Page 80 of The Lies We Steal

Choosing to stay silent as she watches me, her eyes looking me up and down before her feet pad into my room completely. I look down at the buttons on my shirt, pretending to be doing something with them.

A cloud of smoke hits the front of my face and I lift my gaze with contempt. There isn’t a word spoken, nothing is said while she looks over the edges of my face like this is the first time she’s really seeing me. As if I was a stranger in her own home and to her, I probably was.

For the first time in years, she lifts her hand, skimming her knuckles across my cheek bone and the coldness from her skin makes my jaw tense.

“Beautiful boy…” She whispers, her voice murky and filled with fog.

I used to ask myself a lot why my mother never looked or touched me like other kids’ moms did. I watched as children would run into their mother’s arms seeking comfort and praise. The love that should be shared between the two, and I used to wonder what I had done that made my mother hate me so much.

Why her touch always felt like wet slime and her gaze never felt warm, always chilled and judgmental. Why instead of chasing the bad dreams away, she brought them upon me.

I pull my face back, glaring down at her, one thing they hadn’t planned on was me being so tall.

“Yet so rotten to the core.” She adds. The thing is she wasn’t even trying to be mean. She wasn’t trying to hurt me, she just genuinely didn’t care enough to think about what she said to me. Hurting me would require her to give a shit, and she didn’t.

“A shame a face like yours was wasted. At the very least, your father and I can say we made handsome children.”

I sneer, my nostrils flaring, “That’s what happens when you raise a child in another’s shadow, mother. They become nightmares.”

She lifts the white stick to her mouth, inhaling deeply, her eyes crinkling in the corners as she smiles a bit. Smoke swirling in the air between us. I didn’t bother changing out of the suit. I walked over to the bed, grabbing the duffle bag and sling it over my shoulder.

“You should stay where you are headed until after Christmas, it’s for the best, darling.”

Leave it to my faulty parent to require my absences instead of asking where it was I was going. For all they know I could be going to a drug deal. I think I have finally accepted that they would probably encourage me to go somewhere dangerous, me being killed would be a clean way to get rid of me. So they could stop keeping me around to save face.

“Mom, have you seen my medical bag—”

Apparently, I was overdue for a family reunion because Dorian walked by the bedroom door, only to stop when he caught a glimpse of us inside.

I was silently begging my father didn’t pop his graying hair around the corner. Even if he did, he’d look over me for a moment and then continue acting like I didn’t exist. I preferred him out of anyone. He didn’t even try to pretend he liked me.

It’s a kid’s dream to have an older brother he can look up to. Someone who will defend him to bigger bullies and teach him how to throw a punch. Someone they can annoy until they give in and play video games with you.

That’s what an older brother should be. A protector. A guide. Someone you can count on.

I think mine’s just the antichrist.

After graduating from Hollow Heights he left for Boston to attend medical school, I think he’s an intern or some shit like that now. I find it almost comical that he’s being trusted with people’s lives.

How anyone can look at him and not see what a selfish, vile, prick he is.

And knowing that my parents made me to be just like him. Creating me in his image. I wanted to skin myself thinking about it.

He pauses, looking at me with revulsion, “You’re still here? Figured they would have already found you dead in a ditch by now.”

“That would give you too much joy, Dorian. Can’t have that, can we?”

“How anyone thinks we look similar is beyond me. It’s an insult to my genes.”

“Believe me, I don’t want anyone telling me I look like a monkey’s ass either, but you work with what you’re dealt.” I say giving a disparaging smile.

“They should have just broken the mold with me. Instead I’m stuck having to stare at my spare parts every time I come home.”

I wanted to hit him for reminding me, but I didn’t want to deal with the backlash. “As fun as this was, I’d rather go kill myself than stand here with you two any longer.”

I stride out of my room, perfectly fine if that’s the last words I ever speak to either of them. Harsh, I know, but it doesn’t make it any less true.

“Make sure you cut vertical. That way the likelihood of you surviving is slim.” Dorian adds, his voice bouncing of the back of my head as I descend the steps, trying to put as much distance between myself and them as possible.

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