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“Areyou sure you want to do this?” Cal asks me for the eighth time in the last few minutes.
“Of course I don’t want to do this. If I don’t, she’s going to show up at your house,” I point out. . . again.
I’m meeting my mom for lunch and Cal is driving me. Because of course he is. We haven’t heard a peep from Brad in the weeks we’ve been home. I think it’s because he can’t leave his mom. She had a stroke right before I fled. I can’t say I feel sorry for her. The woman makes the evil Disney stepmoms look like nice ladies. I don’t think Brad is willing to sacrifice his visits with her by hurting someone who is now in the public eye and ending up in prison. No one else agrees with me, so here I am, being dropped off by my brother like I’m in high school again.
Cal’s offered to stay, but I know if he does, it’ll turn into a fight. Cal can do nothing wrong in my mom’s eyes, and all I can do is screw up.
My big brother hates that she sees us the way she does and constantly defends me. My mom hates that he’s alwaysdefending me. So they fight. It’s a cycle that I’m not really in the mood to witness today. So I’m sacrificing myself on the altar of sibling-dom and having lunch with her. That should buy us another few months of peace.
“Fine, but I’m sitting in the parking lot the whole time,” he says, and I just laugh. There’s no point in arguing. I know him too well. Even if he agrees not to stay in the parking lot, he’ll just be circling the restaurant until I’m done.
“Feel free to leave when people notice there’s a famous rockstar sitting in his car like a creep,” I joke. He shoots me a dirty look, making me laugh again.
He pulls his car up directly in front of the small steakhouse my mother chose. I’m sure it costs a fortune, and she expects me to pay. We got an advance from the label so I can afford it.
Cal shrinks in his seat, pulling his baseball cap down lower on his face, like hiding his hair and forehead suddenly makes him look less like Callahan Griffin. His antics make me chuckle again.
My good mood is ruined the moment I walk into the restaurant and see my mom waiting for me with a scowl on her face. Looking at my watch, I see I’m early, not late, like the scowl would imply.
The restaurant is nice. Dark wood floors and light blue walls. The tables are all square with white cloths and black metal chairs. The light fixtures hanging from the ceiling are long and black metal that match the chairs, with those old school looking light bulbs. I like the atmosphere of the place. I’d like it more without my mom here.
“Hi, Mom.” I take my seat across from her at the small square table, offering a smile that I hope seems genuine.
“Bellamy,” she replies, looking put out even though she’s the one who asked me to meet her here. Typical.
“So, how have you been?” I’m trying my hardest to be nice. I never understood my mother’s contempt towards me, and as I’ve gotten older, I’ve cared about it less and less.
“Have you heard from your father recently?” she asks, completely ignoring my question.
“Oh, uh, yeah. We text occasionally.” My dad hasn’t been around much since my parents divorced. I haven’t actually seen him in years, but we’ve always texted to stay in touch.
“Hmm,” is her only response.
Thankfully, the server picks that moment to come and take our orders. As expected, my mother orders the most expensive steak on the menu. I opt for a steak salad, which apparently was the wrong choice from the scoff coming from my mother.
“What’s wrong with salad?” I ask her once the server is out of earshot.
“Trying to be skinny for your current fling while being chunky when you were with the man you cheated on is absurd.”
I’m not chunky. Never have been. Even if I was, fuck changing how I look for a man.
Wait…
“Cheated? I never cheated on anyone.” Now it’s my turn to scowl. First, she’s telling me to go back to the man who abused me, now she’s saying I cheated on him? What the fuck?
She just scoffs again before placing the cloth napkin on her lap.
“Did you ask me here to see if Dad talks to me and accuse me of cheating on my abuser? Because if that’s the case, I’m going to be leaving.” I push my chair back and go to stand. Before my butt is even off the seat, she’s throwing a magazine at me.
Right on the cover is a picture of Brad and me in college. His arm is around my shoulder, and I’m smiling up at him. My hair is down and straightened because that’s how he liked it. His eyes are directly on the camera. I don’t know how I didn’t notice the coldness in his baby blues back then, but it’s obvious now. Brad has those all-American good looks with his blond hair and blue eyes. He’s attractive, and this picture was picked perfectly to highlight that.
“Shattered Halo’s Cheating Angel,” I read the title out loud. It’s not even a good title. Not that I expect much from these garbage people calling themselves reporters. I know what they’re doing. They picked a picture of Brad, front and center, where you can barely even see me, to garner sympathy for the handsome man who was wronged. It’s such a typical story and it always works. It might work on me if I wasn’t so over all this and ready for Brad to be out of my life for good.
“You stepped out on Bradley and he’s generous enough to forgive you. Yet you’re gallivanting around with that Irons boy and playing rockstar with your brother,” my mother says, looking at me through her cold, calculating eyes. Eyes that are the same dark blue as mine, but so much more piercing.
I pushed back on the self-doubt that I’ve been working so hard on. My mother has a way of bringing it rushing to the surface. Like maybe she wants me to break.
“I left him because he put his hands on me. Because he manipulated me into giving up family and friendships,” I say as calmly as I can, trying not to cause a scene in the middle of a restaurant. “And not that it’s any of your business, but Kai and I didn’t start dating until two months after I left Brad.”
