Tell Me a Story

Disappointed

From a very young age Jake had known – or at the very least sensed – that not only did his parents not really care for him, but also they had very little time or patience for each other.

Their relationship had begun as a mutually beneficial one. Ellen, at seventeen, had long been the most beautiful girl in school and had decided some time ago that she would like to be a model and, while she was working on that goal, had also decided that she would like a rich man to keep her in pretty things until her looks were able to themselves pay for her expensive lifestyle.

Robert was the son of one of the richest men of the country and, at twenty one had been installed in a high position within his father’s company that – although no one would ever believe it – he did, in fact, deserve. As Ellen was looking for a rich man to keep her in pearls, Robert was looking for a beautiful woman to hang off his arm at the fancy balls he was forced to attend. He wanted someone to show of.

So they began dating, despite the fact they had very little in common, and they probably would have gone their separate ways within a year if it hadn’t been for Ellen getting pregnant not long after her eighteenth birthday. Jake knew he was the reason his parents had got married, despite being incredibly incompatible, and he knew he was the reason his mother had never become the model – or at least he knew that his mother blamed him for it – and he had lived with that for the first ten years of his life. He had even got used to it and probably could have gone in, floating through life, ignored by his parents, without much problem. That was, if it wasn’t for that one terrible night that changed everything.

Jake had been ill for over a week and had spent several days off school. His mother didn’t work but still she seemed to have no interest in looking after her son when she was so busy looking after the expensive wine collection, so someone was brought in, as someone always was, to do the job for her. He didn’t mind this, as it was what he was used to. The only thing he wanted to do was to get better so he could get back to school and to the friends he knew actually did care about him.

Luckily, a bug that was supposed to last two weeks, really only lasted four days, and one evening he was told he would be able to return the next day. At this news he gave a whoop of excitement, his mother poured another drink, and his father patted him on the head awkwardly and congratulated him on “beating that bastard illness so quickly.”

That night, however, things seemed to take a turn for the worse and, not long after he had gone to bed he was forced to rush across the hall where he spent the next ten minutes throwing up and cursing his luck that he had not quite managed to get over the illness in the way he had thought.

He knew he should tell his parents, who would likely role their eyes and call the hired help before washing their hands of him once again, but he didn’t want to do that. He didn’t want to be stuck in the house another day – he didn’t want to be stuck away from his friends another minute.

So he decided he would take matters into his own hands. He would grab some medicine from the cupboard downstairs, dose himself up, then go to sleep. If he wasn’t any better in the morning then he would pretend. As long as he could get out the door without throwing up then his parents never need by any the wiser, he thought, and he would be back amongst good company.

There was a ding-dong sound that rang throughout the house as Jake was creeping down spiral stair case and he was forced to stand perfectly still as his father appeared from the study, huffing and puffing about people knocking at such a late hour, so that he was not heard.

Luckily he was not heard, and once his father had passed, Jake jogged down the rest of the steps, crossed the hallway – his footsteps masked by the deep, red carpet – and pushed through the expensive oak door into the kitchen, hoping that his father did not turn back and see him.