The Temptations of Chemistry

Chapter Eighteen - I Didn't Want This To Happen

 Chapter Eighteen - I Didn't Want This To Happen

"You did what?" I hear Cynthia shriek at the top of her lungs, shooting me out of my slumber. 

I groaned loudly, wiping my hands over my sleepy eyes. Memories of visiting my mother last night flashed in my mind and I knew I had to get up before it became overbearing. I slid out of my bed, still hearing Cynthia growling about something, at least it wasn't me this time. 

After I pulled a long sleeve over my head and a pair of sweat pants, I thumped down the stairs to try and make sense of this racket going on. Actually, I think it just excited me to have someone else in this house get yelled at besides me. 

I came down to the end of the stair case and the first thing I hear was my borther's voice.  He stood in front of Cynthia as her jaw was flung open, and my father standing next to her as usual with his arms crossed over his chest, just listening in.

At least it's not hard to tell where Matty gets the whole, listen-in-and-watch-an-awful-scene-onfold-before-you're-eyes-and-barely-say-a-word thing. 

"Cindy." Matty growled. "It was reasonable okay, she's my mother and I had the right to go see her." He argued.

Okay, now I wasn't so excited anymore. I was just about to turn and run back up the stairs, but I had been spotted.

"Jessalyn." Cynthia called me over and I cringed at her voice. I didn't want to deal with this right now, especially not this early.

"I can't believe you were so irresponsible, Matty." Our father blurted out, his eyes firm on Matty and full of concern for him. "Don't you realize what you could have gotten yourself into?"

"What? What's the worst that could happen she is in jail because she is a suspect for murder, and was loaded with drugs at the scene? It's not like she's getting out, I just wanted to see her, to know her before she rots in a jail cell."

"Murder?" Cynthia shot out loudly, clearly not aware of how dangerous Linda really is. "Oh god.

My father faced me, "Did you know about this?" His eyes narrowed. "About going to see her?"

I glanced briefly around the room before looking at him and  I shrugged nonchalantly. 

"Did you?" She pushed.

"He asked me to go, so I did. No big deal, were not going back, right Matty?" 

My father's arms actually released themselves from his chest. "Why would you go there, you both finally got free from her. I loved her once but you two, especially you Jessalyn, should know that she is up to no good." 

"I tried to tell him." I mumbled under my breath, not even loud enough for anyone to hear me.

Ergo, John kept talking. "I thought that you were trying to get away from all this, Jessalyn. Look at the bad influence she had on you before.."

Somehow that made me snap. "You think I wanted to go there? Seeing my mother was the last thing on this earth I wanted to do! I know how awful she is, okay, I did it for Matty. Don't even act like you care about the influence she had on me!" I yelled, causing everyone's eyes to grow wide and glare over at me.

"I'm sorry, Jessie." Matty turned to me apologizing with sincerity in his eyes as he touched my shoulder, making me flinch. I gave him a assuring nod that he was forgiven and looked back to John.

"I-" My father started.

"No. You don't have the right to do this to me. You aren't allowed to act like you're worried about me, that you care what happened to me when I was with Mom. You knew she was trouble and you didn't come looking for me, you didn't try to contact me. You were ashamed of me because of my behaviour, because other adults would give you dirty looks on the street or at the grocery store. So don't act like you were happy when I went off with Mom, you took that opportunity to bring back your reputation of a perfect family back. You didn't care what happened to me, so why would I believe that you do now?"