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I’ve been many times. I even purchased a house there and am planning to open up another branch of my company there, too. In Pennsylvania. Near Camille. Why? I guess I like torturing myself the same way I like torturing others.
I’ve been messing with Camille a little bit from a distance. She’s about to get married, and the thought of her having a happy life with another man after what she did to me is like a splinter in my soul.
She needs to be punished.
I haven’t given in to my darkest impulses. I fight against them every day, but I make sure that she’s always unsettled and on edge.
“I’m sure you’re not calling your mother a liar.” My father’s voice drips with ice, and I see a flash of anger in his eyes. He’s so protective of her.
“D’arcy. He’s not.” My mother lays her hand on his arm.
The only time they disagree is when I’m here.
A dull sickness settles inside me. They shouldn’t have come.
But here they are. They made the effort so I will make an effort too for a few more minutes. Then I’ll tell them I’m tired and need to rest.
I look at my father. “Come on, Father. We all know she has those premonitions about America. It’s understandable she’d be relieved my trip was delayed.”
He relaxes just a little. “Yes. She does seem to be strangely fond of you,” he says, going for the joking tone.
The easy banter that comes so naturally to him and my siblings. Francois calls him “old man” and offers to buy him a cane. My father playfully cuffs his head, ha ha ha. He mocks my sister Odette for having terrible taste in bands and has made up a name for the music style she likes. He calls it Cats in Heat Being Fed Through a Lawnmower, so she gets a T-shirt with that printed on it, complete with graphics, and gives it to him as a birthday present, ho ho ho.
Such the happy fucking family.
My mother frowns, leaning back in her chair. “Delayed? You shouldn’t travel for quite some time, having been through an accident like this. Maybe it’s a sign.”
A ghost of suspicion whispers through me. I have excellent instincts. I know when people are lying to me or withholding. My mother is currently doing just that, and I have to wonder…
Something’s going on here, something so insane, so foreign to everything that I believe, that I don’t even want to acknowledge it. She’s deliberately trying to keep me from something.
“I’ll go in a month or two,” I tell her, and her forehead pinches in dismay. She glances at my father, and he frowns.
Oh, they’re definitely keeping secrets.
“I was hoping you would consider coming back home and helping me with my company. We’re running into some problems, and I could really use your assistance.” His words ring in my ears, false and tinny. My father never asks for help. And my brothers are every bit as skilled in the field of computer security as I am. He doesn’t need me.
Why are they lying to me?
“Did you ask them to shave my hair?” I blurt out to my mother, needing to get off this train of thought.
“Excuse me?” Her answer is just a microsecond too slow, and I see the flare of panic in her eyes, and now my father is looking angry, but it’s a manufactured, put-on anger. I can tell.
Fuck.
“There are no stitches or staples or bumps on my head. There would be no reason for them to cut my hair.”
“I’m sure I wouldn’t know anything about that,” she says. That’s bullshit. The way she said it. Giving me a non-answer that sounds like an answer.
I’m tired of my parents micromanaging my life to an insane level. Taking advantage of me being in a week-long coma from a car accident tocut my fucking hairthe way my mother preferred?
My mother’s got a thing about long hair on men. She hates it. My father always keeps his hair cut very short, and my brothers gave in to it on her insistence. She also has this thing about beards and goatees—every man in our family, except me, wears one. Oddly, she didn’t really care what we wore, as long as it was clean, pressed, and stylish, but she obsessed about our hair.
The question is… why?
I never considered the why behind it before, but now, it’s a giant red flag.
“I’ll look over my medical records and find out why my hair was cut,” I say to her, meeting her gaze, and her eyes drop. My father leaps to his feet, his fists clenched, and instantly, my mother’s on her feet too.
