The Game Changer The Final Score - By L.M. Trio Page 0,13
door leading into the kitchen and my senses fill with the aroma of my mom’s cooking. A sense of cautious relief comes over me. I know she’ll have a million things prepared for me. My mom, dad and Mikey are sitting around the kitchen table when I step through the door, all eyes pointing in my direction.
“You guys are in the same spot I left you in. Did you ever move?” I ask, attempting to crack a joke.
My mom jumps from her seat with tears in her eyes as she runs to me, with my dad right behind. She hugs me hard and long, and then my dad joins in. I can barely breathe and feel as if I may cry myself, but am unable to shed a tear. I’ve worked so hard at not showing my emotions over the last twenty months, I assume I must have forgotten how to feel anything.
When they finally let me go, Mikey rises to greet me. “Hey, man,” I say, surprised to see that he flew home to be here. “What are you doin’ here? You didn’t have to come.” Mikey has stuck by me through everything. He’s the one person I could dump on while I was inside. I didn’t have to pretend that everything was fine with Mikey. He grabs me and pulls me into a bear hug, trying to hide his own misted eyes. “Yeah, well, I wanted to. I had to check in, make sure you’re takin’ care of yourself,” he jokes.
My mom interrupts, rattling off a hundred different things she made me for dinner. I’m feeling overwhelmed and uneasy, I’m not really up for eating, yet I don’t want to hurt her feelings. I hug her again and tell her I’m starving. I can tell it’s hard for her to let me go each time she takes me in her arms.
We sit together and eat while making useless small talk. I can feel the tension in the room. I know it’s me giving off the negative vibes, but I don’t know how to fix it. We talk as if we’re strangers.
After dinner, I head up to my room and close the door. I feel the need to be alone for a few minutes. I guess it’s something I’ve gotten used to the last couple of years. I lay across my bed. I forgot just how comfortable a bed could be. My eyes scan the room as I notice that everything is the same as when I left it. My articles still cover the walls, along with a couple of leftover drawings and paintings that JJ made me. Most of her work is kept at my condo in Florida. I spot a picture of us pinned to my bulletin board. We look happy; it was her graduation day. I close my eyes, trying to take it all in. My thoughts are interrupted by a knock on the door.
***
(Mikey)
“Come in.” Luke calls from the other side of the room.
“Hey, how ya doin’?” I ask.
“It’s crazy, ya know? I can’t believe I’m home. It sucks, man. I don’t want to go back.”
“I know, it’ll be over soon… for good. Then you can get back to livin’ the life you planned before all of this.” I say, trying to reassure him.
“I don’t know. I don’t know if I can ever get there… I’m different, ya know?”
“You’re not different. You just feel different because you’ve been in that shithole for so long. You just need some time to adjust.”
“Ya think?”
“Yeah, I do. Let’s go back downstairs, your mom and dad would like to spend time with you.”
“I know. I’m tryin’ not to be an asshole. I don’t want to put them through any more than I already have. I’m feelin’ overwhelmed, ya know?”
“Don’t worry about it, they get it. They’re not goin’ to push.”
We head downstairs and watch TV in the family room with his mom and dad. I’m trying my best to find the right words so that he doesn’t feel so bad. I know it wasn’t easy for him the last couple of years, but he’s got to believe that he can turn this around. Just as he’s about to get somewhat comfortable, he glances at the clock and realizes he’s once again faced with reality. I offer to drive him back to the halfway house in order to make his five o’clock curfew.
“Whose car?” He asks nonchalantly, nodding his head in the direction of JJ’s house.