The Outcast Son Read online

  “You all right?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I answered, but my hesitation worried him.

  “You sure? You look distressed.”

  “It’s nothing.” I smiled at him to prove I was fine, although I had that feeling I couldn’t shake off. I knew something was wrong. I didn’t really believe in omens, and I came to tell myself that those premonitions didn’t even exist, that I made them up after they unfolded. Mixed thoughts and memories keep me from remembering how it exactly came to pass, but the way I recall it is me thinking something bad had happened, was happening or was about to happen, and I couldn’t get completely rid of that thought.

  I pictured my mind as a storage room and that disturbing thought a stain just behind my forehead, and I imagined myself using my mind power to reduce the stain and push it farther and farther away, until it was just a tiny spot at the bottom of my brain, in a place I thought it wouldn’t bother me ever again.

  “How can I help you?” the lady at the entrance said with a wide smile on her face.

  “We’ve got a reservation,” I answered.

  “Name?”

  “Laura Johnson.”

  “Welcome to our restaurant, Mrs Johnson,” she said, bowing her head slightly. “You booked a table for two for 8:30 pm, is that correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Please follow me.” She was a tall woman with a likeable face. She made me somehow feel at ease, forgetting the annoying thorn I had wandering on its own inside my brain. Mark held my hand with decision, as if he were trying to protect me from myself. But I was feeling well again. Perhaps it had been only giddiness.

  It was my favourite Italian restaurant, although that was only my third time there. It had a large terrace, a beautiful hallway with lots of light and a gallery with just a few tables with views of the Thames. It was the perfect venue for a dinner date, and I wanted it to be perfect, so I asked for the best table when I made the reservation. And the waitress took us to the best table indeed, next to the wide windows of the gallery. It was like being outdoors but with the nice comfort of the heating warming us up as we entered from the cold.

  When we sat, I felt it again. This time harder. So intense that I couldn’t ignore it. I remember having put my hands on the table as if I were afraid of falling to the floor. Something was happening, but I had to put that thought aside, I had to enjoy my evening no matter what. It had to be perfect.

  “Laura!” Mark said.

  “It’s okay. I’m okay.”

  “No, you’re not.” He was getting angry. “You have been absent since we left home, and you refuse to talk to me.” I reckon he was right. I was so busy pretending everything was just fine that I wasn’t aware that he was realising. He knew something was going on in my head.

  “It’s just…I have this feeling. It’s nothing, really. Let’s just enjoy our night out.”

  “Jaime is going to be fine.” After all those years together, he could read my mind. I couldn’t hide from him, not anymore, and a sense of vulnerability invaded me. But if there was anybody who could help me, it was Mark. He was so in love with me. He wouldn’t let me down. He would stay by my side no matter what, making sure I was safe, and happy, and loved.

  “I can’t explain, but it’s not Jaime I’m worried about.”

  “What do you mean?” he asked.

  “Nothing, I’m just worried. That’s all.” I had been able to completely confuse him, so I carried on. “Last time I had this feeling, I found you upstairs, lying on your back.”

  “Laura, I know you better than that. You don’t believe in such things.”

  “I don’t! But I can’t help thinking something bad can be happening! And I know it’s silly, and that’s why I don’t want to talk about it or think about it or mention it again!”

  “I understand. I won’t say a word, okay?”

  “It’s not that, just forget about it, all right?”

  “Forgotten.”

  That night, I had to learn to live with that uncomfortable little spot itching my brain. It was the only stain on a perfect dinner date. The rosé wine was brilliant. A proper Italian brand in a rather expensive bottle. It was so good that we had to order one more before the mains, and when I tried the calzone, I thought I was going to burst into tears of pure pleasure: the dough was crunchy and tasty, and it kept all the ham and cheese juices inside. It was so delicious that I burned my mouth rather than waiting for it to cool down. But something in me was continuously telling me that I had to go home, that I had to check on Jaime and Happy and Karen as soon as possible and make sure nothing happened, and Mark knew.

