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“Get out of my fucking driveway!” she yelled.
I ran a hand through my hair and narrowed my eyes, passing Alastair and Lev without a glance as I made my way to her car.
“Mom, how are they supposed to get out of the driveway if your car is blocking them?” I asked, in the calmest voice I could manage through my irritation. One thing I knew from dealing with my mom—ifyoulost it,shelost it. She’d probably lose it anyway, but if I did, too, things would get ten times worse.
“Who the fuck are all these people, Tobias?”
“They’re my friends. They’re helping me move out.” I might as well lay it out for her.
“Looks like you’re having a party,” she said, staring at Alastair and Lev and Esther.
“Hi, Mrs. Dunn,” Esther said with a little wave. “How are you?”
“You remember Esther, right?” I said, through gritted teeth. We’d only been friends for like…always.
My mom stared at Esther and didn’t say anything.
“Mom,” I said, somehow keeping my voice steady and firm. “I’m getting some of my things and I’m moving in with my boyfriend. Can you give me half an hour?” I dug in my back pocket for the four twenties I’d been planning to use to order a pizza later, as a thank you to them all for the help they’d given me. “Here. You can go get an early lunch or something…on me.”
She stared at the money. I could see the wheels in her head turning. Shewantedthe money. She always wanted the money. But she also wanted to punish me. She stuck her head half out of the window.
“You all need your heads examined. Tobias isn’t moving out. Why would he? He’s got it good right here with me, and he knows it.”
I hung my head as someone approached. I hoped to God it wasn’t Alastair.
“Hey, Mrs. Dunn? Toby has been sleeping on my couch for the past few weeks, so he didn’t have to come back here. We just went to his room, and it’s been completely fucked over by someone—and my guess is, it was you.”
My mom stared at Esther like she was garbage. “You always were a piece of shit. No doubt it’s been you telling my son lies about me.”
“And what lies would those be, Mrs. Dunn?”
“That I’m a shitty mom and a drug addict and he’s better off nowhere near me.”
Esther stared at my mom, and actually looked happy, as if she’d been waiting years for this moment.
“All I know is that Toby is miserable living here with you. And he’s old enough to decide for himself where he wants to be.” She leveled a stare at my mom and held her hand out to me, palm up. I gave her the eighty bucks. She pocketed two of the twenties and waved the rest in my mom’s startled face. “I suggest you take this money and go use it for whatever… I don’t care. Come back in half an hour and we’ll be gone, and you can have your fucking driveway back.” She glanced at the rest of us, then back at my mom. “Or I’m calling the cops.”
My mom looked nervous when Esther said that. Esther and I both knew there were drugs in this house, probably a few different stashes.
“You can’t prove anything.”
Esther smiled then, and I mentally prepared myself for what I knew she had kept in her back pocket all these years, ready for a moment like this.
“Hey, you remember a while back when you were on a cocaine bender, and you broke Toby’s nose?”
My mom didn’t say anything. I was sure she remembered that. I know I did.
“I took pictures. Toby didn’t want to press charges. I didn’t make him, even though I thought he should have. But I still have the pictures. He was fourteen when that happened. You want to go to jail for child abuse, Mrs. Dunn?”
For the first time, my mom looked less than confident. “I didn’t mean to break his nose. I said I was sorry.”
“Take the money.”
My mom stared at the money, then she looked at me, and I knew the waterworks were coming.
“Tobias, I’m sorry. You know I never meant to hurt you…”
“Just. Go,” I said. Two distinct words. “If you really are sorry, just go—and I’ll never bother you again.”
