When Everything Changes

Chapter 11

I knew it was only a matter of time. The last few days have been just too peaceful. Something was bound to happen sooner or later.

This morning as I was laying in my bed, only half awake, I had this strange since of Deja vu as Matty and Dylan bust into my bedroom to yank me out of the bed to tell me that dad was downstairs. I was up and dressed before I realized it. Faintly, as both my brothers practically hauled me out of bed, I realized Ethan wasn't there.

We're outside now. Standing on the front porch watching our dad walk from his silver Mercedes. (It's new and I've never seen it before.) It's late in the afternoon and I don't know where our mom is but I hope to god she isn't here and won't be back for a while. I'm the first to walk down the porch steps to the head of the long drive. As my dad comes closer Dylan rushes down and put himself in front of me. "What are you doing here?" Dylan says. He has this fierce protectiveness about him that I haven't seen since Nick knocked me down on the playground all those years ago.

"I'm here to see my family." My dad says.

"I'm surprised you know what that word means." Matty says, which surprises us all. He comes and stands next to Dylan in front of me.

"Son." My dad says and smiles. It's a pleading kind of smile. I've never seen him smile like that before.

"David."  My dad sighs at the use of his name.

He looks like he's about to say something, but then his eyes travel past us to the front door. As I turn to follow his gaze I'm silently praying it isn't my mom on the porch. She's been holding up fine I guess but I know she's not ready to see him.

Call it woman's intuition.

Thankfully it's just my granddad and uncle. I really haven't seen much of them these past few days. Maybe they knew he was coming.

"My boy!" he says and claps my dad on the back. "You look a little rough there, fella, Come inside and get some food."

Inside the house, we head straight to the kitchen. I think Matt and Dylan were headed up to their room until they saw me following dad into the kitchen. I haven't said a word to him yet, and he hasn't said anything to me. I don't know what his reason is for that, but I just don't know what to say. My dad's eyes travel around the house as we walk through. But it's not like he's curious about the renovations to the house or anything like that, he's looking for someone. Looking for my mom.

In the kitchen my grandmother is standing behind the island, shredding cabbage and carrots in a bowl and the kitchen smells like barbecue sauce.

My dad takes a seat at the table. My grandma looks over at him and there is a fire in her eyes I've never seen directed at my dad. She slowly sits down her knife and wipes her hand the on the towels over her shoulder. She walks over to where he sits and says, "What are you doing here, David?"

"I'm here to see you guys, Mom."

"No." my grandma says. "You're here to see Evelyn. But she isn't here and if she was, she wouldn't want to see you." She finishes and goes back to chopping. I'm glad she said what she said though. He needs to know that.

"She's my wife, Ma. I have the right to see her."

"No you don't." I say before I can stop myself. "Not if she doesn't want to see you."

He looks over at me. Like he's just realizing I'm here. "Lennon, stay out of this." He tries to brush me off but Dylan stands next me and says, "She doesn't have to stay out anything. She is the one who caught you, with your tongue down your wife best friend throat, remember?"  Dylan sounds light but his eyes are hard.

"Hey," Matt say in the doorway. "Maybe we should just let them talk in here. You two come with me."

"Why? David and I are having a great conversation."

"Dude!" Matty urges. I look over at him and there's an urgency in Matty's eyes that usually never makes an appearance. He cocks his head in the direction of the front door. Sending me a message.

"You know what. Matty's right. We should leave them alone." I grab Dylan by the arm and pull him out of the room as quickly as I can.

In the living room Dylan yanks his arm out of my grip. "What'd you do that for?"

"Because mom is back and someone needs to keep her away from the house until dad leaves." Matty says.

"Oh. Well you go out there. Make her get back in the car and go do something. Matt and I will stay here."

"Do something like what?"

"I don't know. Something that takes a while. Go get your hair done or something."

"Fine." I tell him and push open the storm door. I stop in my tracks. Ethan and Ellie are sitting on the porch steps. They're laughing and her head is on his shoulder. I don't say anything. I let the door swing shut behind me and run down the porch steps like I didn't see them.

"Mom!" I call to her. She has a few Dillard's bags in her hands. "Can you drive me somewhere right quick?"

"Yeah. Just let me put these bags up." She says walking closer to the house.

"Let me get those." I grab the bags from her and run them into the house. Ethan tries to get my attention but I don't have time to talk to him. I rush pass him back to my mom and get her back into the car.

"Why are you in such a hurry?"

"I don't know." I lie. "We just haven't spent a lot of time together lately. I'm just trying to get to you before the boys do." The last part isn't really a lie. We haven't really spent much time together and I miss her. She doesn't say anything. She just smiles and drive through the gates.

We drive for a little bit in silence. The sun has disappeared behind the clouds and it looks like it about to rain.

"So what do you want to do?" My mom asks me.

"Well, I was thinking we could get our nails done or something."

"Yeah, let's do that." She says and turns the nob on the radio for the volume. The radio is tuned to the classic rock station and Thunderstruck by AC DC is playing.

My mom rolls down the windows and we sing along as loud as we can.

The day out with my mom went really well. We got our nails done, then my mom convinced me to get a haircut but it was more of just a light trim, after that we grabbed lunch, and spent the rest of the evening shopping around town. When we pull up in front of the house the silver Mercedes is gone, but before we get out of the car I tell her that dad was here earlier and that's why I wanted to get her out of the house so bad.

"So your dad is in there?" she asks and reaches for the keys. I reach forward to stop her.

"Mom, it's cool. He's gone."

We walk into the house together. She's laughing about something on her phone. I glance into the living room and see that Ethan and Ellie are still together. Once again I don't say anything. And it's not that I don't have anything to say. There just wouldn't be any point in saying it. He's a big boy. His only sorta-kinda girlfriend is back home in New York, and most importantly I'm not his girl and it's not my place. I don't bother going into the living room. I head up to my room. My brothers are laid across the bed, the lights are out and their laughing at some movie on my Mac Book. Without a word I climb in between them and set the laptop on my lap.

We watch movies and laugh and joke until we fall asleep.

A/N

Just once again, I want to say thanks for all of the reads and all the nice comments I really honestly appreciate it. Also I did not proof read so, yeah.

XOXO