Finally, I hear the nurse’s footsteps, and Gavin’s cries quiet down a bit. When I open my eyes, I see Tori staring through us with horror in her eyes.
“I know you’ve been waiting quite a while, but we should have the results for you within ten minutes or so. I’ll have someone bring in a second chair for you, as well.”
It takes a solid five minutes to calm Gavin down completely, and he pretty much passes out from what I’m assuming to be exhaustion.
“I can’t do this,” Tori says.
Like any good record scratch, my heart pauses, along with every other sound around me. That phrase is disturbingly familiar, and the last time I heard it, Cammy caused my life to change, in an extremely painful way. “What?” I’m not sure the word was even audible. What the hell can’t she do?
“AJ, you know I—this isn’t what I wanted—what we wanted.”
“Tori,” I say calmly. “I don’t know what is going on in that crazy head of yours right now, but have you thought through whatever you’re about to say? Because for the life of me, I don’t know what I could have done differently to prevent you from saying something like this.” I don’t even know what she was going to say. I’m just assuming, I guess, based on past experience.
“I can’t do what you do, AJ,” she continues.
“So don’t; be you. How hard is that?” I’m angry. I sound outraged. Is this really the time or the place to have a discussion like this? Our son is in the ER for a high fever, and she’s telling me she can’t do this?
“I’m trying my hardest,” she says.
“Try fucking harder,” I snap at her.
Considering the fact that I can count the number of times I’ve sworn at Tori on one finger, the one time being right this second, she looks baffled. “I can’t,” she says, through gritted teeth.
It’s not like I haven’t had these thoughts about her too, but I was hoping it was all in my head. When people say they don’t plan to have kids, maybe they don’t all mean it, but some do. I think Tori definitely meant it and for a reason she never gave me. In fairness, my reason for not wanting kids was never exactly mentioned either.
CHAPTER FOUR
TWELVE YEARS AGO
FIVE DAYS HAVE done nothing to ease my anger or pain, and I’m not sure I will ever feel differently. I’ve debated calling Cammy every second since I was dragged out of her hospital room, but I don’t know what to say. Well, I do have something to say, but it will probably make things worse. However, if I don’t clear my mind soon, I’m afraid I might completely implode, and if I come any closer to breaking, Mom might lock me in a room and corner me until I tell her every single one of the dark secrets I’ve been keeping from her this year.
With the image of that actually happening, I act on the decision I’ve been debating since the moment I woke up this morning. I grab my coat from the closet and quietly open the front door. “AJ, is that you?” Mom calls out from the kitchen.
“Nope,” I shout back.
“Andrew,” she laments. Mom pulled out the full name…she knows something’s up. “Come in here for a moment, please.”
I roll my eyes and clench my coat tightly within my fist as I turn the corner and walk into our aged kitchen. “What’s up, Mom?”
She wipes her hands off on a dish rag, turns around, and leans her back up against the counter. Her arms slowly fold over her chest, and her eyes narrow in on me. “You have been my son for seventeen years, and not once have you locked yourself in your room for four days straight, which tells me something is going on or something has happened, so what is it?”
I might be what everyone calls a wiseass, but one thing I’ve never done is lie to either of my parents. I’ve never had anything to lie about before. “I’m just stressed-out, no biggie,” I tell her.