xli | gut feeling
Look at their videos? From when? Before I came into their lives or after? I get up from the bed, making my way to the staircase. Sherry follows me as I make my way to the kitchen, I take my phone out, calling Wes.
"Sorry, babe, the guys wanted to go to eat," Wesley tells me, "I can leave-"
"No, it's fine," I tell him, "I'll just call the girls to come over, have fun with your friends."
"You sure?"
"Yes, I'm sure," I tell him before we hang up.
Did I just convince Wesley to go out just so I could do what Luke wanted me to do?
How stupid can I be?
I look through the fridge, eating leftovers from a few nights ago with the girls and Wes. I allowed the silence to comfort me as I ate alone before I go on a walk with Sherry.
I don't think I should do what Luke recommended. It would just hurt me even more. I shouldn't do it.
Walking towards a bench, Sherry jumps and sits down next to me. I take out my phone, 9:57. It's late and Wesley still with the team, Angelina is busy with college, and I'm sure the rest are busy doing something.
Scrolling through my phone, I ended up on YouTube. I was curious, I'll admit, but I know that I don't want to know how he's doing on the other side of the world. I knew it would break me to know that this whole time he was hurt as well, not only me, and I was only thinking of myself.
One video shouldn't hurt. But what kind of video?
My finger lingers over their video, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. I exited out of YouTube and instantly got on the website, searching them. They all looked like they finally got some meat in them, but Luke still looks lanky. They all look very attractive, but with every swipe, I looked back at those brown eyes. I hate this-
An article grabs my attention, regarding the article Estrella had published, exposing Calum. They had announced their upcoming debut, it was gonna be released next month. The writer just goes on and on how they wouldn't get any attention or accomplishments because of Calum's past being exposed.
That's a bit rude, he never knows what could happen. Yeah sure, people will hesitate to even interact with them and their music, but they're kind people. I get off and get on Twitter, searching about Calum. It seems many of their fans are upset with the article. I would be too, they are very hardworking, and Calum acknowledges what he did, why-
I shouldn't get so angry about this.
-
"You have an interview at 12."
"Another one?"
"Yeah, sorry kid," Danny laughs through the phone, "I know it's your birthday, but I promise, these interviews will pass by quickly. You're getting the recognition you deserve and surely but slowly, you will make your first album."
"You better," I tell him, laughing, "Alright, I need to go to this last one then. Tell Nirvana to pick me up here please."
"I'll let her know, let's hope she's on my wife's good side today, she's been calling her Vanessa all morning, not good. Bye now."
Today is my birthday, but sadly I could not enjoy my morning at all hence I had a whole schedule this morning. Luckily, Danny didn't schedule any more interviews for in the afternoon so I was going to spend it with my friends. I was excited and nervous since I would have to talk obviously, but the whole morning, my stomach wouldn't stop giving negative feelings. I try to not overthink it, hoping it was just any mistakes I would probably make on the interviews.
"So, Cassidy, there are rumors that you used to hang out with the boys from 5 Seconds Of Summer, is that true?"
My stomach twists again, maybe that was why I have a bad feeling. I smiled, shaking my head, I try not to talk about that and if it's brought it up, I pretend I don't know them, "I'm unaware of 5 es-oh-es. I'm sorry."
She smiles, confused but continues. She will probably have to cut off that part. She goes on with her questions and concerns about my career. Soon, the interview ended and I waited for Nirvana to pick me up since the others were busy. Getting into the car, Nirvana takes the long route, claiming that Wes told her to do it, but the way there, the gut feeling still wouldn't go away, it started to hurt.
"You're alright?" Nirvana asks, in response I shook my head.
Nirvana then pulls the car over, rubbing my back as I groaned, "I don't know why, but I just been having a gut feeling the whole morning. I thought it was because of the interviews, b-but I don't know Vanessa."
"Calm down, Cass," Nirvana tells me, sitting me up, "You're overthinking and that's not gonna help."
