Ancil“I–I don’t know. I haven’t thought that far.”
“Maybe you should think about it. I wish I could tell you what will happen if you file a complaint but I can’t. My father can be very cruel at times but just at times. He can vary between extremes and sometimes be the kind of man that I can be proud to call my father, but only at times. Every time I try to hate him, he makes me love him again and I hate that about him. I used to look down on my mom every time she told me that she loved him but now that I’m older I understand why she loved him despite the abuse. It’s because you can’t unlove someone and if you do it means that you didn’t love that person to begin with. Once you love someone they become a part of you forever and the only way to remove them is to die. Five years ago, my mother chose to sever her love for my father herself because she couldn’t live with loving him anymore. But it sucks because she left me all alone in this world with my father. She’s no longer here to stand up for me or comfort me when I cry. She just left me.” She was now crying.
I opened my arms to hug her but she pushed herself away from me.
“No, no, no,” she said, wiping her eyes. “You hug me because you feel sorry for me. Don’t feel sorry for me. I hate that. I’m not some charity case.”
“I wasn’t trying to hug you because I felt sorry for you. It was just a friendly gesture.”
“Well in that case you’re free to hug me.”
I proceeded to hug her and she proceeded to squeeze me, resting her head on my chest, soiling my top with tears.
“I want you to promise me one thing,” Kate said.
“What’s that?”
“Promise me that you’ll never feel sorry for me.”
“I, Ronald Baker, will never feel sorry for you, Kate Warren.”
I left Kate’s home and went straight to my own. It turned out my mom was rather worried since she hadn’t seen me last night or that morning. Unknown to me she had been calling my cell phone the entire time but since my phone was dead, again on account of the beatdown, all of her attempts had failed. With much waving and pacing, in a high-pitched voice full of concern she pummeled me with a series of questions. She asked about my black eye, which I lied about, telling her that I had tripped and I fell. Of course, she didn’t believe me, and sensing that I was lying continued to pester me. However, I stuck to the story of my unfortunate face-down collision with the floor.
The next day I woke up excited to go to Kate’s home. I had really enjoyed her company and I never looked forward to seeing anyone as much as I did Kate. She was becoming a permanent part of me and I couldn’t quite decide yet if that was a good or a bad thing. However, getting too attached to her could be fatal, especially with her father’s instruction to stay away from her.
I brushed my teeth and showered to go visit Kate but my mom kept insisting that I stay home. She said that she needed help painting the house or something. For some reason she got two days off from work and decided to renovate and paint the house. She promised me that I could leave after half the house was painted. I took her up on the offer. I grabbed the paintbrush and my mom grabbed the roller and we both attacked the house in the order of straight lines and stripes.
“The last time I painted this house it was with your father,” my mom said, rolling the roller along the wall. “He was a champion painter. He painted really quickly but still managed to remain neat. I barely did any painting when he was at it. I spent most of the time admiring his tensed muscles and sweaty skin. He was so sexy. I get weak even thinking about it.”
“Ewww Mom but yeah I remember that day,” I said with a slight smile.
“As you should. You were right there. You and Nixon were there playing basketball. You guys even smeared the walls with the ball. I got furious but your father remained so calm and collected. He just said,” She deepened her voice trying to impersonate Dad, “Don’t get mad Grace. They are just boys. Let them have fun.”
I looked at her to see if she was going to cry but she didn’t. “Sounds like dad.”
“I sound nothing like Peter,” my mom said.
“No. It sounds like something he would say.”
“Oh, yeah it does.”
While we were painting, a car pulled up in our yard honking its horn. It was my friend and former college roommate, Adam. He was driving his rosy, red convertible with his black shades gleaming in the summer sun. His jersey matched the color of the car and from his mouth, a lit cigarette dangled. A blonde girl with blue eyes sat in the front seat. Adam depicted the image of the typical college kid. He knew how to have fun and how to get in trouble with his parents. He was never given permission to drive his parents’ cars but he drove them anyway because he was just a rebel like that.
“If it isn’t my favorite college dropout,” Adam said. “Next to Steve Jobs, of course.”
