Sleepless Nights(19)
Well, I guess it’s time to prove her wrong. “Actually, Mom, I’ve never been myself. I’ve always been hiding as the girl everyone else thought I should be. I’m tired of hiding behind Victor. I want to be me. I want to say whatever the fuck comes into my head. I don’t want to wear fancy clothes and go to charity functions. I want to ride on the back of my man’s bike and hang out at the clubhouse with people who aren’t afraid to be themselves. I don’t give a fuck what anyone thinks. I’ve done everything in my life to please you or some high society bitch I didn’t even like. I’m just tired of it.”
My mom opens and closes her mouth like a fish and I resist the urge to laugh. “Well you can’t bring that boy in here anymore. He’s a bad influence on your brothers. And I don’t want anything to come up missing. There are valuables in the house.”
Okay that’s it. “Damien put your shoes on. We’re leaving.” I stride over to my closet and pull out a Gucci bag my mom got me for Christmas last year. I wouldn’t have cared if it were from fucking Wal-Mart. I start stuffing clothes and shoes into the bag. When it’s filled up, I grab my wallet and shove it in my back pocket. I go over to my window and throw the bag down. Then I turn back to my mother. “You can tell the boys and Anna I went back to Victor’s. If they want to see me, call me and I’ll meet y’all there. Other than that, I’m done with you.
“You do realize that Damien is Carl Daniels’ son. You know, the guy that was such good friends with Dad? Carl has always been more of a father to me than Dad ever was. You insult him and me with the words that came out of your mouth. You should really learn not to judge Mom.” What I have to say next is between my mom and I. I don’t want Damien to hear and ask questions later. I lean down to say quietly into her ear, “I’ll tell Van and Court all the shit you’ve been hiding from them. Hell Mom, I’ll tell the whole world.” I wouldn’t really but she doesn’t know that. I shouldn’t know all the secrets of my mother’s life but my father thought I should know. He wrote all of it down and willed it to me when he died. I guess he thought I would be older when he died. But I wasn’t.
I grab Damien’s hand and pull him out of my bedroom. I’m not going to miss the purple hues on the walls and on the bed. Nor the white carpet and fluffy rugs. Not even the desk Mom got for me when I was fourteen. It’s all junk that bitch got me, even more ways I let the people in my life control me.
“It was nice to meet you, Mrs. Pierce,” Damien says to her. Pierce is the last name of my stepfather.
“It’s actually Ms. Bridges. And I’d rather you get out of my house than try to charm me.” Bridges is her maiden name, which she went back to after my stepfather died.
“You don’t have to be nice to her. She practically called you a thief,” I tell him once we get outside. We thankfully didn’t run into anyone else in the house.
I go to walk over to the place I dropped my bag, when Damien pulls my hand and brings me into his arms. “Baby, I steal cars for my Dad. I am a thief.”
I shrug. “Yeah, but you’re not going to steal her car, or anything out of her house.”
“I could, if you wanted to piss her off. Though I think runnin’ off like you did was punishment enough.” He smoothes the hair out of my face and looks deep into my eyes. “I ain’t got much to give you, Glossy. Just my bike and my club. I ain’t Victor and I ain’t made of money. I can’t give you this.” He waves his hands around at my mother’s huge ass house.
I give him a small smile. “I don’t want this, Damien. If I did, I would have stayed with Victor and become a housewife with fake everything and a drinking problem.” I lean in and give him a gentle kiss. “I just want you. Plus, I can buy whatever I want. I got my trust found three months ago. Hell, I can buy us a huge house if that’s what you want.”
He purses his lips and glares at me. “I ain’t lettin’ my old lady buy our house. I’ll do it. You can spend your money on decoratin’ it.”
And now I become sad because thinking about the future does that to me. “Do you want kids?”
He frowns at me and wraps his arms tight around my waist. “I haven’t really thought about it. They are cute and everythin’ but I honestly don’t know if I could handle it.”
I gulp down my fears and just blurt it out. The one thing I haven’t told another person since my mother found out. “I can’t have kids.” My eyes get blurry and I know the tears are about to come. Of all the things I’ve been hiding inside my whole life, this is the one thing I don’t like to live with. Because more than anything, I want to bear my own children.