You Found Me

Chapter One

N - At this moment in time, Norma felt like her entire world was crashing down. In her mind, it really was. It was like she'd just been in a car crash that she'd never quite recover from; an event in her life that would change things forever. Her past was a dark place; the amount of bad things that happened to her was almost impossible to count on one hand. Throughout all of it, the only light in her life was Norman. He had always been the something good amongst all the bad things, and now she'd ruined him too. At this point she was convinced that it was her; that she was the problem. She felt as if everything she touched turned bad---like she was toxic. She was the mother of a boy that she'd always seen as the dearest boy who'd ever lived; and now he was broken.
Now she was broken.

Watching Alex take Norman away had literally felt like her heart was being ripped out of her chest, but deep down she knew that it was for the best. For both of them. He'd had a gun pointed at her, for christ's sake---his own mother. Convinced that she committed all these crimes that, in actual fact, he himself was behind. She always thought that her help would be enough, but when he yelled at her and she saw a flash of something in his eyes that triggered fear---fear of her own son, that's when she knew. She couldn't be of any help to him anymore. He was getting worse and worse and it was getting to the point where he was considering hurting people he loves. She didn't want to live in fear of someone she loved so much; to have to deal with that awful terror and panic she'd felt merely a few hours ago when he chased her and had a gun pointed at her, on a regular basis. It would slowly drive her insane---not like she wasn't on the verge of it already.

By now Norma was used to dealing with the brunt of bad things happening to her---but this, this was different. This was Norman. She quite literally felt like part of her had been ripped away; and that there was nothing to live for anymore. She'd failed him, and now her care was out of her hands completely. Looking after Norman was all she'd ever known for a long time now. Her family meant more to her than anything and she'd always put them before herself, but now she was in a position where she had no family to look after. Norman was gone, Dylan seemed to slowly be distancing himself and the only other member of her family that was still alive---she wanted nowhere near her. She was put in a position where all she could do was work on dealing with herself and her own issues, to try and get herself to a happy place or at least one where she wasn't just sitting at her kitchen table staring into space for hours on end. From the moment Alex's SUV drove away, the minute she trudged back to her empty house and closed the door, that was all she could do. It was a cycle; she'd cry, then go silent for a while, then cry again and repeat. She couldn't take her mind anywhere else, and it was getting to the stage where she decided perhaps alcohol would help. She'd forget for a little while, at least, be able to escape into this world where everything was just fine and dandy. Experience that just for a little while. Just as she began to twist off the lid of a bottle of vodka, there was a knock at her door. "The hell---" She croaked, her voice effected greatly by the extent of her crying and shouting throughout the night.

She heard the knock again---this time it was louder. This was no time for visitors, she thought. But as the knocks just continued and became more and more rapid, Norma simply had to get up and go over to the door. She was already hearing voices in her head, and she didn't need some continuous annoying knocking accompanying it either. She walked over to the door, peeking through the glass first to see who was there. Alex.

She concealed herself from view quickly, wiping her eyes and face in attempt to remove all evidence that she'd been crying as intensely as she had been. There was no hiding it though, obviously. Her eyes were red and puffy and still glassy with tears, her hair unkempt. She looked exactly how she felt. Broken.

"Alex--" She began, trying to keep her voice stable and mask any emotion that might be present in her tone. "Did you get him there okay? I mean, does he have a room...is he safe?" She spoke quickly; a nervous and panicked ramble.