Page 18 of Just Enough

“Did my gift come in yet?” she asked quickly. “Listen, I got to go. Happy Birthday!”

She hung up, and I walked back in.

I felt better though because she sounded okay today.

So, I could go back to my own life. The one without her in it.

Chapter 6

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Emily

2 years 3 months prior…

The trouble betweenMom and Dad were coming to light or just starting, or this was the beginning of the end. Either way, Dad finally started asking questions, questions led to arguing, arguing led to Mom leaving a few hours and coming back when she thought he wouldn’t confront her again.

She knew him too well; it seemed. He always raided the fridge for his beer when she left and when she was gone, I saw the utter despair on his face as he glanced at himself, then the beer, then he’d place it to his lips and stopped thinking about it. So, by the time she came home, he was passed out on the couch where she left him all the time.

I made a habit of staying at Katie’s some nights when she wasn’t staying over at her boyfriend’s, then I’d feel guilty and come home bright and early because I feared Mom didn’t come home either.

I didn’t even complain when I drove to college early every morning to finish my last week of the semester because anything was more bearable than staying at home. I slowly felt like Benjamin and I were growing apart. We didn’t talk as much and it made me sad, but at the same time, I couldn’t make myself call him up because he’d baby me. I was beginning to wonder if it was healthy for me to stay attached to him. I’d become so dependent on him helping me with my emotions that I didn’t know how to relax and stop worrying without him.

It wasn’t healthy.

So, I let our distance grow.

But it didn’t mean I didn’t miss his voice in my ear at different times of the day.

Maybe this was growing up. Friends grew apart.

Only Friday evening after work, Mom was waiting for me outside. When she looked up from the old Malibu I got for six hundred bucks last year, her smile was tight and nervous. Now I was nervous too.

I realized this was some sort of confrontation; the end I kept dreading.

“What are you doing here?” I came to a stop once I stood in front of her.

“I know you’ve noticed, Emily,” she started, and I squirmed. “I can’t stay with your father anymore.”

“I know he’s not easy to love…” I studied her face, green eyes and red hair—not orange or flaming, a deep, dark burgundy just like mine. I tried not to see the little improvements in her appearance in the last year like something orsomeonewas giving her a reason to look nice again. Dad had to notice too because she used to not care at all about how she dressed and looked, just like him. “I think if you asked him to quit drinking, he’d stop.”

“It’s not about his drinking.” She smiled sadly, shaking her head. “But, I’ve tried for years to get him to quit, and he doesn’t want to quit. He has to want to, Emily, and I was drowning with him. I couldn’t anymore. I love him, especially the man I fell in love with… But it’s not a good or a happy kind of love. I’d just been staying for the mirage of who he was.”

Taking a deep breath, I didn’t dare blink. “I know.” I understood her. I wish Ididn’t,but I did. I wish I wasn’t so understanding, but I was because I lived in the same house. I saw the same things she did. I saw the lack of warmth, love, and affection from the man in the house because I got the same treatment.

And because I understood her so well, I wanted to cry even harder because it felt like the ultimate betrayal against Dad.

“Is there someone else?” My heard pounded.Thishurt.

She looked down. “There is.”

“Mom.” That one word was full of emotion. “Why cheat? Why didn’t you just leave sooner? I can’t understand that. I understand why you want to leave, but why not leave before you became unfaithful?”

“Because I wasn’t brave enough then.”

“Have you told Dad yet?”

I was terrified of how he’d react. He was already an alcoholic. For some reason, that made him fragile in my eyes, not wrathful because Dad wasn’t a mean man. He never was. He was just a drunk.

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