Trigger warning: domestic violence859Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAQFPCoPABs
859Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡH4MKXlTJTI
859Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpJpYXjmH6T
The doorbell rang.
Feeling his heart jump out of his chest, Mark stood up from the couch in the living room. Just like Mom had said, Dad was here today after spending a couple of weeks training at a faraway military base, but he arrived much earlier than usual. If Mark had known, he would’ve concocted a story about doing a job interview but not getting the job, or at least mentally prepared himself for a possible beating. As long as he didn’t mention hanging out with Ava and her friends, Dad wouldn’t raise either of his giant fists.
Christy, with her eyes still on the TV, simply folded her arms. “I’m not answering it,” she said.
Mom was about to head toward the hallway, but Mark raised a hand and said, “I’ll get it.” After she nodded, he took a deep breath. Though it was just answering the door, it felt like one huge step toward proving himself to Dad.
When he reached the door, he unlocked it and turned the knob with a trembling hand. Dad, in his dark blue Marines uniform, had started growing some white hair and his facial expression was the definition of misery. Mark involuntarily held a breath.
“Afternoon,” Dad mumbled as he picked up his large bag from the ground.
“I’ll get that,” Mark murmured, but Dad shot him an irritated glance while he stepped into the house. Mark closed the door and followed Dad down the hallway in silence.
Dad got to the living room and dropped his bag on the couch. After yawning and unbuttoning his dark blue jacket, he said, “I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in a long time.”
“Welcome back,” Christy said as she lowered the TV volume.
“How was training?” Mom asked in Spanish, entering the room.
“Same as always,” he grumbled in Spanish. “I’m sorry if I don’t have any big news, alright?” He went to the kitchen, and Mark reluctantly followed with Mom. “I’m starving,” Dad said. “What’s in the fridge?”
“Just...bean soup,” Mom said in a guilty tone.
“Just bean soup? It’s like every time I come home, you’re cooking less and less.” Dad’s voice had risen, which usually meant he would get violent. “Is that true, Mark?” he asked in English.
Not trusting his voice to be strong enough, Mark just nodded. Ever since Mom broke up with Brandon Moore, her actions started to match her depressive moods.
“I tell you this again and again: you need to put the kids first!” Dad yelled in Spanish.
“I do, Sam! You’re just not home often to see--”
“There you go again accusing me of not coming home enough. Don’t you see I can’t be home all the time? I’m working as hard as I can to get this family food but you aren’t even putting it on the table!”
Mom already started crying. “You work so hard and then you come home when we’re sleeping and expect us to be perfect?” she wailed.
“Are you saying that’s too much to ask for? What about me!? I’ve made many sacrifices for this job!” He raised his shirt to reveal the various scars scattered across his hairy chest and belly. More than anything, Mark hated when Dad flaunted his scars as if they could excuse him for the sinful things he did.
Mom wiped away a tear with her sleeve. “That’s why you should quit and find a job that pays better and gives you more time at home.”
“I don’t want to talk about that again, Camila,” he growled. “We need to discuss your lack of responsibility around here. After you finally dumped Brandon you’ve been a ghost.”
She sniffled. “At least he made me happy.”
In less than a second, Dad strode to her and grabbed her by the upper arms. “You take back what you said, whore!”
Christy just entered the room and stood beside Mark, her face emotionless.
After Mom took a moment to calm her sobs, she said, “I started seeing him because I lost my husband. This family is falling apart because of you.”
Dad shook her violently. “Everything was normal until you let him come in and act like he’s the father of my family! Then he took away Christina’s innocence when you didn’t even notice! How could you let that happen in this house?”
“How could you let Mark keep missing school for that high school drop-out and her drugs every single day?” she fired back, but then she glanced at Mark, seeming to realize her mistake.
Mark took a step back at the same time Dad let go of Mom and glared. “Marcos Felipe Vargas, you are still with that bitch?” Dad yelled, walking toward Mark.
“She’s not a bitch!” Mark exclaimed in English. “She’s my girlfriend!”
“You’re not thinking straight, son! You deserve better than that stoner!”
A single tear fell from his right eye. “We’re in love, but you’re clearly the last person to understand that.”
As Mark glanced sideways at Mom’s tear-stained face, he received a blow on his stomach. He swallowed his yelp and gripped his abdomen. Once Dad pushed him to the ground, he pulled back his foot. Mark formed a fetal position and braced himself for the kick.
Christy yelled, “Stop!” There was no kick, and Mark opened his eyes to see Christy breathing hard and staring at Dad a couple of feet away from Mark.
Mark scooted backwards toward Mom who hugged him from behind.
“You’re the one who isn’t thinking straight!” Christy shrieked. “What is kicking Mark gonna do?”
Dad stalked to her and slapped her across the face. Staggering away, she held a palm against her cheek. Dad rarely slapped Christy, his favorite child.
