Angel Academy

Chapter Four

Corbin's POV

I sat at the diner listening to Millie gush over how beautiful Niamh looked and how her child was just the cutest thing since her own children. I glared into my coffee, sulking. I wanted Millie to just shut up about her already, but of course I didn't say anything; I didn't want to hurt her feelings.

"I mean whoever she slept with to make that beautiful little boy, I need to meet." My frown deepened; no wonder Niamh didn't want to talk to me. She probably had her own hunk of a guy back home just waiting to wrap her and their child up in his giant biceps and just squeeze the life out of them. Why would she want to be friends with her ex-best-friend again? Her boyfriend or husband was probably a jealous asshole, and it would just be a bad idea anyway. As bad as I wanted to believe that I knew it wasn't true. Niamh would never let someone else control her life like that. Believe me, I tried.

"Millie," I said, interrupting her mid sentence, "thanks for the coffee but I need to get home to my mother."

Millie put a hand over her heart. "Of course dear." She sighed sadly. "How is she?" I felt a little guilty for using my mother's cancer to get out of talking with Millie, but the girl had it coming. She just didn't know when to stop or how to read body language.

"It's bad," I began, frowning. "The doctors say that the way she's going, it'll overtake her in just a few years, but of course, you know mom, she doesn't give a damn." Millie nodded, as if she understood how hard it was to always be raising your mother, even after all these years; how hard it was to try and keep her down and keep her from hurting herself; or how hard it was to pretend like you didn't loathe her for not trying to stop the cancer spreading through her body and try to act like you're proud that she's too strong to be bothered fighting a losing battle; how hard it is to wipe away her tears year after year and guy after guy; how hard it is to have to hide your mother's pills because she didn't know when enough was enough. Yea. Millie had no idea.

When I got home I found my mother laying on the couch, an empty bottle of Jack sitting on the table beside her. She had a vcr in but the screen was blue, and the machine was already rewinding the tape. She lay on her back, with one arm over her eyes, and the other hanging off the couch, fingers barely touching the floor. I frowned. It was times like these when she looked particularly vulnerable. When you can notice how pale she is and how her cheeks have sunk in making the bones of her face jut out painfully. Her lips were thin and dried out when they were full at one point. Her arms and legs were small and skeletal. It was hard seeing her like this. It reminded me that she wasn't the woman she used to be, before my father left us on our own. Her once voluminous blonde hair now fell down dry and stringy around her face, and stuck to the sweat on her forehead.

My mother used to be a beautiful woman before the pills and the alcohol and finally the cancer. My mother had never been a skinny girl, not in all of her years on this earth. She had had curves and the best curve on her was her smile. Her eyes used to be bright blue and there was passion in those eyes. Her hair used to fall around her in waves, and when she'd pick me up I'd rest my head on her breast, just below her neck, and fall asleep feeling safe and warm. Unfortunately, that wasn't the woman she turned out to be after he left us.

Sighing, I pulled a blanket out of the closet and laid it across her before gathering her up in my arms. Her face contorted in pain, and she groaned softly.

"Jeff?" I shook my head.

"No mom. It's me, Corbin. Uncle Jeff doesn't come by to see us anymore, remember?"

Mom frowned. "What an ass," she murmured before she trailed off and closed her eyes again. I set her in her bed and made sure she was nice and warm. I grabbed a water bottle from the small fridge in her room and set it by her bed.