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I’m pulled from my sleep by the shrill ringing of my phone. Disorientated, I fumble around in the bed for it, smacking my hand against something warm and hard. My eyes spring open and I see Tex tangled in the sheets beside me.
I thought it was a dream.
Locating my phone, I glance bleary-eyed at the screen. It’s four AM and my mum is calling. Why? I hit answer and straight away she launches into a drunken tirade about what a shit daughter I am for not answering sooner. Carefully, so as not to disturb Tex, I climb off the bed and slip out into the lounge, closing the door soundlessly behind me.
My mum only calls once a month, and as much as I hate those short phone conversations where she basically belittles and bullies me, I love them too. It’s pretty twisted; she treats me like crap, but I take it because she’s the only family I have. Biological family at least.
The guys are my real family – I know that – but it’s still hard to let go of the bonds of blood.
“You’re not even listening to me, madam, are you?” my mother screeches down the line, pulling me from my thoughts.
“I’m sorry, mama, I am,” I whimper contritely, trying to placate her. Even now, all these years later and across a phone line, I try to make myself as small as possible to avoid her wrath.
“Don’t you lie to me, girl! You’re such an ungrateful brat. I slaved away for years to put food on the table for you and now you’ll see me starve! Where’s the thanks?”
“Starve? What do you mean, mama?” I ask, worried. Even though I know what she really means: she has drunk the money that was meant for food, and has now run out.
“Ha, well you’d know exactly what I’m talking about with those stellar listening skills of yours, wouldn’t you?” she crows.
“I’m sorry, mama,” I repeat, taking a deep breath and trying to clear my head. My shoulders are already up around my ears and my jaw hurts from clenching it so hard. With a real effort, I try to force myself to relax. “Please go over it one last time and I’ll see what I can do.”
She starts a long rambling story about how her latest piece of shit boyfriend gambled her money away and I listen, dejected, as she becomes a walking, talking cliché. My mind starts to wander again but I’m snapped back to the present when she declares, “And that is why I need five grand. Tomorrow.”
“Five grand, mama?” I gasp. That’s such an incredible amount of money. Money I don’t have. “I don’t have that kind of money. Especially since I’m not working…”
“What do you mean, you’re not working?” she snaps. Crap. I didn’t mean to let that slip.
“I...I’ve been sick, mama. I haven’t been able to work in a while,” I lie. I couldn’t stomach telling this woman what really happened to me and then being lectured on how it was all my fault.
“What kind of sick?” she asks, sounding suspicious and not at all worried about her only child in the slightest.
“It doesn’t matter, mama. I’m getting better now. I can probably send you a couple of hundred from my savings – for the essentials – but I just don’t have the means to lend you the rest.”
Ha. Who are we both kidding? It wouldn’t be a loan anyway. Never is.
“Can’t you ask those rich ass fancy boyfriends of yours? Surely they want to help out the mama of the girl they love.”
There’s so much wrong with that statement, I don’t even know where to begin. Although, with what Tex and I just did...does it change things? I bite my lip, worrying that I’ve gone and fucked things up again.
“I’m sorry, mama,” I sigh again. “But I just can’t help out this time.”
“You’re such a waste of space,” she snarls, instantly turning nasty when she realises I’m not about to hand over her next meal ticket. Or in her case, drink ticket. “I should have aborted you in that backstreet clinic with a dirty needle when I had the goddamn chance! All your life you’ve bled me dry, you ungrateful little brat, and now just because you’re whoring yourself out to some rich assholes, you think you’re too good to look after your mama!”
I contemplate hanging up, I really do, but I know that she’ll just keep blowing up my phone until she runs out of steam. She’s slurring her words, but I know she’s still got a few hours of ranting still in her.
It’s nothing I haven’t heard from her before, but it still stings. I try to build walls around my heart, grow a thicker skin, but she’s my mum. Isn’t she supposed to be the person who always has my back? Who loves me unconditionally? It isn’t right.
Instead she’s a poison. One which leaches into my system and hides, slowly destroying my soul with every insult and barb thrown my way in drunken anger.
“I’m sorry, mama,” I whisper, tears forming in my eyes. I wish I were stronger. I wish I could help her. I wish I could walk away.
“The only time you’ve ever been any goddamn use to me was when I sold you to that nice medical student guy and his friends. Fat lot of good it did me! They turned up demanding their money back, saying that you ran away. Useless fucking bitch, you couldn’t even open your legs right and then die properly for your mama!”
“What?” My heart stops beating, stalling painfully in my chest. I clutch it, letting the phone fall from my grasp, where it lands face up on the sofa beside me, my mother’s tinny screeching voice still blaring from the speaker.
“Callie?” Tex calls. “What’s wrong?”
I look up at him through a flood of tears streaming down my face and shake my head.
