More than just a friend || Roger Taylor

20- this isn't my home

17th June 1978

Tw- Illness, alcoholism, mentions of abuse and drug addiction

Now if someone asked me what was exactly on my mind as I stood outside my parents door, for the first time in years, with my stomach knotted so tight it hurt and my breath so quick it almost stopped, I wouldn't be able to tell them.

It was blank, in a desperation to block out all that it could. I knew that would soon end when my eyes met the same pair they'd been so eager and careful to avoid all these years, which is why I was so hesitant in finally knocking the large wood panel that would open to an endless trap of memories bound to haunt me.

My goodbyes had been said and flight had been dragged on for what felt like decades, hours that had slipped into minutes as the frame in time where I had to rattle my fist against the door became too close for my liking.

I didn't know why, but my hand that was free of my suitcase (packed by Connie) wouldn't lift itself upwards. It was like it knew this was bad for me. But it let me do so many other things that were arguably just as bad. It lifted the cigarette to my lips, and the bottle of whatever drink I fancied, and held the hand of whatever guy would next somehow break me. But it wouldn't let me simply knock a door.

It could've been nerves, mainly fear, or there was a slim chance it was because I didn't know how to anymore. I wasn't quite sure how exactly to knock the door of the exact house I'd fled what felt like decades ago. I never expected to come back, so how could my hand know it was going to be expected to knock it.

I slowly exhaled a short breath of air, treating it as if it was a cloud of grey I needed to realise with such ease, my eyes temporarily closing shut as they blocked me from the daunting white wood.

It was in that moment a memory finally did hit my mind, one I wish would've stayed cleared for only moments longer than it had, and I tried to wipe it away almost as quickly as I'd seen it. All I could imagine was the image of my mum in bed to match her damaged voice I'd heard over the phone.

It was almost as if the guilt crashing over me was what had lifted my hand, because only a split second after the image had left I felt it loudly knock against the painted white wood.

The knot in my stomach tightened itself, as did the clench on my suitcase's handle and teeth on my bottom lip as the dreaded silence grew longer and longer. I didn't hear any footsteps near the panel, or any voices mumble slightly, like the place had been like I could only dream abandoned.

But in reality the pause was one so brief anyone else would hardly focus on it, but somehow through whatever tangle it had been trapped in within the depths of my head I seemed to let it drag for what felt like minutes and minutes of waiting. Not anticipating, but simply waiting for a chore I knew I still couldn't build enough strength to do.

"Adelynn, hi..." the voice used by the women who answered the door was one i recognised, but her worn features and peppered hair were completely foreign to me. "I'm Kimberly, the nurse you spoke with on the phone that time. Sorry, your dads out and your mum asked my to get the door."

"Oh ok." I nodded slowly, a twinge of relief playing with my emotions knowing I didn't have to confront dad just yet. But the relief was hardly one I focused on when it was so small and pathetic compared to the guilt, worry and pure fear scrambling through me.

"Sorry... please come in. Make yourself at home." She smiled, not entirely warmly, stepping back from the door to open it wider and let me walk through it. I took another short breath, one that was a poor attempt to prepare myself before I took short, slightly nervous steps through the door to my old home.