So, Here I Am

Chapter Nineteen Hotel 2

"What did I do, Larry ?    What did I do to Maggie "

Larry "Lau, I ..."

"WHAT !! TELL ME !! I can't remember, what did I do ??!!

He was enraged, not at his brother, but at the fact that he had obviously done something .... awful ..... and couldn't remember it.

Larry " OK, bro, calm down"  He couldn't believe he just said that.  Since when in the history of Calm Down, has anyone actually Calmed Down, when told to Calm Down.

Laurent "What the fuck !!"

Larry "Bro, just sit, ok, and I will tell you, sit, please".   He was pleading with him now.         Laurent came over to Larry's side of the bed, and took a seat in front of the window.  Larry sat opposite him, and took a deep breath, to help him gather his thoughts.  He walked him through his recollections of the previous night, as painful as it was. 

Larry "So you remember Maggie telling us that A.J. is our brother, mamas baby?"

He did.

"And you remember us being upset, and crying and shit on the floor.  I was trying to get you to remember all the good times you and me and mama had together ?"

He did.

"And do you remember going into Maggie's room to talk to her ?"

"Vaguely, I was so out of it, Lar, I was so tired, but I just had this urge, this gut feeling, a NEED to talk to her. I can't remember our conversation, or much after that."

"You remember A.J. hitting you ?"

"Shit, yeah." he said, touching his brow, eliciting an "ow".

"Can you remember WHY he hit you ?" Larry asked as gently as he could, because if this question jogged his memory, all hell was going to break loose in a minute, either physically, but knowing Laurent, emotionally, just like last night.

"No." he said flatly.

"You're sure you want to know this, Lau ?  Even if it means knowing why Maggie talks to you differently, looks at you differently ?"

Laurent couldn't believe what he had heard.  Differently ?  Why differently.  He started to cry now.

"Larry, did I hurt her? I promised her I would never hurt her !"   Larry was trying hard not to cry now as well, as he well knew the weight of what he was about to tell his brother.

"I'm sorry, baby boy, but you broke your promise".

Laurent was full out sobbing now.  He was on his knees on the floor, his head buried in the bed covers, pulling them towards himself, as if they might save him somehow.  But Larry noticed something.  He was distressed now, yes, but he wasn't over-the-edge lost and broken like he had been last night.

Laurent collected himself, pulled himself off the bed, and sat in the chair opposite Larry again. Looking him straight in the eyes.

"You have to tell me, brother.  I have to be able to look Maggie, and A.J. in the eyes and know what they know, so I can apologise, knowing what I did.  You have to tell me, Larry."

Larry just wanted this whole thing to be over, but it had to be said. The words had to physically take flight into the air.

"Ok, I don't know it all, I wasn't there, but OK" he said taking his hundredth deep breath of the day.

"I put you to bed, we were in Maggie's room, I thought you were sleeping, but suddenly you got out of bed, and said you had to go talk to her.  I tried to stop you, but you said you had to, needed to clear the air, and you were a lot calmer by then, so I let you go.   About ten minutes later, I heard you screaming in Maggie's room, I went running, and met A.J. in the hall.   We both ran to Maggie's room, and shit, Lau ..." he trailed off, not wanting to carry on, but knowing he had to.

Laurent was staring at him, a single tear slowly escaping his eyes.   Another deep breath, and Larry continued.

"As we went round the corner into her room, Maggie came running out, her top was off, Lau. Then we saw you, and shit, you were naked from the waist down, bro.   A.J. put two and two together and made HELL NO!   That's when he decked you, one hit, bro, you went down hard. Then he started hitting you in the face, until I could pull him off. Then I noticed there were two holes in the wall, where Maggies head had been."

Laurent looked at his hands, and saw that his knuckles were sore.  They were red and grazed slightly, but he hadn't noticed them before now.   Several tears had fallen in the last minute, listening to what he had put Maggie through. 

But there was worse to come.

"Maggie told us you had come to talk to her, like you said, but that something happened, Lau, like a switch just went off, she could see it, the lights were on, but no-one was home.  FUCK !! I can't do this, Laurent !!"   Taking hold of his brother's hand, he said gently,

"You have to, Lar, please."   He took another deep breath.  

"You held her off the ground with one hand under her jaw, kind of around her neck, completely off the floor.  You bruised her neck.  You ripped her top off, Lau, and left her breast with bruises. You took off your pants while you were still holding her against the wall.   If she wasn't the woman she is, and got you SO angry you yelled and screamed, and if we didn't come running ..... I .......I ......."   Larry's tears were falling now, he was so hurt to even contemplate that his brother could be capable of such a heinous act.

Laurent was momentarily stunned into silence.  He could barely comprehend what Larry had told him.

"I might have ..... I was going to ....." He couldn't form the word in his brain, let alone let it leave his mouth, as if saying the word "rape" would have made it real, and it could never be taken back.    Larry was quick to defend him though,

"Maggie knew you weren't there Lau, she knew it. She knew you weren't capable of something like that .."

Laurent "And she still wants to talk to me, to help me, to help us .." he asked, incredulously.

"Yeah, she does.  She loves you, Lau, and you love her, you told me as much.  She's an amazing woman, and if she can forgive you, and that's a HUGE IF, and you love her like you say you do, you will spend as long as it takes to rebuild her trust, her love again.  Because you know what ? It'd be worth it"

Laurent stood to hold his brother, both of them crying into each others shoulders, rocking back and forth, emotionally spent.  But Larry couldn't resist the last word.

"And THAT is why A.J. beat the crap out of you!"

Laurent could raise a small smile at that, thinking he couldn't blame him.

Larry "But we have to go see mama now.  Hear her side of the story.  Listen to what she has to say, OK?"

"Do I have a choice?"

"No, you don't"

And if you listened very carefully, you could hear Laurent's heart breaking all over again.