Love Letters

Love Letters (Part 31)

Note: Everyone's been asking for longer parts so today I tried to make it a little bit lengthier, let me know what you think!

Jem

We returned home a day later than we had initially planned but I’m glad we did. In those four days, I’d had more fun than I’d anticipated. Benny and I had asked to meet Ethan’s new girlfriend but she was due to return from her holiday two days after we returned home and we knew we couldn’t stick around for that long.

With promises to meet up again and thanking Ethan and his mother for their hospitality, Benny and I left. He was excited to return home and see Charlie and his family. I knew I was going home to an empty house since my parents would probably be at work by the time we got home.

When we finally got to our station we were both knackered and rather reluctantly dragged our belongings behind us. Sometimes I felt like staying on the bus or the train even after my stop, I liked the movement and the speed of the train and the regularity of the bus route. You knew what to expect at every stop and even came to guess how busy each stop would be.

I finally got home, opened the front door and almost fell asleep on the ‘Welcome Home’ mat. Someone had picked up the mail and left it on the letter rack, probably one of my parents before they’d left for work. I picked out the letters addressed to me; a bank statement and Tyler’s letter. Though I wasn’t exactly full of energy, I wasn’t as tired anymore. I read the letter on the spot and savoured every last word.

So, he’d split up with his girlfriend. I felt a rather sadistic smile creeping on to my face and felt ashamed of myself. How dare I feel happy when Tyler, my friend, someone I cared for, was obviously upset? Deep down I knew the answer to my own question, I knew why I was happy that things hadn’t worked out for them.

I’d known for a while that I’d started to fall for Tyler, my own hero of sorts who saved me with his words. They say the pen is mightier than the sword and they were absolutely right. It hadn’t taken muscles and strength to win me over; I was enticed by his writing.

That said, I didn’t believe that I could’ve fallen for Tyler for one obvious reason. I had no idea what he looked like, I knew nothing of his physical appearance and I probably wouldn’t ever find out. There was one other problem, suppose I did love him, what next? It’s not like we had a future together and I’d be crazy if I were to suggest that I would’ve been happy to exchange letters for the rest of our lives.

Sometimes, it’s hard to say something but I’d come to realise that sometimes it was harder not to say something. I pushed my feelings down and refused to let them re-arise, hoping that they'd go away.

‘You never quite forget your first love.’ Wise words I’d heard from the mouths of many actresses and actors, those who were playing the role of lovesick individuals. I felt myself wishing that I was wrong, that I wasn’t in love with Tyler, being confused would’ve been a hell of a lot better than being in love.

It was only when I’d finished reading my letter than I heard the sound of the television in the front room, which was strange. My parents weren’t supposed to be home before six and it was only four just then. I considered the prospect of a burglary but what kind of burglar would stop to watch television?

I removed my mum’s vase from the hallway and cautiously snuck up to the door; I closed my eyes and gulped before violently pushing the door forward, vase raised above my head. The sight I saw surprised me so much I dropped the vase on my shoulder but didn’t even acknowledge the thud as it hit the floor.

There he sat, the infamous Parker Michaels, the dark horse of our family, my older brother.

He was slumped on the sofa, feet up on the coffee table so casually, as though he’d been there all along. I managed to trip backwards and caught myself just in time.

‘…Parker?’ I asked in disbelief, gaping at him. He was fully suited out with shiny black shoes and a navy tie against a white shirt.

‘Hey there kiddo,’ he replied, smiling as he looked me over. ‘You’ve grown quite a bit.’

‘Well yeah jerk. It’s been seven years since you went AWOL so obviously I did a bit of growing up.’

Parker laughed a hearty laugh looked behind me.

‘Guess some things just don’t change, you guys didn’t think to change that wallpaper?’ He asked, pointing at the wallpaper in the living room.

I shook my head and was about to ask him why he’d come back, why then?

I wondered how he got into the house and whether my parents knew he was home.

‘Actually mum called me yesterday morning and I decided I’d pop round for a visit.’ He said, answering my question before I asked it, like he used to.

‘Pop round for a visit.’ Since when had Parker started coming around for a visit?

Funny how the day he was arrested everyone stopped talking about him like he hadn’t existed and then as soon as he came home we forgot all the negativity we’d harboured for him all those years.

On June 15th there had been a knock on the front door and there were two police officers, ready to take Parker away. My father refused to pay for a lawyer for him claiming that Parker had gotten himself in to the mess and it was just as well since the case against Parker was so strong he was sentenced almost immediately. Three long years he spent in jail and three long years our household had been in mourning.

By the time he was ready to be released my father had forgiven him and claimed that he hoped those three years had taught my brother a lesson. My mother readied the house for his return, she put up banners, made a cake and invited close family around but my brother never came home. Instead we got a phone call from a friend of his who claimed that Parker wanted to talk to us.

He told us that he wasn’t coming home and that my parents only had themselves to blame for it, he told them that they’d neglected him to such an extent that they had produced a criminal and he had done the time for their crime. He said he wasn’t coming back and that it should be a lesson to them, they’d already messed up one of their children; he hoped they wouldn’t do the same for me.

I begged my parents to let me talk to him, thirteen years old and without a voice. My dad refused to let either me or my mother speak to Parker and told him he couldn’t care less what he did, my father was washing his hands clean of a son he’d rather have dead, and he hung up.

I know my dad regretted what he said straight after, he never told us so but he was so infuriated at himself. His eyes burned red and he smashed the phone against the wall in anger, probably at himself.

My mother didn’t speak of Parker to him for a while in case he lost his temper again and decided she would speak to him when things died down, I followed my mum’s lead and that’s when things between my father and I got bad. We stopped talking and I stopped listening to him when he talked. As far as I knew, he was the reason why I would never see my big brother again.

It became a part of our lives to not talk about Parker anymore, my mother just hoped he’d see sense and come home and my dad pretended he’d never existed and I accepted their decisions and prayed that one day, someday, Parker would come and take me away to wherever he’d gone.

Years passed and Parker still didn’t come home and my parents stopped caring and I stopped remembering my brother. I’d only been ten when he’d been jailed so my memories of him were scarce anyway; I had my own problems to deal with.

And then he came back, Parker with a criminal record, Parker whose face I thought I’d forgotten, Parker who tapped me on the shoulder, calling me back to reality since I was so lost in thoughts about him.