JOEY
MY DAY HAD CONSISTED of seven hours at school, followed by a match, followed by a further four hours at the garage.
By the time I walked through the door a little after eleven that night, I was bone weary, and in dire need of a mattress to collapse onto.
However, the look on my mother’s face assured me that sleep was the last thing I would be getting.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, dropping my school bag, gear bag, hurley and helmet in the hallway before making a beeline for the kitchen. “Mam?”
“It happened again,” she choked out, tears streaming down her face, as she dropped her head in her hands. “Shannon’s in hospital.”
My heart sank. “No.”
Mam nodded in confirmation and I thought I might explode from the sudden rush of blood to the head.
“Why?” My breath caught in my throat. “What happened?”
“She has a concussion,” she explained, slumped in her usual chair. “They’re keeping her overnight for observation.”
“A concussion?” I gaped. “How? Where? What the fuck?”
“Some boy in one of the senior classes hit her with a rugby ball during practice, and she took a terrible fall at school.” Sniffling, she reached for the torn fabric in front of her and held it up. “Ripped her skirt in the process, apparently. I can’t remember his name,” she strangled out. “But he was an older boy around the same age as you.”
“On purpose?” Fury roared to life inside of me. “Mam, did he do it on purpose?”
“He swore blind to the principal that he didn’t mean to hurt her,” she replied, tone dripping with disdain. “He brought her inside when she collapsed and was sitting with her outside of the office when I arrived, but you know what they’re like,” Mam sobbed. “I thought this time would be different for her. Better. She needs better, Joey. She needed a fresh start and it’s ruined.”
“What’s Shannon saying about it?”
“She swears it was an accident, too,” Mam replied wearily. “But you know how she lies.”
“Well then, maybe it was,” I offered, allowing myself to be hopeful for once in my life. “If he took her to the office after it happened and stayed with her until you came.”
“I expect that kind of naivety from your brothers and sister, but not you,” Mam snapped. “You know better.”
Yeah, I did, but for once, I didn’t want to.
For once in my life, I wanted my mother to show me the same consideration that she so willingly showed the rest of my siblings.
It wouldn’t happen, of course.
Because my feelings weren’t meant to be spared.
They were meant to be bulletproof.
Or nonexistent.
“What’s Dad saying?”
Her shoulders slumped, but she didn’t reply.
“What’s he saying about it, Mam?” I pushed.
“That it serves her right for thinking she was better than the rest of you.”
“Prick,” I muttered, rubbing my jaw. “He doesn’t have a goddamn—”
“Please don’t start,” she cut me off with a sob. “I’ve already heard all that I can handle tonight from your father.”
“Mam,” I began to say, but she shook her head, silencing me with her dismissal.
With a sniffle, she rose from the table, pressed a hand to her growing stomach, and walked straight past me, with scorn and disappointment wafting from her in waves.
The kitchen door closed behind me, and I felt that familiar swell of frustrated desperation rise up inside of me. It was the same feeling that was never sated until I forced it away with whatever I could get my hands on.
Helpless, I stood in the kitchen, with my hands hanging limply at my sides, as I absorbed the horrible fucking sensations and feelings rushing through me.
Unwilling to unlock my muscles out of fear of what I was capable of doing, and even more unwilling to detonate the self-destruct button on the life I had barely managed to get back on track, I bowed my head and breathed in deep and slow.
It doesn’t matter, I tried to soothe myself by mentally chanting, none of this matters, because you don’t care, remember?
You don’t care.
You don’t care.
You don’t fucking care!
