Addicted To You .L.S.

Thirty Two.

Now (June)

When I get home, I stare at the evidence board on my mattress because I can't think of anything else. I take Kylie's picture down, rip it in half, and toss it on the floor, barely resisting the urge to stomp on it.

"Louis?" My mum knocks on my door. "Your Dad said your knee was hurting. I came home to check in you."
"Just a second." I scramble to push my mattress down. My sheets are tangled on the floor and I don't have time to do anything but pile them on the bed, shoving Kylie's picture under my pillow and throwing myself on top of the mess. "Come in." She frowns when she sees me, flustered and guilty-looking. Knowing mum, she'd probably had a number of things to watch out for when it comes to her junkie son.

"What are you hiding?" She asks.
"Nothing," I say.
"Louis."
I sigh, reach next to my bed, and grab the shoe box stashed underneath my nightstand. I flip it open, spilling the contents onto the comforter. Photos spread everywhere. "I was looking at pictures."
My mums face softens and he picks up a photo, one of Harry and I, our arms wrapped around each other, our neon swim caps clashing horribly with our tight, blue racing suits. "This was before your growth spurt," she says. I take the photo from her, trying to remember when it was taken; some sunny day during swim practice. Harry's missing his front tooth, which means we must've been about ten. He'd pitched head first off his bake that summer, racing me. Gem had run all the was home with him in her arms and later I found her checking his bike to make sure it was safe.

For a long time we were convinced Gem was born a girl when she was supposed to be a boy, but the way her eyes light up at 'pretty' dresses, makeup, and chick flicks we decided she was fine they way she was born.

"It was before a lot of thing," I say. I put the photo back in the box, grabbing up others, shoving them out of sight.
"I want to talk to you." Mum sits down on the edge of my bed and I keep putting the photos away to give myself something to do. I pause at the photo of Gem and me, we're standing on the deck beside a boat, sticking out tongues out. There's a pink blur on the side of the photo; the edge of Harry's finger, obscuring the lens.

"I shouldn't have said what I did about your college essay," Mum continues. "I'm sorry. You should be able to write about what you'd like."
"It's okay," I say. "Sorry I yelled at you."
She takes another photo, this one of me, fat and happy in the lap of Aunt Marry. "You know," she says quietly, "My mother died of an overdose."  I look up at her, and I'm so surprised she's brought it up that I drop the stack of photos. "I know," I say, bending over quickly to pick them up, grateful I won't have to look at her right away.

Mum rarely talks about my grandmother. My grandfather lives on fifty acres of wilderness, in a house he built with his own hands. After the crash, he'd clapped his hand (a little too hard) on my shoulder and said, "you'll get through this." It's been almost and order, but I'd felt comforted by it, like it was a promise at the same time.

"I was the one who found her," mum says. "I was fifteen. It was one of the worst moments of my life. When your father searched your room... I realized that you could've followed her down her path... when I realized someday I might walk in to your room and you wouldn't be breathing... I knew I failed you."
It's unimaginable, the words coming out of her mouth. She had failed me, but only after I'd recovered. She'd refused to see the changes in me, the things overcome and accepted about myself—the ones she never could. She'd stood there, stone-faced to my begging and tears, my heart still a fresh wound pouring out grief and shock, and she'd seen it as guilty and lies.
I hate it, but there's a part of me, the sliver that's no consumed by Harry, that can understand why her and Dad didn't believe me. Why they shoved me into rehab and practically threw away the key. They wanted anyway to keep me safe.
  I understand.
  I just can't forgive them for it yet.