Love Story: Amber & Larry

Chapter 7: For Better or Worse

You are probably wondering where I meant how the second year was rough. My mom began the process of kicking us kids out, she wanted an empty nest. I didn't blame her, her and dad had raised us kids into adulthood. First went my sister, thank god, she caused enough harm to our family to where we were all sick of her. Then, I was in the process of getting me, Melanie, and Larry to Tennessee because I didn't want to be here to begin with though at the same time it was Melanie's home and I was the only one out of my siblings paying rent. It wasn't easy to be honest looking for homes in Tennessee on the market, I was going to start searching for apartments when I went to ask my dad a question about finding a place for us three and when I explained to him that mom wanted all of kids moved out for her and dad to have an empty nest. To put it in words, my mom got a wake up call that me, Melanie, and Larry weren't moving out because we pay our share of the house including groceries, taking care of other bills, and such. We were mostly the main providers besides my dad. And, my younger brother didn't have the mental capability to be out on his own due to his own mental problems.

Larry's first few jobs here were rough to say the least. Dollar General was barely making minimum wage at the time and this is when a first of jealousy came into our lives that a woman named Neisha came back into my life but met my man during a snowstorm that she needed a ride home. I honestly didn't recognize the name at first until I saw her face to face and my mind went oh shit. I tried to play the lesbian card with her, to get her away from Larry and it didn't work. I had to deal with her ogling at him each time but she never actually slept with him or anything, she used him for his truck to take her back and forth to work. I was grateful when his 1999 White Dodge Ram 1500 broke down and she was gone from our life, but that was one jealous streak I had.

So he switched to McDonald's with my sister and her fling at the time. That ended up being a shit show when my ex showed up, he had this habit of following my man which irked me to no end. I hated him as it was. That didn't get Larry to leave that job right away until it came to getting my younger brother working which I knew was a bad idea, and I mean, bad idea because my younger brother can't handle stress that job is a stressful one. Once that shit show went down, Larry went to KFC/Taco Bell, now he liked this job for a while because he got to make coleslaw and other sides while doing dishwashing. He made friends too. He actually stayed at this job longer than I thought he would.

We got Melanie into school here at the local elementary. It was a good fall for many reasons, I got to meet an excellent teacher and teacher aid, and got to see what the school was like. It went so smoothly. Larry was finally on medication too, it was experimenting to find the right one because he got diagnosed with PTSD, Bipolar 1, and Major Depressive Disorder. He was finally getting back to the man I knew back then. Now, after this was encouraging him to speak with his dad. That was a nightmare process. His dad had been out of his picture for so long at this point, I wasn't sure what to do but it became a much later reason to fix. Truth is, I never met his dad, I heard of him because of our hometown and how well known he was but I had no idea about the man that raised Larry and Bryan. All I wanted was to meet him and his step-mom. That is all I asked for after seeing his mom and Bryan, I only met his step-dad maybe twice in our early years. To be fair, I didn't understand why we went to Tennessee more than Florida but that is how it happened. Our trips out of state were to Tennessee and other locations in West Virginia, he would make it known that we were never going back to Florida. I had to quit bringing it up since I didn't even know how much longer my grandpa was gonna live either.

We celebrated Thanksgiving together by cooking our first meal together as I mentioned in the previous chapter but it was a rough Thanksgiving too. My younger brother got into some deep trouble and well, it didn't help my mom who was having a mental breakdown as everything crashed. This led to a hard Christmas too. My younger brother is serving time in prison for saving three kids who were too young to be facing court. I will not go into detail why because I don't need the whole world knowing my family's privacy. But it was a hard one to face because my younger brother got into trouble with our own sister and I will leave it at that. Larry held me as I cried watching my younger brother being handcuffed. He took care of me that day, we went and had Chinese in silence. He knew I was heartbroken. As for my older brother and sister in law, they cut our sister out of their lives instantly.

Added note: My sister made me show my breasts to Larry earlier that year, why? Because we were only making love in the dark. And she had the audacity to show him her breasts too but he turned away and wasn't interested. Then she tried to convince me that I needed a sugar daddy to take care of me and Melanie, mind you, my sister never had a sugar daddy herself. She later told me she was joking, yeah, no, she doesn't joke when she hated Larry from the moment she met him even when we were teens. To tell you, I have a grudge against my sister worse than I do my older brother but that is fine. I don't need my siblings.