  We paid the bill and left the restaurant at 10 pm, more than one hour earlier than planned. We didn’t rush our way home, but we didn’t stop to enjoy the views either. It didn’t look so pretty now that I had my mind elsewhere. All I could see at the moment was all the distance that separated me from Jaime. The tube wasn’t particularly busy, and the journey was nice and smooth. No conversations. No looking at each other. Just two people travelling together and diving deep into their own thoughts.

  When we finally got to Leytonstone, I sped up. Not a single word came out of Mark’s mouth. He just followed. Resigned. Trusting. Worried about me even though he wouldn’t mention it, as if he were afraid of hurting me with his words. I knew he didn’t approve, but I didn’t care too much. All I wanted was to get home. Check on Jaime. Check on Karen and Happy. Check on the house. Ensure nothing bad happened and get some rest.

  I saw the light of the TV in the living room coming out of the window in the ground floor when we reached our street. Everything was quiet. It made me nervous. I took my keys from my pocket and opened the front door. I didn’t hear anything. Mark followed. He started to worry as well. We moved down the house on our tiptoes, trying not to make any noise. We didn’t switch the lights on either. It looked as if we were breaking into our own house. Then I saw Karen lying motionless on the sofa. The dim TV light illuminated her face, and we could see both her eyes were closed. I moved towards her. The worst-case scenario playing on my head. I extended my right arm to reach her and touched her face.

  “Ah!” she screamed, jumping off the sofa and standing in a fraction of a second. “For God’s sake, Laura! I though’ ya was comin’ la’er!”

  “Is Jaime okay?” I asked anxiously. “Is he okay?” I repeated, grabbing her arm.

  “Oh my God, Laura! Ya’re hur’in’ me!” she yelled. “The kid is alrigh’! He’s just sleepin’ in his room!”

  I turned around and ran upstairs, jumping two and three steps at a time. It felt as if I couldn’t reach the first floor. I was slow, heavy and desperate to get to Jaime’s room. I could hear my heart pumping blood around my body, struggling to contain all that anguish, exactly the same as when I found Mark unconscious. Every heartbeat was an inch closer to Jaime. I was too aware of everything. I was aware of time. It was happening so quickly, but the adrenaline rushing in my brain was stopping me from collapsing before the huge amount of thoughts coming all at once, crashing into each other in a painful dance of disgrace and sorrow. I opened Jaime’s door. I saw his little silhouette on the bed. So fragile. Was he okay? I came closer, having a look at his face, at his delicate eyes. I could see the swinging of his chest as he breathed. Inflating as he breathed in. Deflating as he breathed out.

  “Mum!” he said, and he sat up to hug me. It felt so sweet. He was safe. Everything was all right. “We had macaroni cheese!”

  “Really? I wonder who might’ve cooked them.” I was so relieved that I almost lost consciousness when all the adrenaline dissolved, but I withstood.

  “And me and Karen teached Happy to sit!”

  “‘Karen and I taught’. You have to show it to me tomorrow. Deal?”

  “Deal!” he answered and went back to sleep.

  But I still wasn’t completely composed. Jaime made me remember Happy. It was unusual he wasn’t waiting for us at the door when we got home. We didn’t hear him bark either. I
was so worried about Jaime that it didn’t even cross my mind to check on our dog, even though he used to sleep in the living room, very close to the sofa where we had just had a conversation with Karen. I came back downstairs, and when I reached the living room Mark was stroking Happy’s chin.

  Chapter 13

  Despair

  “You can’t go home now,” Maria said.

  I was about to cry. In my arm, Oscar’s fingerprints were still marked in red. But that didn’t hurt as much as my pride. I wasn’t a mistreated woman. I was strong. I didn’t let him do it. It wasn’t my fault. I knew it wasn’t. It was his jealous mind, his inability to express his feelings, his anger taking control of his actions when his frustration and insecurities threatened his male ego.

  “I won’t. I’m done with him.”

  “Good,” Maria said. “You’ll spend the night at my place.”

  “That’s not necessary. I’ll go and pick up some stuff, and then I can go to a hotel. I don’t want to bother you.”

