Page 20 of Save Me

I pull into Maddox’s lot, and the excited butterflies beat their wings against my chest. This is it!

Maddox lives in a brown brick apartment building I’ve driven by many times. Was I passing my soulmate, and I didn’t even know it? The thought makes me inexplicably sad. All those memories we missed out on!

I see Maddox step outside the building, and great heavens, the way the sun cuts his high cheekbones and his pretty pale skin makes my heart stop for a second. Then he turns that gaze on me, and it sucks the air from my lungs because he looks scared. Just like he did last night.

I’m out of the car and up to him before I can think better of it, and I’m right in front of him, smacked with the smell of alcohol.

“You okay?” Maddox’s voice is harsh, and I stop, looking up at him. His eyes are no longer strained; now they’re harsh, hard even. It makes me pause. Did I see the look I thought I did? Maybe it was a trick of the light.

“Oh, uh, yeah.” I rock back on my feet. Man, it reeks of alcohol. Maybe someone dumped a can of beer near here? I glance around the sidewalk.

“Is this your car?” Maddox breezes by me, and I catch a whiff of alcohol again, and my stomach ices over. He drinks?

Suddenly, I’m a teenager again, watching Dad crush beer after beer while Mom yells at him. I’m in the hallway in my socks. They don’t notice me over the sounds of the game on the TV, Mom’s hair illuminated by the glow. They yell, and each word makes my heart race faster. Always. They’re always like this, and they never change. It’s always the yelling and screaming every freaking night. Where are the parents who would take me out for cupcakes every Sunday–‘Cupcake Sunday’–and then let me stay up late watching movies? Where’s the Dad who would steal all my green M&M’s then run off shouting that he was the king and that it was ‘Dad Tax’? The Mom who would rub my back when I didn’t feel good and get me a soda?

To be fair, they haven’t done that for years. It’s like I got unbearable when I got older. That or I saw the real them.

Mom runs out of the room crying, heaving big, brokenhearted sobs. This time, it makes me angry. Why does she keep doing this? Keep staying with him when she’s not happy?

I stomp to the kitchen, looking for a snack, and when I can’t find anything I want, I slam the doors. Dad yells at me to ‘shut the fuck up.’

“Freaking freak,” I mumble under my breath. No real cusses, at least not American cusses. I refuse to be like Dad.

My mom’s sobs continue, and with a few more choice words, I go to her room.

“Mom, you gotta stop. You gotta leave him.”

She wails louder now that I’m here, and it makes me wince.

“Mom, please, you’re not happy. Just leave him and be happy.”

“You don’t understand,” she cries into her pillow, words muffled. And it pisses me off. Why is she the one acting like the kid right now?

I step around the mess that is her room. “I understand well enough. He’s a jerkface, and you’re choosing to stay and making us all miserable.”

Mom’s head shoots off the pillow at that, hair everywhere, and eyes red. “That’s not fair,” she hisses. “Your dad’s been under a lot of pressure providing this life for you, and this is what you have to say?”

For a second, I’m stunned, then my face gets hot. Is she defending the jerkface she was just crying over? I can’t stop the words; they just pour out of me.

“This life? You mean the life where no one pays attention to me? The life where he’s at work all day, and you’re in bed all day? Oh, but sure, tell me about the life he’s providing.”

“You ungrateful brat!” She spits the words at me. “He should have never gotten you that car.”

The venom she’s looking at me with makes me feel sick, and I catch the smell of alcohol on her breath, too.

“I don’t care about the car!” My eyes are burning with tears.

“Fine, we’ll sell it! I’ll use the money for my medical bills!”

“Fine!” I struggle to keep the tears from slipping down my face. It’s not about the freaking car. Why can’t she hear me?

I run to my room as the tears escape, and I cry angry tears. Snatching my pillow from the bed, I slam it down again and again. And then the angry tears turn to sad tears.

I don’t want Dad to kill himself for our lives. I don’t want to be a burden. Maybe I can do more. Get a job. Help pay for bills. They can sell my car; I don’t care. I just want them to be okay. If they’re okay, I’m okay. I just need to do more. I just need to help.

I stride from the room and past the living room. Mom continues to cry, and Dad continues to drink. I’m in the same house but invisible. Because I’ve always been invisible. I’m the one people look through to get to their loved ones.

Maybe if I helped more, that would change.