Page 77 of The Summer of ’98

She stood up, fast, and slapped me across the face so hard that my head snapped to the side. I didn’t even register what had happened until I felt the painful throb and sting. I turned back to her, clutching my cheek, tears welling. “How could you?”

“You will have some respect for me!”

I never would, ever again.

“I’m going to bed,” I murmured, still clutching my cheek, which was now oozing a little bit of blood. Her ring must have split the skin. “Did you block Leroy’s phone number?”

“Hardly seems important, but yes, I did.”

“Jealousy is an ugly disease,” I said before I ran up the corridor and slammed my bedroom door shut.

My decision was made. Although it hurt to think about how damaged my relationship with my mother was, I couldn’t stay or respect her after what she’d said and done tonight. I quietly sobbed as I packed up my belongings into a travel bag. I folded and stuffed things in so that I could utilize the space efficiently. I wasn’t sure when I would be back, so I grabbed a couple of picture frames, documents, course-related papers. Whatever I needed to start over, including some of my most treasured CDs and skincare—those things I couldn’t leave without.

The entire time my eyes were clouded with pools of tears. If I had just been more careful on that first night with Leroy, none of this would have been happening. But it was, and I had to be brave because Eleanor was right. Only I could make this choice. I sat on the floor and zipped up the suitcase before I placed a hand across my stomach and felt my heart speed up.

“I’ve got you, little one. Always.”

When I opened my bedroom door, I took a deep breath, trembling. There were no words. There was nothing that could articulate how devastated I was. How deep the betrayal ran. I was aware that by getting pregnant I had let down my momma, but I was still her daughter and this felt wrong. This wasn’t how people should treat their children. I went down the hall and made it to the front door when I heard Momma behind me.

“If you leave, do not come back.”

My hand tightened around the door handle. There was so much that I wanted to say. The urge to stand here and convince her that Leroy loved me and would never hurt me was tempting but, in the end, it would get me nowhere. Her mind was made up: Leroy and I were naïve children, about to flush our futures down the toilet, and no one could tell her otherwise. I pulled the door open and stepped out into the warm dark night, slamming it shut behind me.

Leroy

“The number that you are trying to reach is unavailab—”

“Dammit!” I slammed the phone down on its base and leaned against the countertop, inhaling a deep breath. My head hung as I stared at the floor and tried to calm down.

It didn’t work.

Two weeks I had been phoning Ellie’s house, always getting that same fucking message. I hadn’t heard a single word, and no matter how much deep breathing I did, I couldn’t clear the red dots that danced in front of me.

I straightened up and gripped the phone, throwing it with so much force that it flew across the room, hitting the wall.

“Dramatic,” Noah mocked from the table with a mouthful of food. The thought of smacking him in the face was enticing. But I settled for sending him a harsh scowl instead. It wasn’t his fault that Ellie had disappeared from the face of the earth.

It better not have been anyway. “Have you spoken to her?”

He glanced up, his eyes darting from left to right with confusion. “No? Why the hell would she talk to me?”

“I don’t know,” I dropped into the seat at the head of the table. “What about Cass?”

Noah shook his head as he bit into his sandwich. “Nah.” He gave me a disgusting view of his chewed food as he spoke. “She hasn’t heard from her either.”

My head fell into my hands, elbows resting on the table as I groaned with frustration. The lack of contact was driving me insane.

“Maybe she’s on a new dick.”

“Would you shut up!”

Noah sniggered and I picked up the closest item to me—which happened to be a bottle of water—and threw it at him so hard that his sandwich flew out of his hand when he tried to cover his face. Salad and meats covered the tabletop and himself.

“My lunch!”

“What is going on in here?” Mom’s voice had both of us turning our attention to the entryway where she stood with her travel bag behind her and an unimpressed frown as she took in the mess we’d just made. “I spend one night out of town and the phone is across the room and there’s salad all over the floor.”

“Both are his fault,” Noah declared as he started picking bits of food up and putting them back on his plate. He did a piss-poor job of cleaning up before he started toward the corridor, calling over his shoulder as he left. “He’s out of control.”

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