"Can you just answer the question? I'm begging ma," I plead for the third time looking straight to her eyeballs
"No, he's not dead," She says with no regret averting her eyes away from my piercing eyes.
"Where is he then?" I ask.
"I don't know and it's safer if you don't know his whereabouts," She tells me.
"Let me guess, he's a serial killer who is out to kill me and the rest of the family?" I scoff and she laughs. "Mum, tell me everything and by everything, I mean everything with no details left out."
"Your coward of a father decided on his own to leave on his own and I just lied to make you both not feel worthless…." She wants to go on, but I interrupt her.
"These are lies! Mum, I know you tried to kill him and somehow he escaped, why do you continue to lie?" I notice her jerk as I tell her. "So, it's true?" I ask.
"True that what?" She asks confused.
"True that you're a maniac," I say and start to walk away
"No matter what happens, I am still your mother so treat me with some respect" She drags me back and scolds.
"NO. YOU'RE NOT. YOU'RE NOT MY MOTHER. A MOTHER WON'T LIE TO HER OWN SON REPEATEDLY. BECAUSE OF THIS SO-CALLED 'MOTHER', YOU CALL YOURSELF I'VE BEEN LIVING A LIE FOR ELEVEN YEARS. DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW IT FEELS LIKE TO LIVE A LIE?!" I shout at her and she loosens the grip she has on my shirt. "Then don't you dare call yourself my mother, just be happy with the title" I then tell her and leave.
The words I tell her sting her and I'm sure because I could see it clearly on her face the moment the words leave my mouth. It not only stings her, but it also stings me too because I have never spoken to my mother in that tone before, neither have I used such harsh words on her before.
"Just so you know, I found out that he wasn't dead five years ago" As soon as she says this I stop abruptly on my way. "Now I'm telling you the truth son, believe me." She adds. "Look I can't tell you the details because it will hurt you, believe me," She continues
I walked to the bar, took a bottle of liquor and start drinking.
I drink so that I will forget the entire episode that just played out. Drinking is not something I'm proud of but that is the only thing that I can think of to clear my head.
Days when I'm feeling blue, I just go to the park but today the feeling is different because I have never felt like this in my entire life. I've never felt real pain except when my dad died, and to be honest with you, pain sucks.
I'm almost done with the bottle when Lucia walks in.
"What are you doing?" She rushes to me dropping her stationaries aside. "Why are you drinking," She asks while trying to drag away the bottle from the firm grip my hands has on the bottle
"No, NO, NO, let me have the bottle back. I need it…. I… need….it" I stutter and stagger on my quest to get the bottle from her hands.
"Would you stop whining? Your becoming a pain to my ear right now" Lucia scolds me.
"You're a pain too you know" I talk back
"You're this close to getting my hands to your face but on second thought you're under the influence of alcohol and I doubt you'll remember anything after you wake up from the long sleep you are going to have now." She puts my right hand around her shoulder to assist me to my room.
"Whatever" I mumble under my alcohol-filled breath
She finds the new maid and asks her for help to carry me over to my room. They assist me to the room and lay me on my bed.
"You don't run away from your problems neither do you drink your way out of your problems" Lucia advises "Excessive drinking won't help you in any way" She adds and walks away turning off the lights.
****
I wake up the next morning with bangs going up in my head. It feels like someone is throwing a party in my head.
I go downstairs to the kitchen to look for Benjamin and Adanna because I couldn't find them in their rooms. On my way there I see my mum, her eyes show that she's still hurt by my words, but I try not to care.
"Pounding headache?" Adanna asks handing me some painkillers
"Heard you went off. Didn't expect that from you in thought you were always the 'say NO to heavy drinking' type?" Benjamin says with a peal of mild laughter.
"Not the time Benjamin" My sister scolds him. "You do know Miranda's launch is tomorrow right?" She asks me.
"I think so but it's like nine a.m. so I can still prepare?"
"Dude, it's three-thirty in the evening. You slept so long" Benjamin tells me. "Could you take a shower and maybe brush your teeth because you stink" He adds.
"COULD YOU AT LEAST SHUT UP, I'M HAVING A POUNDING HEADACHE FOR CHRIST'S SAKE" I shout at him and go upstairs to my room.
I pull out my phone from where it was charging, take my phone and dial Miranda's number because right now need someone to talk to, but on second thought I stop the call because Miranda would be busy. After all, the launch would be tomorrow.
