LOVE TO HATE YOU

X, Y, Z...

By the time I left work that night, it was well after midnight and I was exhausted. My neck and shoulders were sore and my feet probably smelt as bad as they felt. But I'd made enough money to buy the textbooks my sister needed, so that made it all worth it.

I was going to go with my sister personally the next day to buy them and, while I was there, try and talk some sense into my mother-not that she could be reasoned with. My dad was all my mother knew, and she claimed, even after everything he'd put her through, that she still loved him. I'd read enough books on the subject to know that was just her codependence talking. What my mother needed to do was go to counseling, find the inner strength to kick him out once and for all, and never allow him back into her life.

My dad was another story. A few years back I'd tried to get him to go to a Gamblers Anonymous meeting, but he'd refused. He didn't see it as a problem. He said the problem was not his gambling; the problem was his "unlucky streak." But he was always on an unlucky streak.

My dad was fired from his job in the City Council accounts department around the same we lost everything. "Suspected fraud," they said. That little tit-bit even managed to make the local papers, so, not only did we have nothing, but everyone knew about it too. It's amazing how people look at you differently when they learn your father is a criminal. But my mother stuck by him, and, with the little savings she had, she threw all of it into lawyers for my dad when it was blatantly obvious to everyone he was guilty. At the time I hoped he would go to jail, so that we could get on with our lives without him, but he got off on some kind of technicality that I'm yet to understand-I hate the legal system.

I'd also naively hoped that my mother would finally leave him, especially when the court case started and she caught him with that hooker. But she hadn't. When we were kicked out of our house, the few relatives we did have offered us a place to stay. On one condition, though: that my father didn't stay with us-he'd stolen things and "borrowed" money from just about everyone we knew. But she'd turned down all the offers because she wanted to "stick by her man." That's how we'd landed in that trailer park.

A part of me hated my mother for that, even though JJ kept reminding me that she was just as sick as him, but I still couldn't help it. If I had a child, they would come first. I wouldn't choose some drunken, stealing, lying, cheating, gambling addict over the safety and welfare of my own children. My children would always come first. I bet Li-Hau's father put her first, and I bet that was the reason she was such a smart, savvy little girl without a care in the world. I bet she wouldn't have to grow up ashamed and embarrassed by her family-let down by the parents who were supposed to protect her from hurt.

When I arrived home, I immediately saw an envelope with my name on it stuck to my front door. I smiled because I knew exactly who it was from. Ben had a very distinctive hand writing: it was big, bold and curly. I looked in the direction of his door. The light outside was off and I wondered if he was still awake. If the rumors were true, maybe he didn't sleep. I opened the envelope and a strange card fell out.

"Tap Code," it read and it had a bunch of strange markings and letters on it.

What the hell was that? I was still trying to figure out what it meant when I got to my bedroom and turned on the shower. All I wanted to do was climb into bed and sleep, but, when I did, I heard a tap on the wall.

I jumped, then suddenly realized what it was. "Tap Code!" I smiled as I got it-Ben, Ben, Ben-He had to be the most unique person I'd ever met. I studied the card and counted the taps.

"Hi," he had tapped.

"Hi," I tapped back, it was a slow, laborious process.

"How U?" I heard the tap come back.

"Tired," I responded.

There was a pause before I heard the next one.

"Sweet dreams beautiful."

I swooned, a proper melting swoon that made all my limbs and face feel like jelly.

"X," he tapped again. The swooning increased to critical levels. I was contemplating sending him an X back, but it seemed like a hell of a big deal. An X. A kiss. So I sent back something else.

"Y."

There was a pause, and I knew Ben well enough by then to know he was probably amused by this.

"Z," he tapped back, before the tapping went silent.

I stared at the dark celling with a smile plastered across my face. He was good at this. He was a pro-flirter. If flirting and wooing were an Olympic sport, he would win the gold. I just hoped he was being serious; that this wasn't some kind of sport for him-because I was seriously starting to feel a little giddy and intoxicated by it all.