The Boy Who Couldn't Love

Chapter 7: A Gentleman's Game

he became a shadow of my father and i watched her become my mother.
and i was just as helpless in this situation as i was in the last..
sometimes the damsel in distress doesn't always need our help, sometimes she just needs her own.

It's been two days since I found out that my mother was still alive and two days since Zack became even more curious about my father.
I've spent those past two days going over the same questions in my mind; questions that, without my mother, could never be answered.
I wasn't even sure if being angry was the correct way to feel. She was his victim, just like me. She must have tried everything to get away from him and he just kept finding her and pulling her back to a life she was terrified of.
I still couldn't wrap my head around the fact that she was actually still alive. All this time, all these years; all my life. I thought of every Christmas and every birthday that I cried and wished she was here and in some way, she probably could have been.
Zack was my biggest worry of all now. He was getting too close to discovering the truth. He was never gonna let this go about my dad. I thought I'd managed to convince him that nothing was going on at the start, but now that he knew that he abused my mom, that was just end game.
And if Zack told Frankie what this then that would be another person who was convinced of the monster that my father was.
Hunter was only interested in picking Sadie up for school which I didn't mind, I would rather ride to school with Zack and Frankie anyway than be the third wheel to their overbearing love fest that made me feel so uncomfortable that I did nothing but pray for the backseat of the car to fall out and take me with it.
Frankie was smoking a cigarette when they pulled up in the car and he had the window rolled all the way down, even though it was freezing outside. I climbed into the backseat and threw my bag beside me. I felt more exhausted than ever and sick to my stomach for some reason.
"Hey, you okay?" Zack asked me, looking at me through the rear view mirror.
"Yeah, just a little tired."
I saw Zack's eyes quickly glance at me before he quickly looked away and backed into my empty driveway then proceeded to drive onto the road. As he and Frankie spoke, I watched the many half naked trees pass us and all of the little stores in between. My mind was still spinning with questions about my mom and about my dad and about everything else. I felt both betrayed and alone more than ever now that she would just leave without me. There had to have been a way that she could have taken me. As for my dad, I was both surprised and not surprised at all. Of course he would lie about this. If he hated my mom as much as Dina and Nathan said he did, then of course he would tell me that she was dead. It's not like he was expecting me to get so close to Zack, so who was going to tell me otherwise?
"So, what do you think, Bailie?" Frankie said and pulled my back into reality.
"What?" I asked, looking around at him. He was turned around in the seat looking at back at me.
"I said someone should really teach you how to drive. I can give you some lessons if you want."
"You can drive?"
"Well, yeah," he laughed. "My dad loans me his car when he's not at work."
"Oh, that's really sweet," I smiled. "I'd be a lousy student though, I really know nothing about cars."
"No bad student, only bad teacher," he said, quoting The Karate Kid. Zack rolled his eyes at him and I laughed.
"Okay, if it means that much to you," I told him and he smiled.
We pulled into the school parking lot and as usual, parked next to Hunter's Corvette, where he and Sadie both stood waiting for us. Sadie sat on the hood of the car while Hunter stood next to her, leaning on the side of the hood while smoking a cigarette. He nodded his head to both Frankie and Zack as they walked over to talk to him. I made my way over to Sadie and she smiled at me.
"Hi, Sadie," I smiled. "How are you?"
"I'm good. How are you?"
"I'm okay," I answered. "So, how'd it go the other day, meeting Zoey?"
"Yeah, it was really good. She's so sweet. I can see where Hunter gets it from."
I looked back at Hunter who was still smoking his cigarette while deep in conversation with Frankie and Zack. Clearly, she hadn't met the same Zoey I knew.
"Well, I'm glad you had a good time. Did you spend the whole day with her?"
Sadie then sat forward and pulled herself the edge of the hood.
"We actually only spent about an hour with her because had to go run some errands."
"But you were gone all day."
"Yeah, well we kept ourselves busy," she looked down with a smile on her face.
"You slept with him?" I quietly asked so Zack wouldn't hear me.
She looked at Hunter and then back at me before nodding her head.
"How was it?" I asked and she struggled to hide her smile.
"It was everything you said it would be," she told me. "He was so gentle and sweet and he didn't rush me into anything. He was so patient the entire time. He told me he loved me."
I smiled at her then looked back at Hunter who hadn't looked at me or even Sadie once since I got here. He seemed miles away from everything, even from the conversation he was currently in. I walked over to him and forced him to look at me.
"Hey, I haven't seen you in a few days. How did the game go the other night?"
"Your dad lost to Jimmy in the end," he told me. "I only made it to the semi-finals."
"Hey, guys c'mon we're gonna be late for class," Zack said.
Hunter stood up and walked towards the school ahead of us, not walking with Sadie, not talking to her and definitely not even looking at her. I could tell by her face that even she found this weird.