D U S K ✔

Chapter Thirty-Three

[UNEDITED}

-

  I stared at the closed door in shock, trying to connect everything he said yet still ending up nowhere. Furrowing my brows, I shuffled towards the plug and started charging my phone.

 The lock screen was a photograph of my father and I, stood at the podium in the church, behind us, the glittering light spewed out from the stained glass windows, all of the football players behind us too, smiling into the camera. 

  It was a good day, it wasn't a can-collecting day, it wasn't any special event like Christmas, or Easter, it was simply a Sunday. Not a busy Sunday like most, I was sure it was because of the football game of the season was on, but my father didn't know any better. He was adamant on people showing up. And they did.

  They came in after the game, with trays of hot-dogs and popcorn, cheering about the fantastic win of the season, and came over just to hang out. But what we didn't know at the time was, that it was Harvey Dawson's first time playing the game since he broke his leg earlier that June. He apparently, when he broke it, visited my father in our church and asked for a miracle.

  He made the best play of the season, recovered miraculously, and went on to get a full scholarship at some football university.

  Thinking back to then, it was a much simpler time. I blinked away tears that threatened to escape, and thought about how it got this bad.

  A shrill phone ringing caught me out of the daydream, and I followed the noise downstairs and into the kitchen. Adam was sat with his back to me, his shoulders visibly tense. I sat down a seat away from him, feeling his eyes sink into the side of my face yet I knew I couldn't meet them head on. 

  I heard Adam's voice before I even wanted to look at him, "Where's my phone?" He asked aloud, confused curiosity laced through his rich voice as he patted down his clothes. The ringing stopped.

  "I have it," I admitted, "you left it at my house a few days ago and I've been meaning to give it back." I dug around my jacket pockets reaching hold of it, before I could pull it out, Theresa came barrelling in.

  "Adam, go answer the phone, it's your parents." A huge smile stretched the side of her face as she ushered him into the other room. He threw her a quizzical look but complied none the less.

  Theresa sat down opposite me and for the first time I could get a good look at her. She was skinny, her eyes were sunken and years of stress appeared under them. Her blue eyes crinkled when she smiled, puffing up her high-set cheekbones. She had a soft jawline, it wasn't sharp like Adam's, yet it faded into her neck. She had short blonde hair, that looked to be perfectly styled to fall slightly over her forehead and ears. 

  In short, she was no less than beautiful.

  I stopped my creepy staring and pulled Adam's phone from my pocket, laying it on the table. 

  Theresa beamed up at me, "So how did you and Adam meet?" she wrapped her skinny hands around a mug of, what looked to be, tea and waited patiently for my answer. 

  My face flushed a bright red as I thought back to him breaking into the house next to mine and immediately deemed that inappropriate to tell the lovely woman, who literally looked at Adam like he was still a young innocent child. 

  "Through school," I lied, "we bumped into each other and started talking."

  I could've cringed at my horrible attempt of lying but by her slightly narrowed eyes I knew she didn't believe me.

  "That doesn't sound like Adam." She laughed, "I would've guessed he roped you into something illegal. Maybe all that fighting he does."

  I was taken back, I tried not to show it on my face but obviously I suck at that too.

  "It's alright, dear, I'm not blind, I know he's-" She looked for a word, "isolated. You can imagine my surprise when he brings home a lovely girl, like yourself."

  I went to apologise but she continued talking, "I'm sure it didn't happen like that, but just take precaution, dear. Stay safe." Her ominous warning didn't settle right within, and she threw me a comforting smile as she left the kitchen.

  "--couldn't have been a worse time." I watched as Adam rounded the corner back into the kitchen. He looked at his phone on the table, and back at me. Grabbing it off the table and holding it near my face. "This conversation isn't over."

  He left the room after that. Shutting the door behind him, I didn't waste any time in picking myself up and following him.

  He was out on the front porch, sat on a small brick wall. I climbed up and sat beside him, crossing my legs around my feet ad balancing myself with a firm grip on the brick wall. I looked out to where he was staring, you couldn't see much, only the massive iron gate, and a fortress of shrubs blocking out any signs of life beyond the wall.

  I took a deep breath, only then realising the air was full of smoke.

  I watched his jaw clench as he inhaled the smoke, and released a breath of air. "Smoking will kill you one day." I stated.

  I expected a glare from him, or a spit of sharp, harsh words, even silence. I didn't expect his loud, raspy laugh.

  I was taken back, for the second time today, he was constantly surprising me. I threw him an offended look, "I'm being serious."

  "Oh, I know you're being serious. That's what makes it so funny."

    I pushed myself up from the wall and away from him, "I don't know why you're such an asshole, all the time."

  "I'm not a good guy, Sunshine, you already know that." He inhaled it again, "I'll get what I deserve." He still wouldn't look at me.

"What you deserve?"  

 "You know what, I'm not even getting that, so maybe God  will do me a grand justice and wipe me off the face of the Earth for good this ti--"

  I couldn't stop myself from flinging my arms at him, slapping his back repeatedly, a flurry of raw emotion spilling out of me again and again. How could he even begin saying things like that, in such a belittling manner, as if his life, and mine would be inherently better when he wasn't in it. Could he not see me at all?

 Adam just sat there. Not even moving, as though it didn't affect him in any way.

  I stopped after a minute, my hands freezing in mid-air, breathing heavily from the exhaustion that suddenly washed over me, I wiped away furious tears.

  "Are you done yet." He stated, more than asked.

  That alone sent me into another onset of painful slaps, one by one the emotion only increased and I found myself easing, to wipe away the tears that had spilled. He said nothing this time, and threw away the cigarette bud. 

  He swivelled around to face me, but I hid my face in my hands, hiding from his eyes, sniffling pathetically.

  And then I asked what had been killing me inside from day one.

  "There's something wrong with you, isn't there?