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2.2
Greg was ticked. That much was obvious as Mom and I got in the car. There was a tiny vein bulging out of his forehead, and he avoided looking at my mother. Not a good sign.
“What did they get a hold of?” I asked him quietly as I passed.
He pursed his lips, allowing himself to glare at the sun. It was as much leash he would give himself, and I had to admire that—a lot of people hated my Mom. And yet he kept the job, protecting her as best he could even when Mom acted as if all she wanted was public humiliation. In a way, I suppose, he was even protecting Mom from herself. No small job.
“A lot,” Greg finally answered. “Thong, chest, the drinking, and the men.”
My stomach clenched. I nodded, thinking. I would have to snatch the TV remote from Mom in the car so she wouldn’t turn to the news. I had to keep what had happened a secret from her for as long as possible.
“Maybe you should tell her right away,” Greg advised quietly, contradicting my thoughts. “She won’t perform well in Phoenix after she sees this, and she needs as much recovery time as possible.”
But then that meant I would have to be in the car with her, for hours, comforting her, massaging her shoulders, listening to her wail and rage against the world.
“We’ll see,” I replied after a moment. Schooling his features, Greg nodded to me and stepped away, indicating that I should get in the car. I held back a reluctant sigh and complied.
“I need some coffee,” Mom moaned as soon as I sat down and leaned back against the leather seat. “Tell Greg I need some coffee.”
I hesitated, picturing his face expression of moments earlier. “Mom, why don’t we wait a little while? I mean, Greg is probably—”
“Coffee. Now.” She was looking at me in a way that made me feel like dirt beneath her shoes.
“Fine,” I said, and held back all my resentment and hurt. “Greg?” I opened the car door again. He was standing over by the third car, talking to the driver. “Greg!” I called louder. He glanced at me, frowning.
I shrugged helplessly. “She wants coffee. Now.”
He merely nodded, this time his face giving nothing of his real feelings away. I slid back inside the car and shut the door, looking at my mom. She was holding a hand to her forehead, eyes closed in misery. She did look pretty bad. There were bags under her eyes, and she hadn’t bothered to brush the tangles out of her wild blond hair.
“Did you see Royce?” she asked me, voice oddly subdued.
I shifted on the leather seat, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “No. But I’m sure he’s in the other car with the others,” I told her. “Where else would he be?”
Mom growled. “With that horny bitch he was looking at, probably. God, Autumn, don’t you hear a word I say?”
I didn’t want to argue. She was in the mood, obviously, because she had taken her hand away from her eyes and was glaring at me, but I didn’t react. Through the darkened windows, I watched Greg pass us and head for the tiny car in front of ours.
“Did you like this city?” Mom asked me as the car pulled away from the hotel curb. We were finally on our way, and I felt the release I always did whenever we left a place behind for a new one. My problems would come with me, of course, but at least the scenery would be different.
“Not really,” I said honestly.
Mom laughed. “That doesn’t surprise me. You’ve never known how to have fun, Autumn.”
I guess that depends on your definition of fun, I wanted to say. But she was right. I didn’t have fun, ever, because the last time I’d gone with my mom, it had been a very tedious experience…
* * *
“Felicity?” Some drunk girl sidled up to me from where I stood in a corner. “Felicity Dawn?” She beamed, excited. “Wow, you’re taller then I thought you would be.” The glass in her hand tipped dangerously as she leaned towards me. I looked at her, edging away.
“No, I’m not. She’s over there.” I pointed. Mom stood in a circle of admiring men, laughing. The purple and orange lights danced and flickered over her, making her seem mysterious and adventurous.
The girl’s eyebrows furrowed as she stared first at my mother, then me again. She was small and dark, as if she spent all her time at the tanning bed. “Oh,” she mumbled. “I didn’t know there were two of you!”