Sighing, I nodded, but with this gut feeling, my body started to become tense, my heart wouldn't stop beating fast, and my palms were sweating. I started to feel that the car was closing in on me so I get out of the car, walking back and forth on the pavement to calm down the nerves. Turning around, I see that Nirvana reaches out to grab my bag and takes out my phone. Someone must be calling. Sighing, I still walked, Nirvana rolls down the window, "Cassidy."
"What?" I asked, leaning down to the window, but Nirvana hands me my phone.
From Mom:
I love you.
-
"Cassidy, slow down! I think you're overreacting," Nirvana tells me as I entered into my house' drive, thank God Wesley taught me to drive or Nirvana wouldn't drive me here, so I drove us here, "If there is something happening, we have to call the cops!"
"You call the cops, I going to spare us some time," I tell her, getting out, "Do not come in unless I call you too, okay?"
"You're crazy! Get back over here! You could die," Nirvana tells me, trying to get me back into the car.
"He could kill my mom!" I snapped back.
"Cassidy, please. You're scaring me, just come back and message her. I'm sure she sent you that because it's your birthday."
"Just call the cops and stay here."
Turning my back on Nirvana, I ignored her calls for me as I ran to the house, seeing that the front door was opened, something must've happened for mom to send me that message. If she sent that, she would've sent something else like that, plus she wasn't answering my calls nor my messges.
Slowly opening the door, I tiptoed in, trying to here where they were, I couldn't hear anything at all but my heartbeat, drumming into my ears. Where should I go?
A glass shatters, after that a scream follows behind it. So they're on the second floor. Quietly running up the staircase, I run to my room, I closing the door but open enough to see what's going on if they enter the hallway towards the staircase. Just as I assumed, footsteps were approaching from his office, a whimper echoed and a body was thrown to the floor, sliding a little bit.
Mom sits up, I gasped quietly, her face was nearly bruised up and she was bleeding from the corner of her eye and her forehead. She was fumbling around, trying to find the right words to say to him as he approached her slowly.
"I've had enough of this," he tells her, he wasn't close to the door, but I could already smell the reeking alcohol, "You didn't do the payments and contract on purpose, right?"
"J-Jude," Mom mutters, but my dad quickly moves down to slap her across the face.
"Stop lying!" My dad yells, grabbing her by the shoulders, "First you were lying about cheating, now you're lying about not doing your job properly? Tell me, what was the reason for this? You have to stop lying to me."
"I wasn't lying!" My mom argues back, spitting him on the face.
He laughs, throwing his head back before he looks back at him, he started to breathe heavy, he slips his hands around her neck, mom instantly starts to kick, punch, and push him away, she brings her arm in-between his arms, pulling it down to break his strength around her neck and elbowed him straight to the nose. He groans as mom gets up, but he grabs her by the ankle, pulling her close to him and doing a headlock. Shit.
I get out of the room, reaching my hands out pull on his hair, "Stop, you're hurting her."
Shit, he's not releasing. I'm not strong enough to choke him either, fuck. Think fast! I immediately started digging my nails on his face or poking his eyes as hard as I can. It seemed to work since mom started to tell me to run or to get help as she tries to run away, but I didn't.
He should have a weak spot, I don't think I could keep up with this- his back. From the car accident, he had to be on medications for a month to have his back heal. I kneed his back as hard as I can, once, twice, third, fourth, fifth, sixth-
When my knee hit his spin hard, he groans, letting go of mom. Grabbing him by the shoulders, I push him to the floor, moving to mom to help her, "Come on."
Pulling her arm over my shoulder, we quickly went down the stairs, I don't when but he had gotten back up and was running down the stairs, pushing us down on the floor. Falling, my head is the first to hit the floor, but it doesn't stop me from going in-between my mom and him. Kneeling, I made sure to cover my mom with my body, but he doesn't go after mom, he grabs me by the hair, slamming me to the floor, my head bounced. I could barely process anything with my body but he starts kicking me.
"You bitch!" He yells, kicking me right by my ribcage, I cry, trying to move away, but he keeps on following me, "You! You started this!"
