It Can't Be Over (Book 2 - Immortalfox)

Chapter 7

Eddie POV:

Aleks was tucked away in bed by one in the morning. We had chatted for a few hours in the kitchen, just laughing and joking about anything that happened to cross our minds.

Aleks was getting sleepy in his place in the bar stool and he soon fell asleep there. I had managed to carry him up the stairs to his bedroom without waking James or Seamus up, and I currently sat in the chair parked in front of Aleks’s desk arrangement.

I was feeling pretty winded up to this point. Not only was I tried—I was feeling the hurt from the truth.

Aleks had molded and shaped into this dejected, wounded animal figure thanks to me. These past few months had been brutal on the both of us, but I had only just begun to see that things had probably affected him more.

I had been such an asshole. Sure, I had the right to be worried and scared for my mother, but I had pushed away the one thing I cared about above all.

I thought again of calling my grandmother. I knew she’d flip out if I told her about Aleks and I, but I felt suddenly like calling her and that telling her the truth was a good idea.

Maybe she could help me. I had always been a very family-oriented person. I relied, in a way, on my relatives for advice, and I figured my grandmother—probably the most knowledgeable, excusing my mother—could help me in a time such as this.

I rose to aching limbs that demanded of rest and exited Aleks’s room with my phone in-hand.

I knew it would be very late where my grandmother was, but I hoped she might be having a late night with my mother.

It was on the fifth ring that I heard a tired, feminine voice ask into the phone.

“Edwin, is that you?”

I laughed to myself. The woman knew when her grandson was calling. I remembered that, as of recently, I normally called very late.

“Yes, Grandma, it’s me. Why are you up so late?” I asked.

“Oh, don’t worry about it. Your mother has just been up hacking all night, the poor thing,” she replied thickly in her accent.

“Ah. She’s been taking her medicine, right?” I asked.

“Edwin, really! Do you honestly think she wouldn’t be?” she moaned.

I laughed again. “Sorry, I suppose that was pretty stupid to ask.”

“Yes, yes. Well what do you want this late at night? You know your mother is doing the same as always. If you really want to know how she is you ought to get here faster!”

“I’ll be down soon…I meant to talk to you about something,” I spoke into the phone, my voice slightly shaky.

My grandmother, sensing the importance of what I was about to tell her, replied lightly, “Go ahead.”

“You remember my friend Aleks, right?”

“Oh, yes! Aleksandr, right? Such a nice boy. What about him?”

“Well…I’ll just spit it out. These past few months we’ve been dating.”

My heart stopped beating and I held my breath. I closed my eyes tight, expecting a string of rapid Spanish to spit into my ear, but I got nothing but a sigh.

“Oh dear…I was wondering when you’d tell me.”

I gasped, my eyebrows rising. “What? You knew?”

“I did. You don’t think I watch your videos?”

“But…I don’t even play video games with him like that! I haven’t even officially told my fans yet! How could you have known?”

“The flirting, dear. You constantly flirt with him. It’s not completely obvious, no…but it speaks a tad for itself.”

I was completely mind-blown by this point. I rubbed my jaw, blushing furiously.

“Then…what do you think?”

There was a hesitant pause before she proceeded with a tone that could kill. “End it.”

“I’m sorry…what?”

“You’re mother would be so disappointed with you—just as I am. Of course, she doesn’t see it as clearly as I do, which is why she hasn’t hounded you about it, but for her and my own sake—even yours, really—stop this devilish act.”

“Devilish?” I croaked.

“Yes. I thought you were raised better than this. A man and a woman were created to compliment the other—to reproduce and love the other. It was not meant for a man and another man to love the other. Those acts are of the devil! So please, Edwin, end this before it ends itself. Find a pretty girl, settle down, and live a happy life. No happiness was ever meant to come from a relationship such as this.”

“G-Grandma—“

“Edwin, I mean it. I was waiting for you to tell me yourself so that I could have this conversation with you. This is no joke. You’re playing with fire by participating in this relationship—“

“Participating?” I spat out, “I started it! I love him!”

“Edwin! Do not say that! You are under some sort of an allusion. There is no beauty to this relationship! End it or I shall tell your dying mother!”

I gasped again. “What are you saying? Why would you do that to your own daughter?”

“I will tell her, Edwin. I did not expect you to be so wrapped up in this nonsense. But I will use force if I have to.”

“You would break her heart like that—in her state, you’d tell her about this?”

“See? I knew that you knew this was wrong. You know your mother is against this sort of thing. Since she is so against it, why would you hurt her in that way and continue to see this nonsense through?”

“B-but…I know she’s against it! But that doesn’t mean I am.”

I could feel how much this angered my grandmother. “Edwin…last chance. I mean it. End this before you get here or I will tell your mother and let you nowhere near her.”

“Who the fuck are you to tell me to stay away from my mother?” I yelled. I couldn’t believe I was yelling at my own family in the way I was. I cared very much for my grandmother, but at this point I didn’t even know who this kind, caring elderly lady had become.

“Edwin Cardona Jr.! Enough of this. You end this relationship or you will face the consequences!”

Click.

The tone on the other end went dead and I was rooted to place.

This couldn’t be happening. All of this just didn’t seem real.

How could it be?

But it was. If I didn’t end what I had with Aleks, my mother would die knowing that I was in something she didn’t approve of. My grandmother already despised this…it would be a whole other world of pain with my mother. And if there was one thing for certain, I couldn't live with myself knowing that my mother didn't approve of my relationship.

I stuffed the phone in my pocket and headed for the front door.

I had to go. I had no other choice but to.