I bit my lip, hating the feeling of being cornered in this crowded, loud club. It was Tuesday. That had to be it, why I was having such a shitty time. Tuesdays never went right for me. “There’s not two of us,” I said after a pause, having to raise my voice because the music was more upbeat now. “I’m just a… a relative.”
“A what?” The girl cupped her ear, swaying to the music. “You want to dance?” she asked me.
I shook my head so hard that I got a headache afterwards. “No!” If I’d ever been asked, I wouldn’t have even danced with a cute guy, much less a drunken girl.
“Oh, come on, Felicity,” she giggled, twirling. Her red dress whirled around her thighs, and to avoid the sight, I looked up at the ceiling.
“No, no thank you,” I insisted, trying to subtly back away.
“I just love your song Bought a Gun, by the way,” the girl said, as if I wasn’t trying to escape and that I hadn’t already told her I wasn’t my mother. “So funny. And so true.” She tried to stand upright and nod seriously.
“Uh… thanks. Why don’t you go request it from the DJ?” I suggested desperately. She just kept getting closer and closer to me…
“Oh, sure!” she squealed, spilling whatever she was drinking all over the front of my green silky tank top. Mom’s, actually. She was going to kill me.
I watched the girl dash away, and groaned as I snatched a napkin from the bar and tried to rub the red alcohol out of the shirt. When the napkin turned red and started coming apart, I grabed another one and kept scrubbing. I made sure to find a different corner, so the girl wouldn’t be able to find me again.
The music made the floor jump and the walls vibrate. Giving up on the stain—I would just have to go buy a new tank top when Mom wasn't looking—I looked out over the writhing crowds and wondered what was going to happen to me. Was my life going to be like this forever? Would I always be on the sidelines, watching everyone else live and dance their way through life?
There was a woman in the middle of the dance floor, taller than most, and her long curly hair tumbled around her bare shoulders in a way sexy and confident. Her eyes were closed, as if she felt a sense of ecstasy being so free and out there. Could I ever do something like that? Look like that? Move with such ease?
I was tall, yes, but I was gangly. I hadn’t inherited my mother’s generous curves, and my face was young-looking, my skin smooth, like a child’s. A guy had never bothered to approach me, because usually Mom was nearby or some other, better prospect was.
“Felicity is looking for you,” Greg’s voice rumbled in my ear. Relieved, I turned towards the spot where I’d seen her last. I frowned when I saw that the crowd that had been around her had dispersed, and the colored club lights danced over complete strangers.
“Where is she?” I turned back towards Greg, but he had vanished.
Sighing, I headed for the best place to look for my mother—somewhere near a mirror. The bathroom. People didn’t seem to realize that I was there, trying to make my way through the throng of dancers, and I was jostled so hard that my shoulders would ache for a couple of days. A couple grinding actually shoved me into the wall.
“This party is a drag,” Mom was saying to some random woman as I pushed the bathroom door open. “Think I’ll hit the club that your boyfriend was talking about.” Her words were slurred, and I hurried to her side.
“When were you talking to my boyfriend?” the woman snapped, eyeing my beautiful mother suspiciously. “How did you know who I was?”
Without even looking at me, Mom leaned against me. Just shut up, I silently advised her. This woman facing us was actually wearing paper clips through her ears, and that didn’t seem like a good sign, to me.
“Oh, he pointed you out,” Mom giggled. “Said he’d only settled for you while he was waiting for someone like me come along. He told me that if I would give him a chance, he would change my life.” She rolled her eyes, giggling some more.
“Mom, we should go,” I mumbled, stepping forward reluctantly.
“He said what?” the woman asked dangerously, stepping closer. I automatically dragged my mom backward.
“She’s just drunk,” I said, hoping my voice wasn’t shaking. I hated confrontation. “She doesn’t know what she’s talking about.”
“Who are you?” the woman snapped, glaring at me.
“Autumn, I do too know what I’m talking about!” Mom mumbled, attempting to shove me away. I kept a firm hold on her, so that tactic didn’t work. She frowned unhappily, drooping now. “He said. I heard him.”
