One Night Madness

35th Madness

***

Tay.

I woke up to a very severe headache the next day. After I sent New to Alice's house last night, I went straight to the bar to drown myself in alcohol so I could somehow forget what happened. I couldn't even stand being in my unit alone as it would only remind me of New and how his laughter and rants filled every corner of my room. And that would only make me feel even sadder.

When I decided to confess the truth yesterday, I was so damn ready for his reaction.

Though I knew that he had every right to know the truth, I couldn't help but regret telling him or none of these would have happened.

I told myself to give him some time to think so instead of calling him, I tried to call Alice instead. But even before I could search through my contacts for her name, my father's name popped on the screen forcing me to answer him instead.

"Yes da-"

"You better come here or I'd take you off the family register."

That was all he said and just dropped the call. It was then that I realized that I got a lot of missed calls from him, my mom and even from Off. But considering how drunk I was last night, I didn't even notice all of them.

I just decided to follow my dad's order since I knew that disobeying him would not do me any good, especially that he sounded serious over the phone.

So despite of the headache I was still feeling, I drove all the way home.

But the scene I went home to wasn't something that I expected. There in the middle of the living room were my parents and Nannon who was busy playing with his phone. And for some reason, the atmosphere felt heavy. Like some kind of foreboding.

But what made me perturbed was the serious look on my parents' face—a total opposite of how they usually welcome me home.

"Hi. Is there anything wrong?" I asked in utter innocence but instead of answering, my dad just threw his phone on the table.

"You've got a lot of explaining to do, young man," my dad said in a reprimanding voice which made me even nervous.

"Oookay, you're scaring me," I joked as I got the phone and looked at whatever was on it.

But the moment my eyes saw what was on screen, I felt my world stop and my breaths labored as I tried to find the words to explain. But none came out of my mouth.

"Dad. This..this video..."

"How would you explain that, Tawan? You didn't even know that the people had already feasted on that video last night! If it didn't reach me, it would have still been on the social media platforms until now."

"Mom, dad, I can explain. That video was just nothing. I was so drunk that time! Nothing happened between me and Namtan!"

"But that was not the video suggests! Anyone who watches it would think that you did it!"

"Dad! I swear it was just nothing. And that even happened many years ago! That is of no relevance today. I was just drunk and Namtan happened to be there to help me."

"So you think being drunk gave you the right to take advantage of her?"

"Dad? I did not take advantage of her! I just, I-"

"Don't make up excuses for the mistakes that you did, Tay Tawan! I did not raise you to be irresponsible!"

"Dad, I'm your son! Don't you believe me?"

I heaved deep breaths as I let out my utter frustration. My hands and lips were trembling as I tried so hard not to shed a single drop of tear as the frustration within me was building up.