It was a quiet, boring Saturday afternoon, and Liam sat at Theo's desk doing his homework, enjoying the uncommon silence in the house since everyone was out. His mom and Paul were out shopping, Mason and Corey would go out on a date, Theo was who knows where, so it's not like he had better things to do.
This until all of sudden the door of the room opened with a slam to make the frames hanging on the wall tremble. Liam raised his head - exasperated - ready to scream at Theo to take it a little easy at least, but he met a sight that made him widen his eyes in shock and freeze the blood in his veins.
Before him were Theo and Tracy, clinging to each other in a messy kiss, stumbling into the room, before falling sprawling on the bed. Liam watched them horrified, too embarrassed to find something to say or do. That was surely not something that happened every day.
Probably Tracy felt someone's eyes on her - the well-known woman's intuition - because while Theo moved to kiss her neck, she turned her head to the side meeting Liam's eyes and assuming his same shocked expression.
"Ehm Theo" she mumbled weakly
"Uh?" He mumbled, still caught by her neck.
Tracy moved her hands from Theo's neck to his shoulder to push him away, and Theo raised his face to look at her annoyed "What's up?!" he snorted.
When he saw that Tracy was pecking to her side, he followed
her gaze. He startled, meeting Liam's eyes, wide open, his face
literally on fire.
Shit. This would've been hard to explain.
"What is Liam Dunbar doing in your bedroom?" Tracy asked as calmly as she could managed, looking back at Theo again from her place still beneath him
"Umm" Theo tried, looking back at her "You just... ignore him?"
Liam raised an eyebrow stunned. Seriously, Theo?
Tracy seemed on the same page. "Theo!" She exclaimed pushing him back and sitting down.
"Ugh" Theo protested, rolling his eyes, sliding sideways and pulling himself to sit up, carefully avoiding looking at Liam and focusing on the frames on the wall, with a poker face.
"So do you guys mind explaining this?" Tracy asked however, shifting her gaze from one to the other.
"Um, I think I'll go now, yeah" Liam said, getting up quickly and aiming for the door with his head down.
"Wait, asshole, you can't just walk away like that!" Theo protested.
"She's your girlfriend, not mine"
"This is your fault, what the hell are you doing here by the way?"
"This is also my house, do you remember -?"
"Why are you not around with Mason or who knows who, like any other normal kid does on a Saturday?"
"Excuse me if I had to study" Liam retorted sourly, rolling his eyes.
"Who studies on a Saturday afternoon ?!" Theo narrowed his eyes in his direction, in disbelief.
"Someone who's not an idiot"
"I have my doubts about-"
"Wait, wait-" Tracy exclaimed shutting them up, her eyes moving frantically between one or the other "Do you two live together ?!" No one answered. "No, this is not even my first question" Tracy looked at them baffled "Are you two... friends ?!"
"No" "We are working on it" Liam and Theo said simultaneously.
Theo rolled his eyes. And he looked at her. "Exactly. We're working on it" he added with a grimace.
"Oh my god" Tracy laughed, amazed.
"Okay, I'm leaving" Liam decreed, completely red and flinging
himself out of the room before Theo could stop him again. He closed
the door behind him and rushed downstairs, closing himself in the
living room, so as not to listen.
Once he was seated on the sofa, he pulled out his cell phone. Then he texted his mum.
Out of curiosity, when are the movers coming?
*
"Oh my God, this is crazy " Tracy was still giggling.
Theo's expression, however, was far from amused, he seemed tense, his lips clenched, the foot nervously tapping into the ground, staring at a point far beyond the window.
"Who would have thought that your dad would have remarried Liam Dunbar's mother of all the people?! Chances were one in a million!"
That seemed to shake Theo, who turned back to her, still sitting by her side. "Look, you must not tell anybody about this, you got me?"
"Seriously? Oh my God, everyone will go crazy-" Tracy pulled
out her phone, as if she really meant to text everyone right now.
Theo abruptly grabbed the wrist that held her phone. "I'm not kidding Tracy" he added sharply, his expression frowning.
Tracy let out a groan, yanking her hand away. Theo let her go, his expression now troubled. "Are you going out of your mind?!" She exclaimed, looking at him with wide eyes. Theo didn't answer, but looked away, biting his lip almost guilty. "What's your problem?" She asked then, bewildered. "Why don't you want it to be known? Theo, people get together and break up again and again. There's nothing wrong with that" she added, releasing a verse between the exasperated and the amused.
Theo gave an irritated snort, leaping to his feet and starting to walk up and down the room.
Tracy followed him with her eyes. "Or maybe it's because is Liam? Are you ashamed of that?" she asked after a few seconds, suddenly almost disgusted.
"That's not it" Theo hastened to say, whirling towards her, now almost angry. "I wish everyone would stop thinking that! Liam has not part in this!"