Did what? I asked myself. He kneels on the floor, my mom cries out, telling him to leave me, but he does the same thing he did to me as he did to mom, choking me. I try my best to stop him, even try doing that weird move mom did, but he noticed it and quickly put my arms in-between his legs, holding my body altogether, not allowing me to move to kick or push him.
"You did this! You-"
Bang!
He mid stops from his sentence, falling to his side. Nirvana came into my view, holding a metal baseball bat that belonged to Ashton, he left it here a long time ago. She drops the bat and helps me to get up to go to my mom. She sat down, leaning against the kitchen wall. Crying, we hugged each other as Nirvana gets up to stand by him, making sure he would stay still until the police came.
-
"We were going bankrupt. He wasn't paying anyone back, then a scandal happened, ruining the image of the company, he started to lose it, Cassidy. Thus the reason why he tried to get you into the marriage so that the company wouldn't fall if Wesley's parent's company would combine. I guess it got to him, he was putting the blame on us for ruining the company," My mom tells me, laying down on the hospital bed, her heart beeps slowly and steadily in the room, "I felt that it was probably best to let the company go bankrupt after all the people he took advantage of, the times I would leave for more than an hour was to let people go from our contract, I wasn't cheating on him, but I didn't know he... he would go that far to kill me."
"Mom, you should have told me," I tell her," Especially the cops, you could have died."
"The abuse was happening before you started middle school," Mom tells me, chuckling, "It wasn't going to change either way, but I had to make sure he would never touch you, I guess I failed as your mother."
"No, you didn't," I told her, holding her hand, "I stood up against him. There was nothing you could have done that night, mom."
"I'm so sorry," Mom cries, her eyes filled with tears again, "I'm sorry you had to see that."
"No, I'm sorry," I tell her, choking up, trying to prevent myself from crying even more, "All these years, I thought you hated me and I started to hate you, but you were just trying to protect me by obeying him so he wouldn't lay a finger on me."
She pulls me into a hug, I let out my cries. After a while, my mom had fallen asleep, the medicine must've knocked her out. Adjusting her on her bed, I exited out of the room and walked to the waiting room. There I saw my close family and friends waiting, Angelina sees me, her face covered with tears, she gets up and runs up to me, carefully colliding our bodies into a hug.
"You're so stupid," she tells me in my ear, "If Vanessa wasn't with you, you and auntie could've died."
Mumbling sorry, my friends started to gather around me with tears sliding down their cheeks too. I informed them what happened, I was fine, I would just need to take medication to heal my ribcage and stomach, mom would need to be on crutches or a wheelchair, I didn't notice but he had thrown a vase at her, the glass pieces were in her thighs real deep that she was sent to surgery as soon as we got to the hospital. As for him, my father, he was arrested not only for abusing my mom for more than three years but the damage he did the company, he was removed as the CEO and now my mom is the CEO. She decided it's best to keep the company on hold, she wanted to change the business company as something else.
"I'm sorry your birthday had to turn out like this," Estrella tells me, rubbing my shoulder, "We'll spend the whole next weekend to celebrate."
"Thanks," I tell her, "For now, I just want to sleep."
"And you will get some sleep," Wesley tells me, "My parents booked a hotel room for you nearby, the girls will look after you; meanwhile, Damien and I will just head back to the house and take down the decorations."
"Decorations?" I asked, turning to Nirvana, "You knew about it, didn't you?"
"They were throwing a surprise party for you, but you know..." Nirvana mumbles sheepishly, looking away.
"You want to throw some dark humor, don't you?" Faith asks.
"Yes, really badly," Nirvana whines.
"You suck at them," Damien comments, I shake my head at them and let Nirvana throw in her dark humor.
"Alright, well as I was gonna say, they were throwing a surprise party for you, but you had your own deadly surprise. Aye, Aye-! Come on, I know you guys wanna laugh."
"Please don't take comedy as a career," Angelina sighs, "You'll never make it."
"You guys suck."