“You have no business to say what I should do as the father of this household,” he muttered in Spanish.
“Are you really our father?” she responded in Spanish. Somehow, she didn’t cry like she did whenever Dad slapped her.
“Don’t talk back to me!” He pushed her against a wall. She froze as she held onto it and Dad turned to Mark and Mom. “This is the welcome I get after I was gone for two weeks? None of you appreciate what I do to get your food, your water, your electricity! Without me you would all be dead!” Breathing heavily, he stormed to the living room and slung his bag over his shoulder. “I’m going to unpack. I expect that damn bean soup on the table when I come back.” Then he left.
With Mom still hugging Mark, he hugged her back with his tears falling onto her shoulder.
“I’m sorry, baby,” she cried.
“It’s okay. It’s not your fault.” He rubbed circles on her back.
“I wish he would change.”
Mark let go of her and glanced at Christy trembling with her shoulder against the wall.
“I don’t think he will,” he whispered.
Mark’s stomach growled after Mom dropped him and Christy off at school. It was still free period, so he had plenty of time to buy something from the vending machine. He remembered there being a new brand of gummy bears added.
After a couple minutes of entering the English building and walking down a few hallways, he found the vending machine in the midst of green lockers and classroom doors.
As he came to a stop at the vending machine, he pulled his wallet out of his backpack, only to find a blonde girl in the corner of his eye. He abruptly turned to her and held his wallet to his chest, feeling his heart rate double.
“Can I help you?” he said, his stomach growling again. He smiled at the blonde in embarrassment.
“Hey, I’m Sasha.” She made a small wave. “I know I’m being a total creep talking to you randomly and I’m keeping you from buying your food, but I just wanna ask you something.”
“Uh, sure.”
“At Mila’s party, I saw Colette letting you in and, well, you know what I saw.”
His heart rate quadrupled. Was she gonna ask what he thought she was gonna ask?
“And I heard that Colette is into you when she’s clearly with Andrew. So...I’m just dying to know if you and her have a thing going on?”
He opened his mouth to say a definitive “no,” but then James Miller came out of nowhere.
“You know,” James said as he stood next to Mark, “it’s like everything goes through your ears and out of your mouth.”
Sasha glared at him and folded her arms. “I’m just asking him what’s going on with Colette ‘cause everyone, like me, is wondering too.”
James copied her body language. “Maybe it’s not anyone’s business until Mark or Colette actually say something about it?”
Her glare grew angrier. “You’ve been such a dick ever since you started hanging out with that nerd Sarah. B.T.W., everyone knows you two are dating. It’s super obvious.”
“It’s Selah, and it’s super obvious that you’re still salty about what happened in my car,” James said, his expression not changing. “You know, when I generously drove you home?”
As she pouted, she turned away and walked down the hall.
“She’s just like that,” James said as he fully turned to Mark. “I’m pretty sure she already told everyone about you and Colette, so I dunno why she even bothered asking you.”
The only thing Mark could say was, “Oh.”
“I do feel like Colette doesn’t like Andrew,” James said, lowering his voice, “because she treats him like shit.”
“She actually told me she likes me.”
James gaped. “She does?”
Mark nodded. “But I don’t see her that way at all.”
Staring off into space, James murmured, “Me and the guys keep telling him, but he just won’t listen.”
For once, Mark felt sort of bad for the scumbag.
“Oh yeah!” James took off his backpack and unzipped it, pulling out Mark’s old gray baseball cap. “Can you give this back to Christy? I don’t wanna keep a reminder of her anymore, no offense.”
Mark took it from James and examined it. He remembered Christy had given it to James without Mark’s permission, and to this day he was still mad at her for it.
“It was actually mine,” Mark mumbled.
“Oh.” James zipped his backpack and shrugged. “You can have it again, I guess. See ya later.”
Waving him goodbye, Mark still stared at the hat in his hands. It was just one of many that Ava gave him, but this one in particular was closest to his heart.
“You didn’t have to get this for me,” he said, sniffling.
“I wanted to,” Ava replied with a soft smile. She blew a puff of smoke before holding the joint up to him, asking if he wanted it. When he shook his head, she left the joint in the ashtray on the nightstand. She sat in front of him and kissed him on the cheek, then slowly pulled away and looked at him with beautiful green eyes full of the love she gave him.
Mark felt a few tears trickle down his cheeks as he turned the gray hat over in his hands. Ava wound her long, slender arms around his body and held him close.
“I’m so sorry your dad is an abusive asshole,” she whispered in his ear.
Mark’s eyes turned to the red blankets on her bed. “You don’t need to be sorry. I’m used to it.”
