When I left Riley's place, I didn't go straight home. I passed time by driving around town to nowhere in particular. I did eventually stop to get some cigarettes to calm my nerves a bit. The sun starts to set and that's when I decide to go back home. I hate calling it that. Home. It sure as hell doesn't feel like home.
I sit in my car with the open envelope I just got from the mail sitting on my lap. My shaky fingers trace my name written on the front of it. This can't be fucking real.
The house is quiet when I walk in. I shut the front door behind me and I walk into the kitchen at the wrong time. The three of them look to me from the kitchen table as they chew their food in silence.
I turn to walk out, but dad stops me.
"Shawn, come join us." Geez, this looks like an intervention.
I look to him then to Camila who quickly looks away from me once we lock eyes.
"Nah, I'm good. " I shove the envelope in my back pocket slowly.
He stares at me from where he sits with lowered brows.
"It wasn't a question." I points to the untouched plate of food that sits next to Camila. "Sit."
I'm fucking 18, going on 19 in less than two months. Why the hell am I being treated like a child?I scoff while moving towards the entrance of the kitchen. "I'm not hungry." I lie.
He pounds a fist on the glass table making their dishes clank and Camila flinch.
"Dammit, Shawn. Why do you have to be so difficult?" He says in his stern voice.
I can see Sinuhe lay a hand on his arm to calm him.
"You're getting mad because I don't want to eat right now?" I'd rather not play house and eat at a table and act like we're a big happy family.
"No, I'm getting mad because you're avoiding your family. All you do is sit on your ass all day, the least you can do is eat dinner with us." He says.
I shake my head. "Sit on my ass all day? Pfft. Stop acting like you care about what I do." My fingers are itching to pull out the envelope in my back pocket to shut him up.
"Shawn-"
"-Can you guys stop!?" Camila shouts over him. All the attention turns to her do to her sudden outburst.
"Why cant the two of you go one day without fighting? I'm so fucking sick of it!"
Whoa. Where the fuck is the popcorn when I need it?
Sinuhe gasps loudly "Camila, go to your room!" She shouts.
Camila's chair screeches loudly against the ground as she stands from it. She gives me an angry look as she passes by, bumping my shoulder roughly in the process. I can't help but laugh. What? The concerned look on their faces is just too funny. Now they see just how innocent their little girl is.
"I'll go talk to her." Sinuhe says to my dad before standing from the table and walking towards me.
She stops in front of me with her squinted eyes, her mouth in a furious frown.
"You're a terrible influence on her." She says.
If only she knew how much of a bad influence I was on her the other night.
"Am I really?" I smirk.
I'm surprised when she sends a harsh smack across my cheek. It stings like a bitch.
She walks away after her assault, leaving dad and I in the kitchen alone. He stares at me from the kitchen table with a look of disappointment.
"I didn't raise you to be this way." He says.
