Never Been Loved (3 page)

I need to let her go, and just as I’m about to step over and out of the elevator, my phone buzzes, like

I’ve become the divining rod for the perfect place for cell phone reception. I don’t even have to look at it. I’m already late in picking up Matty, Mom’s bound to call to make me hurry my ass up.

Slamming my hand against the side of the door, feeling the numb-tingle travel up my hand into my wrist only to get that throbbing pain, I press the button to get to the basement.

I get to my car, my shitty blue Honda that’s seen better days, and known better drivers. I glare at the car seat in the back through the window, hating that it’s there, that the kid is always on my mind even when I can’t see him.

Strangling the leather of my steering wheel, I screech out of the underground parking lot, brain on automatic as I fiddle with the radio to catch the rock station. The kid likes rock music for some reason, and

I figure I’ll try and keep him calm with guitar riffs and screeching vocals.

I find myself easing on the gas as I get closer and closer to the palace, my childhood home. I roll down the window to get some of April’s air in, let it swirl in the confines of my car, washing out the stink of fast food and the remnants of Aly’s perfume. I stare into the rear-view mirror, hating that car seat with all I’m worth and what it means that I’m now a father – have been for the last three years instead of the uncle I’m supposed to be.

Life has a way of kicking you in the balls and watching you struggle to catch your breath, only to wind her foot right back and do it all over again.

Inevitable that I get to my old house, and stare at it like a stranger would. The stone steps that I have no trouble walking up, but Matty needs his whole body weight on one leg to heave himself up with. Those awful stone lions on either side of the door that are more pretentious than the gold-leaf plated door knocker resting on the dark green polished wood of the door. Large windows covered by gauzy curtains that always reminded me of hospitals when I was younger until I turned eighteen and learned the truth of what hospitals really taste and smell like.

I walk my way up the steps and refuse to make eye contact with the far window in the upper east corner.
Her
room, as it’s been for the past three years, preserved and embalmed like the room is a living thing and the rest of Jules hasn’t just floated away.

I knock, wait for ten seconds and ignore the cold flush in my body that might mean something’s wrong. Blood sugar levels can either go up or down, my body lacking the hormone insulin to get it into my cells, where it needs to be. Both a high or low feels like getting donkey-kicked, makes your brain fuzzy, and makes me so fucking tired that I need to nap to recover.

I hate that my survival is dictated by a vial of hormone in my fridge at home, and another one I carry in my pouch that I need to use right after I eat. I hate that I could die if my sugar drops too low, and I’m too nauseous to eat to save my own ass.
What I hate most of all? That my sister’s kid is diabetic, too. And there’s nothing I can do about it.

The door opens and it feels like the temperature hikes up ten degrees. Mom hates the cold, and I don’t know why she sticks around Montreal when she has enough money to move anywhere she wants to. I think it’s just to screw with me.

Yeah, most likely just to screw with me.

“Hunter? Is that you?” she asks. Like she gets any other visitors to the house. The woman hardly lives here anymore, but keeps the brick monstrosity for bragging rights only.

“Yeah, it’s me,” I say, looking around the foyer for Matty to come around the corner any minute. I stare straight ahead and will myself not to let my eyes travel up, up, up the grand staircase. I will myself deaf to the imagined sounds of Jules running down the stairs to ask me for a ride somewhere, all that time ago, when we were still in high school, and I got my license before she did.

I wonder what the Elevator Babe would say when she saw this place. Aly’s already seen it and I hate the way she looks at the furniture, the paintings, even the floor. Like it’s all going to be hers one day. Which is true, but still, keep that smug look off your face, I don’t care how nice you can suck my cock.

“Where have you been?!” Mom asks, and the edge of shrill she adds to her voice has my eardrums popping.

“I had a date.” If a date constitutes Aly fucking my brains out, then yeah, that’s exactly what I had. In the morning light, I know what I am – I’m a transaction; instead of money, I pay in orgasms.

