Book I: to cross oceans for [BxB] (trans) - completed

Hiding Places - Danny

Something had shifted.

It wasn’t one single thing or event I could point my finger at. Things just weren’t the same.

There was a space around me where before the had been only Shawnie. It was this almost physical thing I could reach out and touch but didn’t know where It had come from.

And now this? In what universe was telling Turner a good idea? And how could Keanna encourage this ridiculous plan?

I sighed and walked into the kitchen, my stomach rumbling. I adored Mrs. Lawton, but she couldn’t cook to save her life.

Who boiled an entire block of cheese to make lasagna?

I stoped in the doorway to the kitchen. My mother was sitting at the small formica table, nursing a bottle of vodka.

She hadn’t been home when I’d gotten here after detention. I couldn’t help but wish she still wasn’t.

Guilt settled in the pit of my stomach at that thought. I had no right to judge her or to wish her gone. Not after everything I’d done. What I’d taken from her.

“You're back?” her words were slurred but the contempt was still clear.

“I was next door with-"

“The Lawton kid.” She spat out the words and took another drink from her glass. “Bad influence, that one.”

I fought the urge to correct her. There was no point. In a few hours she wouldn’t even remember this conversation. And I didn’t care what she thought about Shawnie. I didn’t.

“Kid needs a dad to grow up proper.” She said, nodding sagely at her own words. “Or maybe not. You had a dad. Still turned out trash.” dry laughter and a hiccup followed her words.

“Did you even go to work today?” I tried to keep the hurt and anger out of my voice but wasn’t very successful.

“Don’t take that tone with me! I mind my business.” She shouted, not even bothering to look at me.

She brought the glass to her lips again but it was empty. She frowned and reached for the bottle but knocked it over with her clumsy fingers.

I hurried forward, but wasn’t fast enough. It fell to the floor, breaking into multiple pieces and drenching the carpet with alcohol.

“Look what you did!” she shouted at me, stumbling to her feet. “Ungrateful piece of shit! What else are you going to take from me?”

Tears gathered in her eyes. Those same black-as-coal eyes I saw every time I looked in the mirror. Pain and grief making them all the more similar to mine.

For a long moment there was no sound in the kitchen other than her drunken sobs.

“Come on, mom. Let's get you to bed.”

“Don’t touch me!” she exclaimed with a wobbly voice, stumbling again and falling on her ass.

I wanted to cry. To scream and beg her to go back to being the smiling woman in the pictures she'd locked away in the attic. The mother that had been absent for years now.

I helped her to her feet and down the hall to the bathroom. I waited outside the shower and then helped her get ready for bed.

“Ungrateful piece of shit.” She spat  before closing the door to her room in my face.

I waited outside her door and listened to her drunken footsteps as she made her way across it and to the bed.

I stood there until the quiet of the house was interrupted only by the hum of the electrical appliances.