Page 79 of Collision
I take a deep breath and silently pray that my mother will be reasonable for once. “You’re not going to like what I’m about to tell you,” I warn her in a trembling voice. I take a pause before letting it all out in one big breath. “It’s over.” I gasp for breath, as though there’s been a brick lying on my chest all this time, and I’ve finally pushed it off.
“What, dear?” she asks, perplexed.
“Between Travis and me,” I add, looking her in the eye. “It’s over.”
A stony silence settles over us. “What did you say?”
“You heard me,” I reply, trying not to be intimidated.
She stares at me in disbelief. Then she shakes her head, twisting one corner of her mouth. “Don’t joke.”
“I’m not, I’m serious.”
“You can’t,” she says, setting her fork down on her plate.
“That bastard cheated on me, Mom,” I explain. She just keeps looking at me, lost, panic in her eyes. “He lied and cheated on me,” I repeat. “He seduced a girl just to use her for one night.”
My mother blinks, as though awakening from a deep sleep. “What are you talking about? Travis is a good boy. He comes from a very respectable family; he would never do something like that!” she says, putting her hands on her hips with an accusatory look.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. It was a shock to me too.”
“What you’re saying is impossible, he must have been under the influence of alcohol, maybe those troublemaker friends of his peer-pressured him.”
I wrinkle my forehead. “What movie are you making up in your head? He was completely lucid. And, even if he had been drinking, how can you justify something like that?” I shout, slamming my fist on the table.
My mother won’t stop babbling. “Honey, listen.” She runs her hands over her face, as if trying to organize her train of thought. That train has been off the rails for a while now. “I know that you are in shock and hurting a lot right now, but think about this for a minute… You can’t throw away two beautiful years over one momentary mistake.”
I look at her, dumbfounded. “He disrespected me constantly, cheated on me regularly, and tricked an innocent girl into sleeping with him only to disappear the next morning!”
“Vanessa, did you consider for even a second that he might have been going through a difficult time? You know he’s under so much pressure, you’ve never been able to fully understand it. He must have felt so lost. You can’t condemn him for that.”
I am struck speechless. So this is my fault now?
“You…you…you’re crazy, Mom! Of course I can condemn him. In fact, that’s exactly what I did. I left him. It’s over! I have no intention of ever going through what you went through with Dad!” I get up, turn on the faucet, fill a glass with water, and drain it all in one go.
“Vanessa, if you allow pride and anger to win out over the bond that you two share, you will end up regretting it bitterly. Do you really think you’ll get another chance like this again?”
My eyes widen in disgust. “You know what, Mom?” I slam the glass down furiously on the kitchen counter and turn to look at her. “I knew this news would upset you. I knew that you would go into a rage and that you would do your damnedest to change my mind. But—and who knows why?—a part of me actually believed that, confronted by the enormous lack of respect that boy showed your daughter, you would have understood and supported me for once! But I was stupid to think that, because the only thing that matters to you is money!”
“Vanessa!” she scolds me.
“No, Mom, don’t ‘Vanessa’ me! You have made up this idea of himthat has nothing to do with reality, but we all know why you did it. He has something the others don’t, doesn’t he? Ten figures in the bank! And that is more than enough for you. Who cares if your daughter is demeaned, humiliated and betrayed! What really matters is that she marries a billionaire who will lock her up in his luxurious golden mansion where she can live the most miserable existence in human history! But, hey, she’ll be able to do it surrounded by caviar and champagne!” I take a breath. “You can put your mind at ease. Travis and I broke up days ago, and I have no intention of going back, not now or ever!”
“D-days ago?” she starts. “Then who was in your room last night?”
I swallow with difficulty as I stare at her with wide eyes.
“Leave me alone, it’s all over anyway!” I spit. I leave the kitchen without giving her a chance to say anything else. I run to my room and shut myself in. I turn the lock and throw myself onto the bed. With my head sunk into the pillow, I burst into my second inconsolable crying jag of the day.
Part Two
One Month Later
Twenty-One
“Okay, ready?” Tiffany asks impatiently.
“No!” I scream, my eyes closed in terror.