Then I take the phone and call Salah. On the first ring, he picks up and says "You talked to her didn't you"
"How did you know?"
"Because your sister kept calling me asking me to come over to take care of you. She was worried sick about you and just didn't know what to do. She blamed herself and said she should have stayed in the house." He tells me this and I make a sound that makes him think that I don't believe him. "Look, she might not show it, but she really cares for you and me to care for you" He adds.
"Can I stay with you? I mean, please just for a while till I sort myself out?"
"You don't need to ask, you're more than welcome to stay."
"OK I'll be there soon," I tell him
"Then we better start packing because I don't want to see you in this house for now" I hear a voice from the other end. I turn around and see my sister leaning on my wardrobe and she flashes me a smile.
"I'll call you back Salah," I tell Salah on the phone
"Yeah, me too, I have to go too so bye" He hung up without me getting a chance to say goodbye.
I drop my phone on my bed and ask my sister "So what brings you to my room without knocking"
"You have to get out of here," She tells me
"What, are you chasing me out?" I ask playfully
"Stop joking around, you know what I mean. It's not safe for you here" My sister says sternly to me
"What now? She's going to kill me now as she killed dad?" I say laughing
"Why does this sound funny to you?"
"Because I've been living a lie and when I ask her to come clean, she says she did it for me. I still need the truth, even if it's just a bit. I mean, it's my life I deserve to know something" I say.
"Since you want a piece of the truth, I'll tell you but not here, I can't tell you here"
"Then let's go, wherever you want to tell me, I'll go with you" I sniff "I just want the truth," I say with tears streaming down my cheeks
"Then we better start packing," She says handing me a box and I let out a light chuckle wiping my tears.
We start packing together and I ask, "Where is Benjamin?"
"Stepped out and I don't know where to. I got something for you, it's in my room, let me go get it." She steps out
She comes back with a well-tailored suit and says "I got this for, for you to wear to Miranda's launch. You've not been on the good side recently and haven't gotten time for yourself, so I decided to get this for you"
"Thanks a lot, " I tell her
"Let's start going"
We go to her car and she starts driving. There is silence in the car for three minutes, but it feels like three hours instead.
She then breaks the silence "So you want the truth?"
"Yes." I give a short but firm answer.
"I couldn't give you the truth when you asked because I didn't know the details and me and Dad are still working on it."
"I don't care at least it's something"
"Two years before you were born, mum was pregnant, and she told dad that it wasn't his and this brought up so much problem, that I was told by Aunt Hilda …..." She says but I interrupt her.
"Wait for a second, Aunt Hilda told you this? Why didn't she tell me?" I interrupt
"Because you would be blinded by your unconditional love for mum" She mocks me, but I ignore her because she is right.
She continues "As I was saying before I was rudely interrupted, Dad later went back to mum because of the 'unconditional love' he had for mum," She says stressing the unconditional part.
She adds "Mum said she didn't want her son trained by dad because she felt he didn't know the real world. She wanted her son to be trained by his real father and dad agreed. Everything went back to normal, but dad started losing money. Mum thought that it was because he would treat people for free and she thought he could do more with the hospital like others she knew. She asked dad if they could have another chain of business, he asked what and she suggested that they have an organic farm and he said no. She kept on asking him about having an organ farm and told him about how it would help the hospital but he said he doesn't want to hear that suggestion again, so she wanted to take the hospital at all cost. On the day of her anniversary, she planned to kill dad but things didn't go as planned, as for that I don't know much about it because Brent doesn't talk much about it" She says and notice that I'm confused about her mentioning Brent.
I want to interrupt and say that I thought Brent was dead, but she reads my mind and answers "Brent isn't dead. He's with Dad, he vowed to protect him, he was the one who made sure dad wasn't killed. So back to what I was saying, The next day, mum sent Brent on some kind of errand, 'killing people I suppose', she cornered him and took the gun to shoot him with her own hands, she felt that she would do better. He pleaded that she shouldn't kill him and that whatever she wants she can have and she said she wants the hospital to herself and that she doesn't want him near us, so he had no option but to go. When he ran away, she had second thoughts and sent Brent after him, so she thought he was dead until five years ago"
"So, what your trying to tell me is that everyone I know apparently resurrects from the dead, because two people who I grieved for are now alive. So now you are going to tell me that our late grandparents are now alive or that Martin Luther King is back from the dead, right?" I say perplexed because I'm still trying to get a hold of the information I just received. "Five years ago? Five years ago?" I keep repeating this phrase.
