“Enough!” I screeched and the room stilled. I turned eyes to my son. “Give your Uncle Lawrie your car keys.”
“What?” he asked sharply. “Why?”
“Do it…now,” I whispered, my voice trembling.
“I’m not—” he began.
“Keys, pal, you’re not going to make your mother ask again,” Lawrie stated, moving to my son with his palm up.
I turned and caught sight of Aisling and Cillian, anger and horror and sadness searing through me that all this time my daughter was a part of Aisling fading.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered.
Tears formed in her eyes.
Cillian shuffled protectively closer to his sister.
Seeing that, I stomped to my phone on the kitchen counter. I snatched it up, slid my finger on the screen and put it to my ear.
It rang once.
“Are the kid’s all right?” Conrad asked in greeting.
He sounded very concerned.
That did not dawn on me.
“Auden’s grounded,” I announced. “He cursed in my home even after I told him not to and then he did it directly to both me and Mickey.”
“Shit,” Conrad muttered, a surprising response but one that was lost on me.
“And our daughter is a bully. She’s hanging with bullies and she defends her position that she doesn’t say cruel things, but she doesn’t deny she participates by not only egging it on by laughing but also not doing what she can to stop it or remove herself from it,” I shared.
“Jesus Christ.” Conrad was still muttering but now doing it sounding angry.
“She further defends herself by saying I taught her that garbage with what happened between you and me and Martine.”
“That’s ridiculous,” he bit out and that got to me, making my body jerk.
“What?” I asked.
“It’s ridiculous. What happened with you and Martine is not that. There’s no excuse for bullying.”
I didn’t know what to make of his shocking show of support but at that juncture I had no choice but to roll with it.
“I want you to come and get them. I don’t know what you and Martine have planned for Thanksgiving but I will not have my children under my roof behaving this way. They can come back after Olympia apologizes to Aisling and ends her association with Polly, who’s the ringleader of the mean girls. As for Auden, he must apologize to Mickey and me.”
“We’re not going back there, Mom,” Auden called and I turned to him.
“You’ll do what I say. I’m going to rescue Thanksgiving for my brother and the other man in my life who’s never treated me like dirt and his kids who are good kids who are also unfailingly kind and sweet. And as much as it pains me to admit, my children being present will negate those efforts.”
Auden opened his mouth but I turned away when Conrad said in my ear. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
Of course he would.
“That would be appreciated,” I said acidly then hung up.
I whirled around. “Your father is coming. Go get your jackets,” I ordered.
“We’re not going back there,” Auden repeated.
“You most certainly are,” I returned. “Get your jackets.”
Now Pippa was cowering into Auden in a way that didn’t sit well with me but I couldn’t pay attention to that because Auden looked to Mickey.
“I’m sorry. I was out of line. It’ll never happen again,” he declared.
I drew a sharp breath into my nose.
“’Preciate that, bud, but you gotta turn that to your mother,” Mickey replied like Lawrie, firm, but calm, and disappointed.
Auden looked to me. “I’m sorry, Mom. I shouldn’t have said those things, but we had a really bad morning and last night wasn’t great either and we’ve both had enough.”
Other things were beginning to trouble me at his words but before I could latch on, Lawrie spoke.
“Whatever that is, Auden, you don’t take out on your mother.”
My son nodded and muttered, “I get that. I messed up.”
“I didn’t know about your mom.”
That came from Pip and I saw her looking at Aisling.
“So?” Cillian returned. “That doesn’t matter.”
Pippa bit her lip and pressed closer to her brother.
“High school is hard,” Auden put in lamely.
“It is,” I shot back. “It’s also when you begin to learn who you are, who you want to be and how to do the right thing.” I looked to my girl. “What you’ve done, I hope to God somewhere inside you, Olympia, you knew was the wrong thing.”
“If I went against her, she’d turn that on me,” Pippa told me, her voice shaky.