Not enough (Fermín López)

Chapter 24

The birthday boy didn't score on his birthday but played a good match. And Barça won so he got that as a present too. Celebrations were over, though. And he just wanted to go home and rest but didn't want to do that alone so he convinced Lorena to not go back to her parents and stay with him in her dorm instead. It didn't really take much effort to get her to say yes. And between all the celebrations, they hadn't gotten much alone time recently. So it was nice to catch up.

Lorena woke up before Fermín did and she picked up her phone to check the time. But saw something else there. She was still staring at her phone a couple of minutes later, not knowing what to do. Her parents had sent her two texts. The first one read "where are you?" and it was from last night. But they sent another one in the morning "we need to talk, this can't go on like this". She didn't know what that meant. It was almost impossible to know when it came to her parents.

It was then she noticed Fermín moving behind her as he woke up, his arms holding her tighter but she couldn't bring herself to relax like she normally would under his touch.

"What are you looking at?", she moved the phone so he could see it and he struggled to read the words a little since he was still half asleep. "What does that mean?"

"I don't know. I should have gone home last night but I stayed here and forgot to text them...".

"I can go home with you. Maybe it's time I talk to them. We're really dating now, Lorena. I have to do something...".

"I'm not sure that's a good idea".

"Lorena, you look terrified right now. I'm not letting you go there alone. Let's get dressed and go, ok? I'll be by your side the whole time".

Lorena nodded, moving almost on autopilot. She knew it wasn't going to end well. There was something about the tone of the texts that made her fear the worst.

When Lorena's parents heard the door open, they moved to go see their daughter but clearly didn't expect to see a man by her side.

"What is he doing here?"

"Fermín is my boyfriend and he can come here if he wants to. Adrián was here all the time".

"We wanted Adrián here, we don't want him".

"You don't know me", said Fermín.

"We know enough. This is a conversation between our daughter and us".

"Well, I'll be her plus one for the conversation. I'm not leaving".

Lorena looked at Fermín, worried about the consequences of what he was saying but her parents seemed to be confused by someone not being afraid of them. Good.

"Very well", said her dad. "You're on your own from now on, Lorena. We just wanted to tell you that".

"What do you mean I'm on my own?"

"We've had enough of this. University is paid for the full year so you can finish that but your dorm should be empty by next Friday, we're not paying for that anymore. And you're not welcome here if you don't follow our rules".

"What? Where am I supposed to go?", she asked, her voice so small.

"You can't do that to her!", yelled Fermín.

"Little boy, you can't come to our house to tell us what we can and can't do".

"Where am I supposed to go?", whispered Lorena, not really hearing what was being said around her.

"You're coming with me. Let's go", Fermín took her hand to get her out of that house. "I'll send someone to get her stuff. And you'll let them in without any problems".