"Yes, that's the same time Brent died. He faked his death when mum's cartel had a clash with another cartel. So now mum doesn't have a clue that Brent is alive. Because he made it look like his body was burned up alive in a car crash during the clash"
"Then why did you call dad a coward that time at dinner?" I ask remembering the dinner incident.
"Because he ought to have sent a message or something to tell us he was alive or something. Instead, he did nothing until recently"
"That makes sense. I guess. Can't believe that my beloved mother tried to kill my father, my hero"
"Your hero without a cape to be exact. And that beloved mother of ours is still trying to kill him because he knows the way too much and she feels he is a threat, but Brent is protecting him. They are looking for a way to bring her down because she is a danger to the public"
"How exactly?" I ask
"For Christ's sake, Andrew why do you have to be so daft, she has an organ farm. Imagine how it feels like to get kidnapped, get transported to an unknown location and have your organs harvested and sold to the black market. Few survive but a greater number of people die. Think about it, Andrew." She now parks the car to the side and adds "She also runs a cartel. Think of the innocent people that might have died in the process. And she did this all in the quest for money. The money was never enough, and it will never be enough for her. So many people would die in the process of her trying to get more money. Don't you want to stop that?"
"But she kept on saying she did it for us"
"OH, so killing Steve, my fiancé was helpful to me or you? Or let me just make it general as she always does. So, killing the love of my life was for us, right?" She asks tearing up.
Steve was Adanna's boyfriend. He was an American with blonde hair and blue eyes and he wore glasses. He and Adanna met in the USA when she went for a course there and they dated for some years until his death.
"You guys were engaged?" I asked startled
"You too, huh? Mum thought I wouldn't get engaged to him, she thought he was one of the others. She thought we would date for just a few months and break up after then as my previous exes, so she was shocked that I came to tell her that I was engaged to Steve, a boy she never liked. She didn't even take at least a week to kill him." She stops and starts tearing up worse.
I try to stop her from talking but she continues "It took her three days to kill him just after we got engaged, I mean who does that. Who kills their child's love? Months after his deaths she tried to pair me up with some guy and my refusal made her angry. I always had a feeling it was her who killed him, but I was never sure so right after this dad's incident. I confronted her about Steve's death, and she said that stupid line again 'I did it for you, when I asked how she did it for me she said I didn't deserve him." She cries harder this time.
But she still adds "The moment she said that I packed my things and said I would never come back but I only came back because I wanted to be there for you when you know the truth"
"But that was not the version she told me. She told me that..." I say but get interrupted.
"Sorry but I don't want to hear that version of what she told you, the last time you said it in your office it stung." She interrupts
I remember my words to her at the office.
*You disappear for a year without telling anyone where you went off to, you don't call mum or me for a year and when you finally get back you think I'll act like everything is normal. Do you think I'll just wave it off and hug you like everything is normal? Adanna you need to stop this act, it's very irresponsible. You give mum a heart attack every time. *
*For Christ's sake Adanna, stop shrugging this off. Your turning twenty-nine and you still act this irresponsible? *
When I think of these words, I feel bad because I didn't even care to listen to her own side of the story. I judged her by my mom's side of the story.
"I'm such a bad brother" I groan
"No, you're a terrible brother to be exact" She chuckles
"I'm sorry. My words hurt you."
"You've apologized before, why apologizing again?"
"Because I didn't know the details. Now I know the details I feel bad. Adanna I'm sorry"
"It's fine I mean unfortunately your family, so I have to forgive you," She says and we both laugh
"You're not going to stay in Salah's apartment for too long because she will find you. You may have to leave the country"
"When do I get to talk to Dad?" I ask
"As soon as possible" She replies
"So, what about my brother"
"What brother?" She asks annoyed
"You know what I'm talking about"
"He is your brother"
"He is, even if he's caused by mums' infidelity he still is"
"And I thought you grew up," She says putting her three fingers on her temples
"What's that supposed to mean?" I ask sternly
"Apparently you still live in a world of fairytales and happy endings. You believe that you both would automatically become best buds, right?" She asks with a burst of laughter. "Let's just hope this particular story has a happy ending" She adds