I keep my phone in my hand and leaving the front door wide open, I step inside. We were lucky enough to find a block of land with bay ‘glimpses’ when we bought this. Nothing like the view from Gabe’s place but we can see the water. Just. We had got to enjoy beautiful sunsets across the bay by building the house so that the main living areas were upstairs, with all of the bedrooms and rumpus room downstairs, the rumpus room leads out to the pool and the garden.
I walk down the hall and check the boys old rooms, Ryder’s is completely empty, Sonny’s is as I had left it, all of his personal stuff is packed into boxes but his bed stands exactly as it always has. I don’t trust Jay to take enough care of Sonny’s stuff so I will take it with me; the boxes are too heavy for me to move on my own so I will have to wait for Jo to arrive. I go into the rumpus room. It’s completely empty, last time I was here there was a huge plasma TV on the wall, sofa’s and a pool table. Perhaps Jay’s already moved them, or sold them if he has no room at his new place. I go to the thermostat on the wall and turn the heating off, it’s beginning to make me feel sick it’s so warm in here. I take a last look around the empty rumpus room and then head back down the hallway towards my old bedroom, I’m not sure if I want to go in there yet. I will go upstairs first and bring down the artwork off the walls that I want and there are a couple of pieces of art deco that I collected over the years, Jason was never a big fan but I went through a phase where I loved the stuff; I step off the last step into the large kitchen/living/dining area and stop dead in my tracks. I’m actually not sure what to make of the scene in front of me.
The place has been completely trashed, the kitchen cupboards and drawers are open, there is very little food in them, packets, spice jars, nothing that you could actually eat, there are dirty plates and cups all over the bench tops and some smashed over the floor, the sofa has been shredded, like somebody has set to work on it with a knife and just slashed and slashed until there is nothing else left, the plasma TV is missing from the wall and my old dining table and chairs have gone, there are holes in the walls, which look to me like somebody has punched them; my heart is hammering so hard, I feel I’m in danger of breaking a rib as it hits against them so hard. Just as I turn to head back down the stairs and leave I notice a couple of zip lock bags on the side, the bigger one appears to have weed inside, I open it up and sniff, yuck, smells like cheese, yep, definitely weed, hydro probably, but the other bag, the smaller one, I’m not sure, I pick it up and examine it. “What the fuck?” I whisper to myself out loud. I know what I think it is, but I cannot for the life of me fathom what it’s doing here? I grab both the bags and shove them into my bag I have hanging across my chest and head back down the stairs, calling Ryder again as I walk, still no answer.
I stop at the bottom of the stairs for a few seconds trying to decide what I should do when I hear a cough from my old bedroom. I’m not an idiot and this isn’t one of those scary films where the girl, all alone, goes to investigate what the noise is. Na, I’m more your Scooby and Shaggy, I shit myself at the sound and get my arse out of there. I head straight for my car, thinking all the while that I still don’t know how to lock it from the inside, I’ve never read the manual. My brain is racing, my thoughts all over the place when my arm is grabbed and I’m spun back around to face Jay, but it’s not Jay, not my Jay at least, I let out a pathetic scream and try to pull my arm away. “You’re here Lauren, I knew you would come.”
He starts pulling me back towards the house. “Jason, no, what are you doing? We agreed, you wouldn’t be here.”
It doesn’t matter how much I try to drag my feet, he is too strong for me and I’m being pulled closer and closer to the house, I have to stop him, I can’t be alone with him in there.
“Jason… Please. I need to get stuff out of my car. I have boxes and bags and bubble wrap.”
I don’t, I’m making it up as I go. I just need to get away from him. He spins around and leans right into my face and speaks to me through gritted teeth. “That car Lauren. That fuckin car has got to go. I don’t like it darl, I don’t like it one bit.”
He’s stopped moving while he’s talking and that’s all that my mind can focus on right now. I need to keep him talking. “Why, why not Jay? You’ve always liked Beamers.”
“No! Not that one Lauren. Look at it, look what it says; who the fuck does he think he is, buying you a car, you’re MY fucking wife, he shouldn’t have done that, you’re NOT his one, you’re mine.”