"So what?" Tracy exclaimed in exasperation, standing up in turn and spreading her arms.
Theo didn't answer again, stubbornly looking out the window again, biting the inside of his cheek almost to the point of hurting himself.
"Is this about your mother?" She then whispered more softly, after seconds that seemed like an eternity. Theo winced as if he had been suddenly stabbed, and Tracy realized she had got it right. "You never talk about her, I didn't even know your father and her-"
"She left!" Theo shouted sharply covering her voice. "There's nothing to say, there is nothing to talk about"
"So that's the reason? You don't want people to know that your mother has abando-?"
"That's enough" Theo snapped, walking toward the door and flinging it open. He stopped, holding it open, and turning to Tracy, still standing in the middle of the room. He looked away. "Now you better go" he said with all the calm he could gather up.
"Seriously?" Tracy squealed, shocked. "Are you kicking me out?"
Theo didn't answer, keeping looking at the ground and keeping the door open.
Tracy snorted angrily, before reaching to take her bag from
the bed and walking to the door. She stopped in front of him, looking
at his bent face "Do you know what, Theo? If you keep pushing people
away, sooner or later you will be all alone"
And she left.
Seven years before - third grade
"Daddy, daddy!"
Theo jumped on the couch next to his dad, sitting with his laptop on his lap and his glasses on his nose. The man was so busy typing that he didn't even seem to notice him. At least until Theo placed a sheet of paper in front of him. Paul winced, turning to the child.
"What's this, honey?" He asked with an exasperated smile.
"You have to sign it, daddy. You'll come, right?" Theo exclaimed thrilled, grabbing him by the sleeve and hopping on the spot. Paul picked up the paper, squinting behind the glass to get a better look. "Open Day? What is it?"
"The teacher said it's a day we can bring out parents to school, they can do lessons with us and stay with us all day! I can't wait! You will come for real?!"
Paul smiled sadly, lowering the paper and ruffling fondly with his hand Theo's hair. "Honey, I'm sorry, but you know your dad has to work, don't you?"
The smile slowly slipped away from Theo's face. "But can't you not go for once?"
"Honey, you know I can't" Paul shook his head weakly.
"And Mom?" Theo asked, sounding almost desperate, his eyebrows frowning, as if trying to hold back tears.
"Honey-"
"When is she coming back ?! She said she would come back, but so many days have passed, if I call her, she will definitely come."
"Theo" Paul pushed the laptop away, turning to the side and taking Theo by the shoulders. "Listen to me, honey... Your mom ..." Theo looked in anguish at his father's eyes, green and deep as his. "... she will never come back to us"
"No ..." Theo shook his head. "She'll come back!" He added stubbornly, squinting to free himself from tears. He looked at his dad determined, before grabbing his paper and running away.
*
An hour later, Theo was turning over uneasy in his bed. He knew it wasn't true. His mom couldn't have left. He couldn't have left them. Theo remembered that day of two weeks ago, sitting secretly at the top of the stairs. He had seen his mum, a big travel bag in hand, coming out of the door. She had done it often, but she had always came back. Every time. Theo knew she would come back. She would come back for him.
He put his hands under the pillow, pulling out the folded sheet
the teacher had given him that morning. He looked at the empty spaces
in which it asked to enter the names of his parents and sighed. Then he
slipped awkwardly out of bed, putting the sheet under his pillow as if
it were a treasure. And he slipped downstairs. As he walked on tiptoe
so as not to disturb his dad who was still working in the studio, he
started to go to the kitchen to grab a glass of water. When a sudden
noise made him stop in his tracks. Were they ... were they sobs?
Surprised, Theo changed direction as he approached the studio. The door
was ajar, and yes, sobs was coming from there. His father ... was he
crying?
Only the weak cry. Promise me you'll never cry, honey, can you do that?
Theo spied his father, bent over the armchair, his shoulders trembling as he cried, unable to stop the tears, his face buried in his hands, while his mother's voice repeated to him the words he had heard so often during the years that they had almost become a mantra.
Almost horrified, he turned away from the door and stepped the living room. He grabbed a chair and held it in front the telephone. He climbed up to be able to get there and opened the phone book that his father kept there with all the important numbers. His mother's was easy to find. It had always been the first on the list. Theo dialed it, taking the receiver to his ear with a trembling hand. She would come. She would come, she would answer and she would run to them ...
The phone beeped. Sorry, the number you called is non-existent.
Theo nearly dropped the receiver on the ground. Non-existent ... non-existent ...
... she will never come back to us
She's gone.
Non-existent.
Theo jumped out of the chair and ran to his room. He hid under the covers, his father's sobs still ringing in his head. Don't cry, only the weaks cry, Theo
She will not come back.
Non-existent...
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