Ballet Slippers

42

Ed’s Point of View

“M-Mom… Dad…?”

Suddenly they all turned to look at me. My mother looked distraught, and my father… well, he had that look on his face that he always does.

One thing you should know about Ella and my parents is well… They’re your typical snobby rich American folk. My mum was born in England where she married my real father; we don’t speak to him though because he was an alcoholic and shit got messed up. My stepfather – Ella’s real father – raised me as his own. Now he didn’t have any anger issues or anything there was just an insane amount of pressure in our house growing up, and that’s the reason I moved out as early as I could to be honest. When I hit 18 I was up and out of the house pursuing my music; unfortunately Ella stayed behind and well… it was about to take a toll on her. I had been a shit brother to be honest; this was the most Ella and I had spoken in the past two years. But I loved my sister; we were so close as children and then when I moved out everything changed. She wasn’t really allowed to speak to me according to our parents they didn’t want her turning into me or some garbage like that. I was happy Ella was back in my life, but it didn’t mean our parents would be happy.

“Hi honey,” my mom said surprisingly, “what are you doing here?”

“I should be asking you that…”

She ignored my remark and began to fix the collar of my shirt like she always does; she turned to Taylor and smiled softly, “Hello Taylor, I’m Marianne.”

Taylor nervously outstretched her hand, “H-Hello,” she smiled. Taylor had never met my parents because I had been living with her in LA for the entirety of my relationship; but she had seen pictures, as did they of her. My father was still talking to the doctor so my mother was obviously trying to distract us from the problem at hand… like she always does.

“How has your trip been? Still planning on touring in the New Year?” She asked looking at me with some sort of fake concern.

“Um yep,” I said, “do we know what’s wrong with Ella yet?” I asked even though I already knew. I was sort of testing her to be honest…

“Oh well, she um missed her competition. So I guess that me-,”

“That’s what you’re worried about?” I asked frowning at her.

“W-Well I mean-,”

“Mom! Ella just got dropped and abused by the dance teacher that did this years ago to her; she suffered a concussion and severe bruising to her trachea. And you’re worried about the competition?”

“It’s not like that,” she sighed.

“Why are you even here?” I asked letting out a huff. Taylor squeezed my arm obviously encouraging me not to be so lippy with my mother. But this was sort of how it was like now; since I’d moved out they kept trying to control me, to control the situation and most of all they thought they had the key to the ignition of Ella’s life. I was sick of it.

“Ed maybe we should um, go inside?” Taylor asked.

I looked over at her pleading eyes; she didn’t want to start a fight when we hadn’t even seen my sister yet.

I sighed and looked at my mother one more time, I didn’t even feel like speaking with my father, so Taylor took my hand and lead me into the room Ella was in. I was surprised and relieved to see Harry with her; they were having a conversation that we obviously interrupted, but I think she would understand considering I was warning her about our parents.