“You can’t just leave him here! What would the neighbours think?”
I snicker. “That you’re his grandmother, yeah? Which you are, just to remind you.”

She’s wearing those big sunglasses that Hollywood seems to be wearing, and she’s nursing a glass of something that tinkles with ice every time her hand shakes. It’s not even ten-thirty in the morning.

“No need to get smart. You could have called, Hunter. I raised you better than that.”

I want to tell her that she didn’t raise me at all, but I’m not in the mood for her crocodile tears, not when I have to gear up for Matty’s antics in the next five minutes.

“How was the kid?”

Mom’s mouth twists, and she takes a noisy slurp of her drink. “As if I would know. Edouard?
Edouard?!
The man is like a ghost, I have no idea how he moves around so silent- oh! There you are! My son has come to collect my grandson, Edouard, would you kindly collect him from his room?”

Eddie materializes to my left, nods, and I hear his soft footfalls climb up the stairs. I thought Matty would be ready by now, shoes on, dressed and all that shit. Now I’m going to have to do it, and the little guy is going to fight me every single step of the way.

“Who was your date with last night? Someone I know?”

I bare my teeth. “You don’t know her.” A picture of the Elevator Babe comes to mind, her walking in these pristine halls, maybe awed at what she finds in this house. I’d tell her that looks can be deceiving, that we’re really in Hell.

“What about Alysha? How has she been doing? Why, I saw her mother just last night, and she was asking about you. When you two are going to set a date for the wedding?”

I fist my hands, satisfied when my knuckles crack. “You’re still not pushing that card, are you?”

Mom whirls on her stilettos (not Converse) and pushes the swinging door to the kitchen. I count to ten and then follow when I don’t hear anything from upstairs.

“There is no reason why I shouldn’t want to look after my boy, and wishing him to find a suitable...companion for the rest of his life is one of those ways I can do that. What is wrong with Alysha?”

I want to bust my skull open on the granite countertop. It’ll take maybe three good hits with my forehead and that’ll be it – all over, all done. No more guilt, no more responsibilities, no more diabetes. No more Matty. No more reminders of Jules being dead while I’m still here, struggling through.

“She hates Matty,” I say, staring down at the countertop, picking up the traces of gold, black and brown, running a finger along the colours.

Mom swirls her glass, ice making music in time to her movements, and purses her lips. “Well, I’m sure that’s none of her doing. Matty is a handful and a half. Much more so than other boys his age.”

I want to punch something. We both know that extra half handful is because Matty’s diabetic. Just like me. Heat boils in my gut, and I stuff my hands in my pockets so I don’t let fly and do something I’m going to regret.

“Because he was born that way? The least she could do is talk to him, it’s not like she’s going to catch diabetes by touching him for fuck’s sake.”

Mom slams her glass down on the granite, amber liquid sloshing over in tsunami-like waves over the glass and onto the counter. I’ve gone and rattled her and feel like beating my chest in triumph. The woman’s an ice queen, and I like thawing her a little when shit doesn’t go her way.

“Alysha is the only one who will have you, Hunter. Or do I have to remind you of the string of other women you’ve gone through these past years?”

My gag reflex acts up. My mother is talking to me about my sex life. Where’s the bleach so I can swallow it? “I’m not talking about this with you.”

Jesus Christ, there have only been two women other than Aly in the past ten years. Shit.

She laughs, the kind of laugh that clearly puts you in your place. “When are you going to learn? Aly is the only one who will have you and my grandson. The main reason being she knows all about your past and what happened with Julia. You could do worse, Hunter. Much worse. She’s presentable, and I’m sure she could be a good wife.”

“I’m not going to marry her, Mom. Whatever scheme you and Dad cooked up before he left nothing to do with me.”

Her eyebrows make an appearance over the rims of her sunglasses as she adjusts them. She smiles without any warmth behind it, the kind of smile that puts me on edge ’cause I can’t see her endgame. It’s the kind of smile that she puts on her face when she knows she’s three steps ahead of me. How in hell did this woman give birth to me?

