Page 3 of Mistaken Identity
Meanwhile, Mom never bothered.
She would make sure that all my papers were signed for athletics and school, but damned if her ass would ever leave the house.
She was agoraphobic.
She hadn’t always been that way.
However, one day she left the house for groceries, and the next she never did it again.
My dad allowed it to continue, and before either of us knew it, she was so far gone that she couldn’t even step outside to check the mail.
Hell, when I was in a car accident when I was sixteen and a brand-new driver, she still hadn’t come.
Dad had responded to the call, and he’d held my hand while the rest of his crew had cut me out of the truck that had been slammed into a power pole by a semi-truck that hadn’t seen me pulling out.
I’d been in the hospital for two weeks with a broken femur, and she hadn’t come up there once.
“Mom?” I called again.
That’s when I heard the small whimper.
I sighed.
Mom probably heard me open the door and not close it, and now she was worried that the outside world might get in.
Fucking shit.
I slammed the door closed and walked through the house, my lip curling as I saw all the piled dishes in the sink.
With Dad and me gone, not here to clean up after her, the house reeked.
“Mom?” I called again.
Another whimper.
I followed the soft sounds and stalled out when I got into the hallway and smelled something weird.
Coppery something.
I sniffed again. “Mom?”
The whimper was closer, but not any louder.
I turned the corner into my bedroom and stilled.
There was red splatter all over the walls.
“What…”
That’s when I saw her.
Her legs and arms were on the bed, but her head…
“Oh, god. Mom,” I croaked.
I couldn’t move.
Couldn’t breathe.
