Page 105 of The Teacher of Nothing
Bile creeps up my throat.
What truth?
“You can’t tell her,” Mom whispers. “You swore to me.”
I stand up despite the way my knees slightly buckle. Uneasiness has a hold of my nerves and every cell in my body feels alive. Something tells me that the big secret will have me wanting to bolt and I need to be ready.
“Tell me what?” I demand. “What have you been hiding from me?”
Whatever this is will hurt. I can feel it. Like a calm before a chaotic storm. My mother has betrayed me in some way and I need to know what it is, no matter how painful it may be.
Mom’s head bows and her shoulders begin to shake as she sobs. I stare at her with new eyes, aware of how weak she is as she fumbles for her purse, locating a couple of her pills.
“I need to know,” I say to Darren, unable to peel my eyes from my mother. “I need to know what has her choosing this over me.” I motion at the pill bottle in her hand and then at him.
His smile is wicked as he walks over to her. She’s limp but willingly goes into his arms. I want to throw up but manage to keep from getting sick.
“When your daddy died, your mother had a hard time keeping her shit together.” Darren murmurs the words as he gently strokes her hair. “Damn near drank herself into the grave with him.”
I remember those early days after Dad died. When I was a small child taking care of a grown woman who would never leave the bed. I learned quickly how to open cans of ravioli and other easy meals to feed us. I’d done a good job, too, until the food ran out.
“She was grieving,” I whisper. “She got better.”
She was forced to get better.
Child protective services were called when I went to a neighbor’s house asking how to cook a frozen turkey. It was all that was left in the freezer and I dragged the rock-hard thingnext door. I didn’t realize that day I’d be getting my mother into trouble.
Luckily, it was the wake-up call she needed.
I spent the night with strangers, but the next day, the mom I knew and loved was back. She was fierce, loving, and protective. Since I was young, I don’t remember all the details, just that she was back to taking care of both of us and going to work like normal.
And then, one day, Darren was there, filling the role of dad.
“When you have an expensive oxy habit, it’s amazing how quickly you can go bankrupt,” Darren states, a smugness in his tone that grates on me. “Your mom was on the verge of losing everything.”
My stomach twists at his words. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying your mother was desperate. Desperation can make you do crazy things.”
I wrack my brain for memories of years back. Mom went on a vacation without me one summer, while I stayed with some people who were practically family, and when she came back, she was married to Darren.
“She married you for your money?” I rasp out. “That’s what this is all about.”
Darren snorts. “Hardly. You know your mother doesn’t do anything in moderation. Her Michael Kors bags can attest to that.”
Mom remains strangely quiet, as though she’s resigned herself to the fact he’s going to tell her biggest secrets—ones that are going to destroy her family.
“I don’t understand,” I whisper.
“Your mom embezzled from the law firm she works at. She stole money from that old man you used to call Grandpa Leo.”
Mom’s boss, Leo Sorrel, was the family I’d stayed with while she ran off to marry Darren.
“What?”
Darren laughs. “Right? Leo may be an attorney, but he’s a great guy. Who would steal from that guy? She’d have to be a heartless, selfish bitch.”
She was an addict.