“But you shouldn’t be. You deserve all the love in the world.” She leaned in and conquered his lips with a mind-numbing kiss. He didn’t realize she’d lowered him until his back was on the red blankets. Her lips left kisses on his chin, his jaw, and when he tilted his head back, she kissed his neck and his collarbones. For a moment she pulled up his shirt over his head, then went down to his stomach. She stopped to look at the purple bruise his father had left there the day before. After leaving a light kiss there, she looked up at him. “I know how broken you are, but I can save all of you, piece by piece.”
He could feel his heart bursting at her words. But his head wasn’t clouded enough to completely give his body to this beautiful woman. “What about Jeremy?” he managed to whisper.
Her lips froze on his belly button. “Why would you even think that, baby?”
“You’re with him a lot. Everyone told me.”
She crawled up so her head was right above his. “Mark, trust me when I say he’s just a friend. He’s new around here, so I’m helping him figure stuff out.” She gave him a kiss on the lips, long enough to make him forget his name. After she pulled back, they were both breathing heavily. “You’re the only one on my mind,” she whispered.
Mark didn’t know what to say to that.
“Do you believe me, baby?”
He lifted his hand to cup her cheek. Her green eyes carried so much love that it might’ve matched how much he felt for her. As she turned her head to kiss his palm, he said, “Yeah, I believe you.”
She smiled. “Do you trust me?”
It sounded like a huge, serious question, but it felt like an easy question that he answered in a heartbeat: “Yes.”
The corners of her amber bow-shaped lips lifted into a smile. “Now hush. I wanna love every part of you.”
Holding his breath, he felt her gentle hands pull down his shorts.
Mark shivered. He knew now that her every word was a lie. It wasn’t just her promise of love, but her denial that Jeremy was just a friend. He was the reason why she left and moved on to the next preteen boy to screw over.
Mark had that thought running through his mind every day, a good reminder that he never deserved her. And while she was the one that took his virginity, she was his best mistake to learn from. And if the time came when they would meet up, he would prove to her he was a much better person now without her. He would prove to her the New Mark he came to be.
Yet, as he stared at the gray cap in his hands, he realized it mattered too much to him to throw it away. He unzipped his backpack and tossed the cap inside.
The bell rang to signal that free period was over, so he headed to English.
“How far are you on packing?” Christy asked as she lowered the passenger window.
Mark kept his eyes on the road. “I’m halfway done.”
“I got everything in boxes except for the stuff I’m gonna need till moving day. You should help Mom move the TV…”
Mark stopped listening to her as he thought about how to bring up the gray cap. His hands tightening their hold on the wheel, he remembered growing angry when she had told him where it was, and that anger was coming back.
“Mark?”
He glanced at her puzzled expression. “James gave me back the hat you stole from me.”
Her eyes widening, she turned to look at the road. “Wow, he even gave that away. Fucking asshole.”
Ignoring her reply, he said, “How many times do I have to tell you to stop taking my stuff without asking me?”
“You should be glad you got it back, dummy.”
“You know how much that hat matters to me, and all the others too. And I might throw them away at some point. I just don’t know yet.”
But then she started laughing.
“What the hell is so funny?” he said, his voice rising.
After her laughter subsided, she sighed, then said, “You and I both know you’ll never throw those hats away, which is why I got a surprise for you at work.”
He parked the car in the parking lot and turned to her, his heart thumping hard in his chest. “What the hell did you do?”
She cocked her head at the restaurant. “Go inside and see.”
Stepping out of the car, closing the door, and stomping toward the small building in lightning speed, he somewhat knew what she had done, but another part of him thought she wouldn’t.
As soon as his eyes found the woman that both showed him the physical intimacies of love and shattered his entire world, he only heard his heart hammering in his chest as everything around him froze.
She barely changed; her smiling green eyes and amber lips were as graceful as he’d remembered. Her light brown hair was now longer, the tips curled across her shoulders.
And in the high chair next to her was a dark-haired baby boy. The infant’s green eyes found Mark, followed by a dribbling grin, and Mark instantly smiled back.
A few hours ago, Mark would’ve gotten a heart attack upon seeing his ex and her baby, and that was probably Christy’s plan all along. But now he was just smiling in nostalgia. The hurts also came back as reminders, but they didn’t matter as much in the grand scheme of things.
But before he was even prepared, the woman turned her head, her eyes landing on him. His breathing quickened to a pant and his face burned up. He had no choice but to greet her.
It was as though his feet had minds of their own, taking him toward Ava’s table. The world around him was set back in motion as he got closer to her.
Gulping, he stopped at the table and stood across from her. Her eyes stayed on him.
“Hey, Mark,” she said.
“Did someone take your order yet?” he blurted out.
She looked confused, before saying, “No, but I’m ready to order now.”
He raised a finger. “Okay, just give me a sec.”
As he turned toward the kitchen, he wanted to kick himself. He should’ve at least said hi back, but he was always making things more awkward than they should’ve been. He was acting less of an old ex and more of a waiter that had never met her.
