place to crash. I thought when he left, things would go back to what they were for me and my mom.
But I was eighteen, almost out of high school and therefore, not her problem anymore. Or so she told me.