Ev
I always walk into my parent’s house with trepidation and dread. I know it sounds horrible. My Dad rarely talks to me. My mother tries to talk to me and sometimes even succeeds. I worry about her a lot. She never goes out much and my Dad runs her ragged. It makes me sad. I know that when my parent’s married they loved each other, but as the years have gone by, it has sucked them dry. That is just what I see it but they have been together almost fifty years and that has to count for something. However, they seem like shells of the people they used to be and honestly, I don’t want that. I am pretty sure that is why I really don’t try to meet someone. The couples in my life haven’t been the greatest role models for love.
When we are growing up we are taught that love is like a romantic comedy and everything turns out happy in the end. Real life isn’t that way. When I got divorced, it was a mourning process. I felt as if my spouse had died; not that I left him. I mourned the divorce like I mourned a death. It was not a romantic comedy where all ended well with kisses and loud outburst of undying love. I sometimes wonder if I even know what love is. Was my marriage that ended in divorce the greatest love of my life. God, I hope not. I hope that I’m not so jaded that I never experience love and passion again, but at the same time do I really want the hassle of a relationship? Relationships with family are hard enough, throw a romantic relationship in the mix and it could be a recipe for disaster.
I make small talk with my mother and get Donnie out of his room and we leave. Donnie is surly sitting in the passenger side of the car.
“Try to be pleasant,” I tell him. “I really think you will like Ness and Dug.”
He grunts. I silently wonder if teenagers speak another language that consists of monosyllabic words and grunts.
“How is school going?” I ask him.
He grunts and says: “Fine.”
“Your grades okay?”
Another grunt. “Yea.”
I pull off on the side of the road. I throw the car in park. “Donnie, can you speak in more than one syllable?”
He stares at me with those beautiful green eyes and they are so cold. “Mom, don’t start.”
I swallow hard, trying to control my emotions. I want to scream at him, shake him and ask him why he hates me so much when I love him more than anyone on earth. “It isn’t going to kill you to spend some time with me and meet some people I really care a great deal about. It will be good for you.”
“How is it good for me, Mom?” he asked. “I really don’t feel like hanging out with old people. I live with old people.”
I stare at him, wondering where the hell my sweet little boy is. That three year old who couldn’t wait to hug me and wouldn’t sleep alone in his room. Where had he gone and who was this non-feeling creature in front of me?
I glared at him. “Just be nice.”
He grunts. Again. He sounds like a caveman.
In the back of my mind, as I pull onto the road, I think to myself, it would be a great investment for someone to create a colony to send teenage boys to. Maybe, I should market that. They would stay at the colony until their balls dropped and they began to speak in normal sentences and treat people with respect. On second thought, they may not ever get to leave the colony. I don’t have that much energy or time to invest in such an endeavor. I think I will pass. I hope that this stage he is in will pass and he will grow not to hate me so much. I can only hope this happens because the alternative is too much for me to bear.
We pull into Ness and Dug’s place fifteen minutes later. “Please be nice.”
He grunts. “I will.”
We walk up to the door and I ring the bell. Ness answers with a winning smile and Dug comes up happily behind her. “Is he with her? Is he?” I hear Dug ask excitedly.
“Come in before Dug bust a gut,” Ness tells us. She looks Donnie over. “He can’t wait to meet you, Donnie. Your mother talks about you quite a bit.”
Dug walks in his giant steps toward Donnie. Donnie doesn’t flinch at Dug’s size and it surprises me. “I am so happy; yes sir, to meet you, Donnie. You are so handsome, just like your mom said and you look all neat and tidy, yes you sure do.”
A smile creeps onto Donnie’s face and he softens. “Thank you. “
Dug claps his hands. “I hope you like hot rods. I have hot rods and I want to show you them. Yes sir. I really want to show you the mustang. Do you like mustangs? I sure do. I surely do.”
Donnie smiles even bigger. “I love hot rods. I would like to see them.”
“Follow me, Donnie.” Dug told him and walked off toward his room. Donnie followed.
I let out a deep breath and relaxed.
“Were you worried?” Ness asked.
“I was. Could I please have a glass of tea?” I asked. “Donnie was really moody on the drive up here.”
She put an arm around my shoulders and led me to the kitchen. “Dug has a way of calming people down. He has a way about him and obviously your boy was open to it or he wouldn’t have been so eager to go with Dug and look at hot wheels. Let’s be honest, hot wheels are not really age appropriate or super cool for Donnie. However, it might remind him of when he was a little boy.”
I sat down at the kitchen table and put my head down. “I wish he didn’t hate me, Ness.”
Ness sat a glass of tea in front of me. “He doesn’t hate you, Ev. He doesn’t know how to forgive you for whatever travesty he thinks has occurred. He is a teenager and they don’t understand anything that is going on with them.”
“We used to be so close,” I told her sadly. “Never a night without saying I love you. I would say ’I love you more than the moon, the stars, the sun and the rain’ Now, he won’t stay with me for one night, won’t speak with me and if he uses a full sentence it is usually to tell me to leave him alone. How could I have let this happen? I loved being a parent when Donnie was little. Now, I can’t do anything right no matter how hard I try.”
“What happened, Ev? What wrong does he think you did?”
I couldn’t meet her eyes. “I don’t really want to talk about it. I am ashamed of myself but mostly I am just mad that I could be so stupid.”
Ness patted my hand. “I am here if you want to tell me. I wasn’t put on this earth to judge you.”