  “Don’t be silly! You know there’s always room for you at mine! And you better forget about going anywhere near Oscar tonight.”

  “I’m not scared of him,” I said.

  “I know you aren’t, but you’ll do me this favour, right?”

  I hesitated for a moment. Was I thinking rationally? My life was in the place Oscar and I called home. I had been living there for a while now, and I didn’t want to rush any decision. I wasn’t scared, but perhaps it was just my pride, or rather my dignity, keeping me from feeling any fear.

  “Right?” Maria insisted.

  “I guess I can pop in tomorrow morning.”

  “Good. And I’ll go with you, of course.”

  “I’m sorry I ruined your night, Maria,” I said.

  “Don’t dare be sorry!” she said. “It’s not your fault!”

  “I know it’s not my fault, but I hate you have to change your plans because of what happened.”

  “Look,” she said, “to be honest, I only agreed to go out after dinner because you were here.”

  “Thanks, Maria,” I said. “I mean it.”

  “No need to thank me.”

  “Thank you anyway.”

  We went straight to Maria’s place. I wasn’t in the mood for wandering around any longer, and even though she tried to cheer me up, I was too immersed in my dark thoughts to even pay attention to her. I didn’t want to speak. I only wanted to sink deeper and deeper into a place nobody could reach, where the sunlight and the voices of the living were too faint to touch me.

  Maria understood. She showed me the guestroom and left me alone. I was tired and not very drunk, so it was easy to fall asleep while having my mind rambling through my plans for the following day. I knew Oscar worked in the morning. It was one of his Sunday shifts he hated so much. I could use that time to get home, pick up my things and go away. My parents would be very happy to have me back. They always were.

  The morning brought me Maria’s voice whispering in my ear and a sudden smell of toast, cured ham and coffee. She had woken up before me and prepared breakfast. It was comforting to feel being looked after, particularly after what happened the previous night, and six hours of sleep had been enough for everything to sink in and make me reaffirm my decision of leaving Oscar and moving on.

  “Good morning, Sleeping Beauty,” Maria said when she saw my eyes open.

  “Oh my! You’re crazy! You didn’t need to,” I said, staring at the tray she carried.

  “I’m sure this will suit you well,” she said.

  “You bet!” I told her while sitting up. “You’re very kind to me, Maria.”

  I was genuinely grateful, but I couldn’t help feeling like a patient in a hospital. I knew she didn’t pity me, but the thought of Maria being worried about me or believing I was in danger, or even worse, thinking of me as a victim, awoke a certain sense of anger in me. I understood it was solidarity. Empathy. The right thing to do. I’d do it for her, too. For any friend. For any woman.

  It was 11 am, and Oscar would be back home at 1. We were in no hurry, but I wanted to get things done as soon as possible. I still loved him, but trying to convince myself everything would be all right was a bad idea. Broken things don’t get fixed on their own, and our relationship was beyond broken. He had destroyed it. He had been stretching its limits for weeks, if not months, and by punching my boss in the face, he had given the final blow to our story, or so I thought that morning as Maria and I walked the streets of Compostela, grey as usual, to get to our apartment.

  I opened the door of the building with my key and stepped into the lift. Maria was next to me, caressing my back and my shoulder with her right hand. It felt good. Warm. I needed it. For the first time I admitted I needed it, and for the first time, I realised I was afraid. Oscar wouldn’t be home, but I could sense how fear spread through my body. It was irrational and embarrassing, but I’m not ashamed now of having had this feeling. There was nothing wrong in it. It was my self-preservation instinct warning me about the dangers ahead.

  A pitiful noise made me step back. Maria frowned at me when she realised what it was: a crying. All my alarms shut down and abandoned me to my sympathy.

  “Don’t,” Maria said.

  “I know, I love him, and I do feel sorry for him, but I won’t forgive what he’s done.”

  “Laura?” His voice echoed in the corridor.

  “I’m not here to talk to you,” I said, his footsteps coming in our direction.

  “Thank God you’re here!” he said as he appeared before us, still wearing his pyjamas.

