About half an hour ago Mother burst in through the front door, having abandoned all thoughts of attending the orchestra rehearsal she had been heading to, with the news that MJ had gotten into a terrible row with a bunch of people in the hostel he lives in and was going to leave. Better to live on the streets than there, was the basic gist.
Want to know what my first, my very very first thought was?
.....It sure as hell wasn't sisterly concern. Oh, no.
It was; 'oh God, he's going to want to come here. He can't come here, he can't...'
Yep.
Want to know what my next course of action was, as Mother prepared to race back out the door again to answer the plaintive call for help and guidance from her only son?
.....I'll give you a hint. It was not to give her a hug full of daughterly love. Oh no.
What I did was to tell her, flat out, that she needed to keep the promise she made just before we moved in here; that MJ would never, ever again spend even the smallest possible amount of time living with us. Never. Ever. And to warn her that if he did, I wouldn't be sticking around to see how it panned out; I would be gone. I loved him, and I loved her, but I was never going back to how life was before, not for anything or anyone. It was him, or me. That simple.
She agreed with me. Distraught as she was, she agreed, immediately, no arguments.
Then as she opened the front door, she said that he "hadn't even mentioned it as a suggestion".
And I lost it.
"He will!" I told her. My voice was loud. My voice was cold. I didn't care. All I cared about was making the situation crystal clear; "he will. Sooner or later. If not now, then some other time, he will, and it can't happen; d'you understand? Ever. We cannot live with him. Not 'just for one night', not even for half a night; d'you hear me? He can never live here. NEVER."
She said that she did. And she left.
That was a while ago now. And I can't get the image of the expression on her face as we stared one another down that endless second before she walked away and closed the door behind her. It said so many things, but the main thing that stands out is that she was in pain. A pain that I had caused.
So that's where things stand now.
And this is where I am; sat at my computer typing this and split between feelings of guilt and regret at having let my Mother down and intense fear and worry at the thought of MJ walking through the door bags in hand with the intention of staying and buoyed by Mother's own fear driven blessing.
God, I feel wretched.
Alice x
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