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“Like my mother?” I whisper hoarsely, watching the words injure him. Watching his eyes snap shut as if he can erase a lifetime of deceit so easily.
My mother knew all about Ike Ellis long before I did. And she would’ve learned the hard way, just like I did.
He was a womanizer. A fiend. When he had his health he drank and did what he pleased, including dipping his wick into anything that didn’t cry for help.
The irony of all of that is, he blamed my mother for everything. And when she got sick, he started blaming me.
Still does. Once she died. Everything was my fault. Even all his own failings.
“You can’t blame me forever, Papa.” I remind him. Deliberately choosing to call him that. Forcing his mind back to easier times. Before I learned to despise him. Before I could match his hands with a fist of my own.
“If you wanna blame something, blame yourself.” I sigh, glancing at my new watch so he can see it. “…I wasn’t gonna stay. Got a plane to catch.” I add. Watching some relief spread over his features.
“But seeing as there’s some bad weather coming in. I think I will stay. At least until it clears. I’ll have Grosvenor set an extra place.”
Give myself some time to claim what’s mine…
Rallying himself, he opens his mouth again to speak, but a sudden and loud crashing sound, followed by a scream soon after stops him.
I stay glued to the spot, my head cocked and my heart stabbing to pounding in two beats. Already frantic because I know it’s Eve. Kicking myself for taking my eyes of her for a moment. But if my father’s onto me already I don’t want to make my need for her so obvious. Not to him anyway. And not just yet.
But as he does his best to launch into action, lifting himself out of his chair. It’s Eve’s flushed face and heaving chest I turn my head to see filling the doorway that’s sprung open.
“Ike! Sorry…” She gasps, glancing at my father then me. Looking like as if I might’ve been something she imagined earlier but is now painfully real. And my mind’s instantly at ease seeing her again. And in one piece.
The still swollen organ in my pants front flexing extra hard at the sight and scent of her. Her sweet, unmistakable scent that only a girl of her youth and innocence can have fills my senses.
Her eyes are wide and wild. Shifting from fear to a question once she spots me.
Asking the silent questions question I already have all the answers for, but obviously now’s not the time to show any of them.
“What is it Eve!?” My father exclaims. His lower lip pumping like a fish.
“It’s Ricky!” Eve whines. “He’s- He’s gonna kill Ronnie!”
Chapter 4
Eve
Leaving Ike to talk with his son and my new step brother Ezekiel, I go back upstairs to mama. Hearing her remind me to stand up straight and to call her ‘mother’ instead of mama.
“Ike’s spent a ton on those elocution lessons darlin’,” she drawls in her own broad, natural way of speaking.
The kind of talk rich folk as we used to call ‘em don’t have, but we’re both trying hard to change. To fit in. To not screw this up.
But it’s not my speech or where we sprang from that she's really worried about. It’s my twin brothers.
Mama knows as well as I do if there’s anyone who could mess things up for us all, it's those two.
She’s part way through reminding me how to act like a young lady as well as ask if I’ve seen my brothers Ricky and Ronnie.
But before I can even tell her I haven't. We both get the answer in a way that makes us both turn pale.
They promised to behave. To not act like wild men. But as mama, I meanmotherkeeps reminding me, they both take after their real daddy. And I know mama thanks the lord every day that I didn’t turn out like them. And also that I was too young to remember what life was like when daddy was around.
The faint, guttural curses followed by some dull thuds from downstairs sees both mama and I leaping for the door. Both of us knowing from experience that not only have the twins broken their promise, they sound like they’re setting a new record for how long it takes them to ruin everything.
They’re shouting and bawling by the sounds of it once we reach the stairs, sounding every bit as drunk as they promised not to get. And when Ronnie and Ricky get the liquor in them, there’s always trouble.
