Afternoon Run (Camren)

nineteen; ❝defend yourself❞

"Those lessons were great," I tell my girlfriend on the phone.

I softly yawn as I pull my covers down, getting out of bed.

"Mhm. Yes, yes I was in bed," I say, answering her questions. "I just needed sleep."

"Don't you always get sleep?" She asks, a new concern in her tone.

"Well, yeah but when I stay over at your house, you know we don't always end up sleeping as much as we should be!" I yell, reminding her of the past times where we had been busy with other things instead of sleeping.

"Fine, fine," she says, lightly laughing. "I guess you just won't stay at my house anymore— so you can have your sleep."

"No! I wasn't complaining!"

She laughs and as she does, a loud knock comes on my door.

"Oh, I have to go," I tell her. "I'll talk to you later though."

"Ok," is all she says before she hangs up.

I get up and open my door, angry when I find that it's Michael. Of course, he has to show up and ruin everything.

"What the hell are you doing here? And at this time? Leave!"

"Look, Camila, I already talked to mom and she let me come up here to talk to you."

"Like hell!" I yell at him and I try to shove him out of my room as he tries to enter.

Turns out, my weak power is no match for his strong stance.

"I want to talk to you," Michael says, raising his hands and shrugging.

I roll my eyes and tell him, "you have one minute. That's it."

He nods head, beginning with, "I told mother that I'm sorry. I just— I let myself get manipulated by dad and I tried to manipulate you two. I refused to admit it to myself for forever but I finally admitted it. He's a monster and he destroyed everything he touched. I'm glad he's gone now though because who knows what other shit he would have done."

"Ok."

"I came to apologize to both of you because I really messed things up between us but I want us to be a family again. All those times I wanted to come visit here, dad would forbid me from and he punished me for it. It was horrible and eventually, he made me try to hate you two. I realized though— I can't hate you two! The whole time I thought it was you and mother lying— it wasn't! He lied about everything but now, I can see through all of that. I want to be a family with you and mom again."

"A family? You're serious?" I ask since I'm seriously confused as to why he would bother coming for that.

"Camila, I love you and mom. I just fell for the lies dad told and it really messed me up but I finally know the truth now! So I want to be a—"

"Shut up!" I yell at him and I punch his chest, trying to begin attacking him.

"Don't try! Your attempts to punch me wouldn't even be half as bad as dad's attempts."

"What?" I ask, getting up from the ground and ending the fight that hadn't even begun.

"He.. I don't know," he says, rather uncomfortably which makes me suspicious of him.

"How?"

"The truth is— he would hit m—"

"He fucking hit you?!"

When he stays silent again, I have my definite answer.

"I can't believe that," I say. "Well, I can but to you? I thought you were his little mini me and he loved you."

"That's why," he tells me. "When I wasn't acting enough like him, he would just do it."

I don't know what to say so I rush into a hug with him, making him hug me back.

Nothing would ever be able to repair the years of loss and absence. But we could certainly try to rebuild our sibling relationship, and maybe one day, we could consider ourselves family.

"I want to be a family with you two and put all of the messed up stuff he did behind us," he says.

"It won't be easy to fix everything that's gone wrong in our relationship and it'll take time but I'm willing to try," I tell him, "What did mom say?"

"She said that her opinion was dependent on whatever you say."

  "Then I say that we'll give this a try," I say as I smile at him and he returns it, hugging me a bit tighter.

Another impulsive choice. This time, I think I made the right one though. Michael isn't like my father. He's shown that to me, and the worst that can happen is that we choose to live our lives separately again. I had gone through that before so I'm not that worried.

"Let's go downstairs," he says.

I nod my head in approval, and I go downstairs with him, a bit relieved that finally, after all these years, I'm going to try to fix my damaged relationship with Michael.