He grabbed a notepad and pen, took a deep breath, and exited the kitchen. As he approached her table, she started talking to the baby and smiling. The sight tugged at his heartstrings, mainly because her smile was so big and the baby was adorable.
In the corner of his eye, Christy appeared at the entrance. She gave him a malicious grin, and he just gave her the finger. She rolled her eyes and whispered something to Scott who was about to go to Ava’s table with a notepad. Then Christy disappeared in the kitchen.
Mark came to a stop next to Ava, and she smiled at him.
“So what will you have?” he said in a monotone voice.
“Quit it,” she said, still smiling. “I wanna talk to you first. It’s been so long.”
He let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. “Okay.” Pulling the chair back with a loud screech, he mentally cringed before sitting down. He was made of awkwardness.
He waited for her to talk, but when the silence grew too long, he said, “What’s his--”
“How are you--”
They both laughed. She said, “You go first.”
Smiling, he said, “What’s his name?” The baby was holding and staring at a fork as if it were the most interesting thing he’d ever seen.
“Dylan.”
Mark gaped. It was one of the boy names they came up with if they had kids. “That’s…”
“I know. And it suits him.” She smiled at Dylan who put the fork in his mouth. She lowered the fork at the same time his eyes spotted the spoon on the table. Dropping the fork on the ground, he leaned forward to grab the spoon.
“Sorry,” Ava said as she scooted her chair back and bent down.
“I’ll get it,” Mark said, crawling under the table for the fork.
After he put it on the table out of Dylan’s reach, Ava suddenly said, “I’m single now, and I’m planning to stay that way.”
Though he had already known from her friends, her words shocked him a little. At least it didn’t hurt as much as seeing an ex move on.
“And I’m living with my parents, so for now I’m just taking care of this little guy until I start job-hunting again.”
He nodded, then he asked her the most important question: “Are you happy?”
“I am,” she said. “Honestly, I’m happy to be a stay-at-home mom even though I know I made fun of those kinds of moms, but…” Tearing up, she used her T-shirt to wipe her eye.
Mark grabbed the nearest napkin and handed it to her.
“Thanks,” she said, laughing. “I’m sorry, it’s just weird seeing an old friend that wouldn’t recognize the person I am now. I know you must be really shocked.”
Mark shook his head.
“You’re not?”
He decided to with complete honesty. “I think...you were never happy the last time I saw you,” he said, remembering her periods of depression and the false happiness she found in all the drugs that she introduced him to. “You lost yourself in all the drugs, and dated a lot of guys younger than you, ‘cause you tried to find an escape but never found it.”
She nodded.
Glad that he was right, he continued. “And now that you have a kid and you’re a stay-at-home mom…I think you’re finally, truly happy.”
“Wow,” she said. “You should be my therapist.”
Grinning, he shrugged. “I guess I just thought about you a lot.” For some reason he didn’t feel embarrassed having confessed that to her.
She looked a little sad. “Well, if it helps, Dr. Vargas…” She winked. “I think I was after younger, inexperienced guys because I liked being the mature and older person. Like, the person with more power.” She cringed. “But then I found out I was pregnant with Dylan, and then I just stopped dating. I guess that’s when I started being happy, because all I cared about was him. And…” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “And then I realized, this whole time, I was hurting little innocent kids like him.” Her eyes watery, she turned to watch Dylan start banging the spoon against the table.
“He’s really cute,” Mark commented, hoping to cheer her up, and it turned out he did when she smiled again.
“He means the world to me now.” She took a napkin and wiped the drool off of the baby’s chin. Then she turned to Mark and asked, “What about you?”
Where could he even begin? The last few weeks felt like a few years. And not to forget he had rehearsed this specific part of the conversation over and over in his head. It was finally his moment to brag about the New Mark. But in this moment, he was too elated to go with the original plan.
All that he actually said, much to his surprise, was just, “I’m better than ever.”
Her hand touched both of his on the tabletop. “I’m glad to hear that.”
“And I’m not seeing anyone either. But there’s this one girl…”
“Ooh, tell me all the details.” She leaned forward, her green eyes bigger.
He shook his head though he smiled. “Long story short, she doesn’t feel the same way, and I don’t think she’s gonna change her mind.”
“Aw. I’m so sorry, Mark.” She looked from their joined hands to his eyes. “I’m sure it’ll work out somehow.”
“Yeah, I hope.”
She stood up and pulled him into a hug. “I’m sorry, it’s just really great seeing you again.”
He hugged her back. “It’s great to see you too.” And he did mean it. More than anything, it was the closure he needed with her. And like she had said, he was hoping whatever he had with Paige would work out. Somehow.
As they still hugged, Christy came out of the kitchen in her work uniform and gawked at them. Smiling, Mark raised both of his middle fingers at her.
The Old Mark had run away because the New Mark just made another comeback.
ns 15.158.61.54da2