“Alysha will make a fine wife. Especially with all the resources she will bring you.”

She says nothing about being a mom. My chest cavity heats up, the burn crawling up my throat until I know I’m about to hurl words that’ll change my life forever. I swallow them down, ignoring the taste of failed rebellion, and wait quietly for Eddie to bring my nephew along.

Mom doesn’t say anything – she knows she’s won, and she’s never been one to gloat.

Fuck, I hate this place.
The kid is sleepy when Eddie finally brings him into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes at me and I’m sucker-punched all over again when I see him, like I forget who he really looks like. My sister had dark hair and light eyes, beautiful, and her little boy is beautiful, too. Jules’d be rolling over in her grave if she found out Aly was going to be Matty’s mom.

I’m worried his sugar’s spiked and I didn’t have the forethought to bring his pouch with me, but I guess I can use my own stuff that’s in the car. I want to vomit as the thud in my chest gets harder, and adrenaline starts coursing through my body.

Is this it? Is this the day when I have to take him to the hospital and social services will take him away from me to place him in foster care? Is this the day I lose the last piece of Jules forever because I’m such a spineless piece of shit who should know better?

Self-loathing is just another name I call myself.

I knew this was coming, this big change needs to be done. Not for me, for Matty. Because I can’t lose the last piece of Jules I have, I can’t. Not yet. Not when I can see her smile on his little boy face, or hear the exact cadence of her laugh when he giggles.

Holding out my arms, Eddie places him on my chest, and the little guy wraps his arms around my neck, holding on tight. I feel his heart beat next to mine, and whatever tension my body had as I came through the door, slowly bleeds out of me. No matter how much I hate everything that’s happened to me, no matter what happens in the future... I need to make it better for Matty.

Whatever happens now, is all for him.

First things first, I need to tell Aly.

Yeah, that’s gonna go over well.

Chapter 3

Aly’s gone, and left the door unlocked, too. Her perfume still lingers in my room, in the hall and by the front door. I’ve been dismissed like the lowlife I am, and that’s good. I don’t have to face her and endure whatever shit she’s going to throw my way when I tell her I won’t be the recipient of her blow jobs anymore.

The place is a mess. At least the kid’s room is a contained disaster, sheets on the floor from the day before, toys and kiddie books covering every inch of floor space. If I walk in there, I’m bound to slip and kill myself.

Aly’s left the kitchen, right across Matty’s room, full of shit. She ate something on a plate, stuffed in the sink with half her breakfast. The coffee pot is shoved into its place in the coffeemaker, sputtering because the fucking thing is still dripping. I bet the babe next door wouldn’t leave shit lying around like this.

“Matty,” I say, rubbing his back so he wakes up. Only when I get eye contact do I continue, gently placing him on the couch. “I want you to clean your room, all right?”

He nods sleepily. “Daddy, I’m tired.”

Fuck. Shit, fuck, fuck!

Shame presses down on me like a living thing, burning through me as I settle Jules’ kid on the ground. I locate his pouch on the counter, hidden behind some bananas that I know I didn’t put there and pull out his glucometer.

Heart in my mouth, and dread settling into the pit of my stomach, I crouch and put Matty up on the kitchen counter, watch as his shoulders slump forward and he squints around, trying to see. My hands shake, like I haven’t done this a million times before, as I jab in a test strip, and ready the mini-piston by pulling back on it. I always give Matty the choice of which finger he wants to use for blood.

He gives me his middle finger of his left hand, holding out all five fingers and staring at me like I’m the one who caused all this. Fuck, maybe I am.

Swallowing, I stab his finger with the mini-piston and watch his finger bead with a perfect red dot, ready to be sucked up by the test strip already in his glucometer. When the blood’s in the test strip and the five second countdown starts on the glowing surface of his machine do I let myself breathe normally. My part’s done, now I have to see what the result is.