After Before and After

Phase 4: Chapter 127

The reporters surrounding Jack's mother all scattered off to catch different families filing into the parking lot. Jack was staring intently at the woman, hands defensively on his hips, eyebrows raised as he impatiently waited for her response.

"I'm here to see you, Jacky" she cooed in that sad, high voice that meant she was fishing for sympathy. "Why else would I be here?" she asked softly.

"Looks like you're here for your fifteen minutes of fame" Jack bitterly observed.

Where the hell was Paige? Ralph wondered. She had to be here somewhere. She needed to be here. But it was hard to know with all the people trying to escape the reporters and all their equipment littering the front entrance of the courthouse.

"Oh no, of couse I'm not" she insisted, her voice small and possibly fake. "I was waiting for you and Paige and they just came running up to me, asking who I was and why I was here... so I told them."

"Sure you did" Jack snapped, rolling his eyes. "You got your interview, I'm sure we'll catch it on the morning news. Can you just go now?"

Ralph watched the interaction unfold from beside Jack, too stunned to speak. Last time their mother showed up, Jack couldn't speak either. Now, he was holding his own just like Paige did before.

"Jacky, please--" she reached her arms out to touch him, but he stepped back dramatically.

"No" he snapped again, his voice firm and steady, "you don't get to do that. You don't get to fucking touch me. Go back to wherever you came from and leave me alone. I can't deal with you now."

"Oh but Jacky, just give me five---"

"Don't" Jack cut her off, his voice so aggressive it nearly scared Ralph. "Don't call me that."

Ralph stared intently at the woman who gave birth to the boy he loved, and saw the tears pool in her eyes. They didn't fall though, they just hung there like a threat she held over Jack's head.

"I'm sorry" she whispered, clasping her hands together in front of her chest. She released the tears now, looking small and frail, hoping it would be enough to make her son believe her apology. She looked like an actor, like she was staging this just for him, just long enough for it to work.

"You're fourteen years too late for sorry" Jack spat the words out, and Ralph could see the hurt illuminating off him now, hurt that definitely wasn't staged.

Before she could get in another word, Jack marched off and disappeared among the crowd of families trying to leave and reporters trying to get any kind of statement for their next news story.

Ralph turned back to look at the woman now, horrified to be left alone with her. They stared at one another for a moment, Ralph's eyes glassy with authentic hurt now too, before she spoke.

"Would you tell him for me? Would you tell him how sorry I am?" she had the nerve to ask, her voice still whiney and dramaticized.

"No, I won't" Ralph found the strength to answer. "What I'm gonna do is go and stay with him, like you should have."

And just as Jack did, Ralph pushed his way into the swarm of people in the direction Jack went. Ralph was pretty sure she had no idea who he even was, and probably didn't recognize him from her surprise appearance at the Merridew mansion just barely two years ago. All she knew was that Ralph had come looking for Jack for some reason or other.

And she didn't know much more about Jack than she did about him. He tried to imagine what that would be like, to not know Laurie for most of his life or what became of her. It was a horrible thought. But it was just a thought. It was Jack's life.