Teasing My Dad’s Best Friend(4)

She made her way back to the booth and found her parents waiting with Mitch. John and Angel looked completely at ease and happy while Mitch looked as if he were being held hostage. She had never had anyone get nervous around her parents before, but it excited her to see how afraid he was that they would get caught.

The four of them ordered their lunch, John and Mitch talked about the cabin and woods which bored Alissa to death. Angel tried to have a conversation with her daughter, she was always trying to be the ‘cool mom’. She told Alissa that is she was a good girl she might be lucky enough to get a glass of wine.

Alissa gave a half smile to her mother. She wanted to tell her that she had already drank much stronger stuff than her mother’s wine. How could she have not? Her mother was what Alissa referred to as a wino. She had to have at least a bottle of wine each night before she went to bed.

It did not take long for Alissa to realize that she would not miss a bottle here and there and she began stealing it when she was barely 13. John liked much harder liquor, but he was also more careful with it. He would have a few drinks each night and then lock his bottles up. It took Alissa a while, but by the time she was 15 she had found his key and began stealing a shot here and a shot there.

By the time she was sneaking out to parties she was able to out drink most of the college students and could win any drinking game. Alissa did not consider herself an alcoholic like her parents, she considered herself a young girl who wanted to have some fun. She thought that her parents were far too old to be drinking in order to forget their responsibilities. After all, that was one of the reasons they had forgotten that she was their responsibility.

“You don’t seem very happy,” Angel said to her daughter.

“Really mother. I am 18 years old and you are just noticing that I don’t seem very happy,” she smirked.

Her mother looked as if she had been slapped. John looked at Alissa and then at his wife, tears were welling up in her eyes.

“You know what,” Angel growled at her daughter. “We have done everything that we can for you and you are completely ungrateful. I am so sorry that your life has been so difficult.”

Alissa scowled at her mother. “You have bought me everything,” she rolled her eyes as she spoke. “You have not done anything. When did you come to my school when I was being bullied? How many times can you remember tucking me in at night? Tell me, Mother. How old was I when I went on my first date? Or what was the name of the boy?”

Alissa stood up and walked away from the table. She was not going to deal with her mother pretending to be Miss Perfect all summer. She knew that it was the last summer that she would ever have to deal with Angel and John and she planned on making sure they knew exactly what type of parents they were by the time it was over.

As Alissa walked out and got into Mitch’s car Angel sat at the booth with her mouth gaping open. Alissa had never spoken to her like that before. Yes, she had been sarcastic and she had been a brat at times but she had never called her mother out like that and Angel could not believe that she had done so in front of Mitch.

If there was one thing that Angel cared about, it was what other people thought of her and her family. She always made sure that they were dressed in the best clothes, that their house looked as if it should be in a magazine, she would go days without sleeping just to make sure all of the flowers she planted were perfectly manicured and if anyone said a bad word about the family Angel was quick to respond.

Alissa had no idea how many times Angel had to respond to people saying bad things about her. It was Alissa that Angel spent most of her time cleaning up after. She had cleared up rumors about Alissa by purchasing other girls clothing, she had paid boys not to spread rumors. Angel did not want to believe that they were true and so she decided to ignore them, but deep inside she knew that her daughter was not the sweet little girl everyone pretended that she was.

John paid the bill and Angel excused herself to wash her face. “Do you want Alissa to ride with you the rest of the way so Angel can talk to her,” Mitch asked hoping that John would say yes. He was already regretting what he had just done to his best friends daughter.

“No,” John replied. “It is best if they stay away from each other for a while. I have a feeling this is how our entire summer is going to be.”

Mitch nodded his head, agreeing with John and then walked to his own car. He had met both John and Angel long before Alissa was ever born. He knew that the two of them had not been the best parents. He had often wondered why they had even had a child.

He had witnessed them leaving their little girl with many different baby sitters, hiring nannies to take care of her and sending her off to different programs just so they would not have to deal with her.

In fact, he never even remembered either of them holding her when she was a baby or so much as showing off a picture to any of their friends. They had mutual friends that were surprised when they found out that John and Angel had a child. As Mitch opened his car door and climbed in he could see the anger on Alissa’s face.

Mitch closed his door and started the car. After driving for about five minutes he looked over at Alissa. She looked like a broken girl. He realized that she probably had no idea what love was. The guilt grew in him as he began to understand what motivated Alissa to seek after men’s attention.

“You’re really mad at her, aren’t you?” he asked her.

“Mad?” Alissa huffed. “You actually have to care about someone to be mad at them. I hate her.”

“You know, Alissa,” Mitch said, trying to figure out what he should say. “Hate is a very strong word and she is your mother.”

“My mother,” Alissa jerked her head toward Mitch. “No, she is the incubator that I grew in. My mother was 30 different teenage girls who babysat me; my mother was the daycare, and day camps that I grew up in, or the different nannies that I had. Angel is just the woman that gave birth to me.”

Mitch sighed. He did not have any experience trying to council people, but he knew that deep down her parents had to care about her. “You know,” he said slowly. “You shouldn’t be so hard on them. Have you ever wondered why they behave the way they do? Maybe it is all they know.”

Alissa shook her head. “If that was all they knew then they would not do it,” she said making a face at Mitch. “If they had any idea what it was like to live life the way I have they would never do it to their own child. I can’t imagine having a kid and making them feel as if they did not exist or that I did not care about them.”

Mitch’s heart broke for Alissa. He could not imagine what she was going through our how she was feeling. He had grown up in a well-balanced family where he was made to feel loved every day.

He always knew that when he got home from school his mother would be there and when he went to bed at night his dad would come and talk to him. He sat back in his seat and thought about Alissa’s life.

“You know,” he began. “No one knew that you felt that way. If I had known I would have…”

“You would have what?” Alissa interrupted him. “Stepped in, been my daddy? Maybe told them that they were wrong? Everyone knew what was going on. People didn’t even know that I existed until I was a teenager. How can you say that no one knew how I felt?”

Mitch had no words. Angel and John had always made it seem like they were such a happy family, that they were getting along great and Alissa was always taking part in some activity.

He shook his head as he realized just how blind, he had been. He loved John like a brother and Angel like a sister and he could not imagine that they had been as bad as Alissa was saying they were.

“Listen,” he said to her. “We are going up to the cabin to enjoy the summer together before you head off to college. This could be the last summer that you spend with your parents and I think that it is important that you clear the air.”

“What do you want me to do, Mitch?” she asked. “Do you want me to tell them that I have slept with multiple men because they ignored me when I was a kid? Do you want me to cry and tell them that I have daddy issues? I won’t do it. I have taken care of myself and I have made my own choices. What I do has nothing to do with them not being parents.”

Mitch looked at Alissa as she spoke. She seemed so grown up and so young at the same time. It was obvious that she had learned to take care of herself at a young age, but without the parental supervision that she needed she was still very immature.

“The only thing that I intend to do,” she continued, “is to let them know that they were the worst parents that have ever existed and it would have been better if I had never been born. I am going to make sure that they understand after this summer they will never see me again. I am leaving in the fall and never coming back and that is how it is going to be.”

Mitch wanted to grab her and shake her, but he wanted to hug her and make her feel better at the same time. He knew Alissa’s parents were in for a long hard summer and he only hoped that his indiscretion was not part of her attempt to cause them pain.

Alissa fell asleep staring out the window and Mitch did not see any point in waking her. He thought that it was best that she rest. He had seen Angel when she was angry and it was not a pretty sight. He knew that the chances were there was going to be a big fight not long after the four of them arrived at the cabin.