“He better not have said that, or you’re going to be in some serious pain in a few seconds,” the woman hissed. I cringed.
“Listen, we’re not looking for trouble. I’m just going to take her home, and you can get back to your evening,” I replied. This time there was a definite tremble to my voice.
She turned her heated glare on my mother. “Who are you? What’s your name?”
“I’m Felicity—”
“That doesn’t really matter,” I broke in hastily. “We’re gone. Now. You won’t have to see us again, okay?”
“Wait just a second!”
I was already dragging Mom out the door, and the woman was fast on my heels. “I’m not finished with you!” she was shouting.
“What did you do, Autumn?” Mom slurred.
“What did I do?”
“You’re going to answer me, and we’re going to settle this,” Paper-Clips woman said, planting herself in front of us. I found myself face-to-face with her chest, and, grimacing, leaned away. She was wearing a black halter top, and I could smell her sweat. Ugh.
“I don’t like this person,” Mom moaned, bending over as if she was about to puke. I moved my feet, just in case. “Make her go away, Greg.”
“Who’s Greg?” Paper-Clip asked impatiently.
“Greg, come here!” Mom called loudly, and then broke off the command to cough. Her breath caught me full in the face and I held back a gag.
“Hey, baby, what’s going on?” A blond guy walked up to wrap his arm around Paper-Clips. He was cute, just Mom’s type. He wore a clingy white T with an unbuttoned over shirt, and some nice jeans that were obviously made to look worn from the rips.
Paper-Clips’ eyes narrowed as she looked up at him. “This woman says that you—”
“Jason!” Mom squealed, holding her head up and spotting Blondie. She threw herself at him. “Oh, it’s been so long!”
He held her gingerly, wrinkling his nose and looking at me, as if this were my fault. “Hi, Felicity.” He tipped his chin at me in some kind of come-get-her signal. I just folded my arms and raised my eyebrows.
“So you do know her,” Paper-Clips stated.
Finally realizing that he was in some trouble here, Blondie—or I guessed his name was Jason— flushed and pushed Mom away from him. “No. I mean, well, yeah. We talked for like a second.”
“What did you talk about?” She practically had to shout it, because the DJ was getting pumped again, and the dancers were screaming and moving with more vigor.
“Nothing!” Jason shouted back.
“Only about the fact that you’re fat and ugly!” Mom shrieked, laughing drunkenly. She stood shakily and leaned on me again. “I don’t like them, Autumn,” she said in my ear.
Paper-Clips waited for about three seconds before she came forward. “Did you just call me fat and ugly?” she asked. She shoved both her finger and her face into Mom’s.
My mom looked at her with her red-rimmed eyes, pursing her lips thoughtfully. “I think… Yep.” She nodded. “Yeah, I think that was me. Or was it you, Autumn?” She fell to the floor at that moment, yanking on my arm in an effort to stay up. I had to move in order to keep from collapsing on the floor, too.
And Paper-Clips slammed her fist in my face. The hit was intended for Mom, of course, but of course I took it for her.
Paper-Clips had a mean right-hook. She knocked me out, and I didn’t wake up until Greg and I got to the hospital. Mom didn’t come, moaning about a headache, and went back to the hotel.
“Look on the bright side, Autumn,” Mom said as we when I walked through the door, my nose in some kind of splinter after they’d stopped the bleeding and given me a pain medication, “you’ll have this story to tell at the other parties we go to.”
But I never went to another party with her again. From then on, I spent the nights just strumming chords absently on my guitar while watching TV in the hotel room, waiting for her to come back home. Waiting for my life to really begin.
You've described the club incident really well- I can imagine myself being there. You've given further details on what Autumn actually has to put up with- I really hope she ends up standing up to her mom! I've still got Thor in my mind so I'm curious as to what is to come with him