Unexpected. (A short story)

Four

Charles stopped outside his house not wanting to go inside to face the horrors of Melissa alone. He walked through the door swiftly trying to get to the stairs as quickly as possible before Melissa caught him but he had no such luck. Although it was 10 in the morning it was obvious that Melissa was drunk. "You useless piece of shit. I told your father not to fight for custody. You do nothing around the house and you go to parties and stay out all night without telling me in person where you are going," Melissa kept yelling about how she hated Charles. "Stop yelling at me you bitch you are not my mother and you didn't raise me so you have no right to yell at me for being a horrible person when you have no clue who I am!" An anger grew in Melissa's face and Charles immediately regretted everything he had said because she had a bottle of vodka in her hand and she hurled the bottle at his head shattering behind him and small pieces lodging in his cheek. He stood there for a moment before bolting down the stairs and into his room with Melissa yelling after him that it was a mistake, but he knew it wasn't because this was not the first time she had done something like that. He went to the bathroom and pulled all of the glass shards out of his face.
He needed to talk to someone, at that moment he would have wanted to talk to his mother but she was out of the picture since she wasn't aloud to contact him in any way, so instead he decided to talk to Mia, the sweet and caring Mia.
"Hey you don't mind if I tell you some stuff right?"
"No of course not. What do you need to get off your chest?"
"The only reason I haven't secretly bought a ticket back to Arizona is you. If I had never met you I would already be gone, and I know that we have only known each other for a little while but I'm glad that in that small while you have learned to like me and I'm glad that we're dating."
"I'm really glad we're together too, and I'm really glad you haven't left. Maybe I can come over and help you set up bookshelves."
"No that wouldn't be a good idea."
"Oh. Why?"
"Because I'm kind of a mess at the moment. There's glass in the front entrance, my face is red from crying and I have blood all over my face. So not the best thing at the moment even though I would like to see you even if I just barley left."
"OH GOD WHY ARE YOU BLEEDING?!"
"Melissa, my stepmother, has a drinking problem and got smashed at 10 in the morning and started to yell at me like she always does when she gets shit-faced and she threw a bottle at me and it smashed in the front entrance but small pieces scratched and stuck in the side of my face, but I guess I'm used to it because it happened a lot in Scottsdale."
"Oh my god Charles that's horrible. And I thought my life was kinda bad with my parents not even looking at me and totally ignoring me the whole time they're home."
"I would rather have that instead of two people that don't care for you but make it seem as if they do. I've never told anyone that they hit me, a lot but not in front of each other because when they're together they both make it seem as if they care for me."
"Charles I just want to say that if you ever need a place to cool down you can come over to my house no matter the time or day."
"Thank you. I'll talk to you later. Thanks for letting me vent."
"No problem."
Charles put down his phone a went to his bathroom to wipe the blood off his face to make sure that there was no longer any glass shards in his cheek, then went back to his room to assemble the bookshelves.
It took him about an hour to assemble both and another two to put the book on them in the right order, then looking at his phone noticed that it was 15:00 and in another hour that Melissa would be going to work so Charles decided to charge his phone and take a nap.
When he woke up again it was 19:50 and it looked as if the sun was going to sent in a little while. Charles ventured upstairs to see if anyone was home and luckily no one was, so he took a Bottle of Jack Daniels from the cupboard and texted Mia.
"Meet me at the park."
"Okay can't wait."