Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 94609 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94609 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
“Stop that right now,” PaPa ordered, his nose scrunched up as he walked over to me and took my hand in his. “Don’t speak like that in front of Theo.”
“He should know! I hate him, I hate him, I hate him,” she sobbed. She turned toward me and narrowed her eyes. “You ruined my life. Everything good I’ve ever had was ruined the day you were born,” she accused.
My chest burned and I felt seconds away from vomiting.
I cried and my whole body started to shake as my stomach sat in knots. I needed to use the bathroom. I needed to throw up. I needed Mom to love me.
Why doesn’t she love me?
How could I have been a better son?
PaPa shook his head as he pulled me behind him. He stood straight and puffed his chest out toward my mother. “Don’t you ever speak to that boy like that again, or you’ll never speak to him again.”
“Good,” Mom said. “I never want to speak to him. I wish I’d never had him.”
She spat toward my feet with nothing but darkness in her eyes.
“I won’t keep him around this. Deal with Christina. I’ll look after Theo,” PaPa said to Grandma before he pulled me around to the back of the house.
PaPa stayed close to my side as we stood on the dock behind his house, looking out toward the lake for a long time. The sky was fast asleep. PaPa and Grandma’s house was quiet. It wasn’t quiet an hour or so ago when my mother decided she didn’t want to be my mother anymore.
She was running off with some guy who had a motorcycle because I was the kid she never really wanted. Grandma yelled at Mom and begged her to stay. They said how much I needed her, and they were right. I loved my grandparents, but I needed my mom, too.
It seemed she didn’t need me back.
Grandma always said it wasn’t Mom who said hurtful things to me, but it was the kind of drugs she used that made her not be herself. She and PaPa tried to make me feel better about Mom not being nice to me. Sure, she loved me, but she didn’t like me very much. I often felt she only loved me because society said she had to.
After Mom yelled back that she should’ve had an abortion, I felt my heart break. I didn’t know anyone could actually feel a heart break, but I felt it in my chest—the tightness that appeared.
I heard a motorcycle pull off, and I was certain Mom was on the back of it.
I kept biting the inside of my cheek to the point I could taste my own blood. I didn’t care. I didn’t care about much of anything anymore. Every few minutes, PaPa would squeeze my hand, almost as if he were reminding me to breathe. I didn’t know I could forget to breathe until God gave me a mom who didn’t want me.
“It’s all right, Theo. We’re gonna be all right,” PaPa said, his voice deep and raspy from all the cigarettes and cigars he’d smoked. He hadn’t lit one in a few hours, but I could still smell the scent imprinted on his clothes. I used to hate it. Now, the smell reminded me of home.
“You boys need to come back inside,” Grandma called as she walked down a few of the steps on the back porch. She didn’t reach the bottom, but she waved us over. Grandma loved a lot of things in life, but makeup was her favorite pastime. That afternoon, she didn’t wear a drop of it.
“We’ll be just a minute,” PaPa shouted back toward her.
“Make it less than that,” she ordered before she headed back inside.
PaPa squeezed my hand once more.
Breathe.
I took a breath.
“I d-d-don’t want to go back in there,” I softly said, stumbling over my words. That was another thing my mom hated about me—the way I stuttered.
“Yeah. Me neither,” PaPa agreed as he brushed his hand against his white beard. Last year, some kids in our small town confused PaPa for Santa Claus and asked if they could sit on his lap. He let them, and they told him what they wanted for Christmas. He made sure each of those kids got the exact gift they requested, too. That was who PaPa was, though. In many ways, he was Santa Claus, and whenever I’d come to his and Grandma’s house, it felt like being at Santa’s workshop. There were always cookies, love, and any gift I could ever want.
PaPa slid his hands into the pockets of his slacks. He stared out at the water and said, “So let’s not go back in there.”
I looked up at him, confused. “But Grandma—”
“Grandma will be all right for a bit of time. She’ll know where we are.”