  Maria’s fingers clenched around my wrist. It was her way to say Don’t fall for it, and as sure as hell, I wouldn’t.

  “I’m so sorry!” Oscar said. His eyes were wet. His hair in a mess. “I don’t know what happened to me!”

  “Oh, I do!” Maria said. “It happened that you’re a jealous son of a bitch, and you couldn’t stand the idea of your girlfriend going partying without you.”

  Oscar’s eyes were red fire. He was staring at my friend, his arms tense and his legs quivering. But the smile on Maria’s face wouldn’t go away. She wasn’t scared. It was evident how her powerful self-confidence was undermining Oscar, making him angrier and angrier. He was staring at her as if he were under threat. And he was, or at least his self-perception was. But he wouldn’t lose his nerve. He calmed himself down, and only then I asked Maria to leave it to me.

  “Please don’t interfere,” I said. “I can deal with it.”

  Oscar’s eyes moved to me, and his expression changed once again. He wanted my forgiveness.

  “I need time,” I said. “I won’t forget easily what you did yesterday. I know you were angry, I know you lost control and you didn’t want to hurt me, but what happened isn’t something I can forgive just because you’re now sorry.”

  My words somehow eased him. Somehow, he thought there was hope for us, that our relationship could be fixed and I would be willing to try.

  “Please,” he said, “don’t leave me. You know I love you.”

  “I need time, Oscar. I’ll be at my parents’ for a while. I need to think.”

  It was a rather pathetic scene. It was the first time I saw him begging. I didn’t like it. I didn’t enjoy it, but it had to be this way. I couldn’t stay there after what he had done, and I didn’t know I’d be able to convince my boss not to fire me. He’d be angry, and hurt, and he’d probably present charges against Oscar. I was okay with it. He deserved it. He deserved to be prosecuted for having punched someone in the face, but I really needed the job, particularly if I wanted to start over on my own.

  Maria helped me pack my stuff. Only the essentials. Two large bags would be enough for now. A background noise of apologies and crying almost made me feel pity. I wanted to get out of there. In less than half an hour, the two bags were downstairs and a cab waited outside. I didn’t say goodbye. I didn’t ask him why he hadn’t gone to work. My most sincere indifference was all Oscar had
from me before I got into the car and left to my parents’.

  A week had passed, and the only news I had from my boyfriend was a bunch of unanswered texts on my phone. I was surprised he’d kept the number to a reasonable minimum, pretty much what you’d expect in any healthy relationship. All of them started with an apology, followed by a promise, and finished with a plea, a formula he repeated no more than once a day for the entire week. I’ve got no words to say how sorry I am. I love you so much and you can rest assured something like this won’t happen again. Please, Laura, come back home. I cannot live without you. I miss you so much, and I can’t forgive myself for what I’ve done. I’ll be miserable for the rest of my life if you don’t come back. I love you.

  The afternoon of the sixth day, I decided to reply. If you loved me, you wouldn’t do such a thing. That’s not love, it’s something else, and I won’t be part of it. But I felt sorry for him. He had made a mistake. A terrible one, but a mistake after all. I loved him. This wouldn’t change in a week. Or in a month. I wanted to believe it’d work. I don’t feel sorry or weak for having thought he wouldn’t do it again. I missed him, and after that much time without him, I had forgotten about the bad things and convinced myself it had been a one-off. He’d understood the lesson. He’d learned I was firm and strong and I wouldn’t take any rubbish ever again.

  My mobile phone vibrated on the bedside table. He’d replied my text in less than five minutes. I screwed it up. I was with the most wonderful woman in the world, and now I’m alone and miserable. If you give me one more opportunity, I promise you won’t regret it. I love you, Laura, and I know you love me too. Please, come back home so we can talk.

  A week isolated at my parents had made me grow sad and melancholic. I had lost my job. It had been too much for my boss’ pride and his alpha male disguise. He fired me out of embarrassment. He couldn’t even look me in the eyes.

  Time and solitude made me forget. I didn’t want to be alone, and there still was a trace of love for Oscar I couldn’t shake off. I called him.