[Overview] [Act 1, Scene 7] [Act 2, Scene 9]

“Why can’t you just stay out of my life, for fuck’s sake?” I kick the side of the church with my rented shoes, scuffing them up good. The useless woman of a mother twitches surprised at the bang that it makes.

She says, “My only child’s getting married, I have a right to be there for him.”

“Fuck you,” I say, pointing my finger right in her face. “When your only child got beaten to pulp by your dead-beat husband, you had the right to be there for your son! It was your fucking duty, mother!” I accidentally spit in her face saying it all enraged and shit.

My mother doesn’t look so good these days. Too skinny, with wrinkles cutting deep into her spotted skin. Not even her fourteen layers of make-up can cover her drug habit, no matter how much she tries.

“What’s he got you on these days,” I say when she turns away from me and my judging eyes. “Crystal? Crack-cocaine? Something new and colourful from the coast?”

I can see tears in her eyes, like my words can actually hurt her. Like anything I do could ever be of interest to that woman.

“I didn’t want to leave,” she says. “But your father…” Her lower lip starts to shiver. “Paul keeps me safe, you know.”

“Paul’s got you hooked and treats you like shit, mom. Always has.”

“At least he doesn’t beat me like your father did.” She turns to me all righteous-like. Ignorant bitch.

“Fuck, woman. He’s dad’s best fucking friend. They even rode together. You ending up fucking the old man’s buddy made him even more mad. And guess who he let all that extra anger out on.” Of course, I make no effort in hiding just how fucking angry I am. And she can feel it. And she doesn’t care, because to her it’s only ever herself.

Her, her, her.

She says, as I expected, “But I had to—“

“Spare me your bullshit,” I say, cutting her off. “Paul Harris is poison for you. You should have done the right thing, and taken me away from both these monsters. That would have been a great time to try and do the right thing. Not now. Not here. This is not your day. This is not your celebration. This is not your fucking son.”

Shit slaps me across the face. I want to hit her right back, but restrain myself but a twitch away from it. I’m not my father.

“Well, that settles that,” I say. “Just do me a favour and leave. We are done here.”

“You know your father loved you, right?” Is she serious?

She can’t be.

I look in her eyes. She’s fucking serious.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“He only wanted you to be a strong man. You always cried so much. He blamed me for it, and he was probably right. I mothered you too much.”

“Give me a break.”

“When I left him, I did it not just for my own sake, but for yours, Mitchell. Without me messing it all up, he could make the man out of you that he always wanted you to be.”

“You fucking cunt.” I see my own fist fly towards her, without any of my self-control. Just at the very last second, I pull my arm to miss her just by a hair, and my fists lands on the plastic siding of the church, breaking right through it and cutting my skin. “Fuck!”

“You remind me so much of him.”

“Yeah,” I say, pulling my hand out of the siding. “Do I now? You know what happened do that old fuck? You wanna know? I fucking geeked him. One day, when he let his bad day out in me again, I stabbed him in the chest over and over again after he was passed out drunk and satisfied from showing me who’s boss.”

She looks at me in shock and terror. There. I said it. I confessed it to her. She thought, all those years, that it was gang related. That’s what Paul “Lost Boy” Harris believed, too.

I can see that train of thought on her face, and say, “That’s right. It was me. Twelve-year-old Mitch. Little Mitchell fucking Junior. All because mommy left him when he needed her. Because that man deserved what he had coming.”

Suddenly, her shock turns to anger, and starts wailing on me with her too-skinny arms and flappy skin. Her long, red, fake fingernails scratch along my arms and chest and leave searing pain wherever they scratch me. She’s gone insane, all doped up on whatever powder Paul’s got her on so she won’t leave him, too.

She yells, but her voice breaks what with her crying and being all freared out, “How could you do this? You are monster, you little rat! You are fucking useless. Useless and a monster and you will never make anything of yourself, and you deserve the way your father treated you!”

For a moment, I just let her go to town on me. Hell, she might even be right. I do deserve the worst for killing a man. But he deserved worse.

I say, while she’s starting to tire of beating on me (which’s really not as bad as what I’m used to), “You’ll wait and see, mom. I am making something of myself, and soon I’ll be gone from this piece of shit town. Once I—“ Oh fuck,

Her eyes go big—so big I can see the dollar-signs plopping up over her yellow-brown eyes.

“What do you mean, Mitch?” she asks. Like that, the woman with skin like an old handbag caught the scent. It’s what she does. Had my old man been better with money, or with drugs, she probably would never have left. All her talk about safety might be true, but the reason she went with Paul Harris was his dealing in drugs. At the end of the day, that addict I used to call my mother is nothing but a parasite. That’s what addicts do—latch themselves to whatever can get them hooked to what they really want.

“Forget about it.”

“Tell me Mitchell. I’m your mother. The least you can do is let me in on your plans, after you already ruined our family.”

Really? That woman never ceases to shock me.

More because I’m angry and furious and pissed, and my pride is hurt, I tell her about the cocaine.

I say, “Once I drop that shit off, and cash in my reward, I’ll be the fuck out of here, and you’ll never get to say another one of your fucking lying words to me.” I even push my finger into the centre of her chest to make my point.

But then I see it. In her eyes. Fuck.

Fuck.

She’s with Harris. She’ll go and tell him. She’ll make him take it away from us. I can’t believe I just did that.

I just told my mother about the drugs, and now the Lost Boys will come after us. Suddenly, I don’t feel so good.

Before I even know it, I wrap my hands around her throat. I have to. Fuck, I can’t do this! But my hands start to push harder. She croaks something, but I can’t hear the words.

Then, I hear Sarah calling from around the corner. “Babe? Mitch? Were are you?”

I look into the fading eyes of my mother. Shit. I let go.

She holds her neck, wheezes. Again, Sarah calls for me. Then, my mother runs away the opposite way.

All I can do is stand there and watch.

Sarah’s voice is coming closer. I light a cigarette and lean by back against the wall.

The second the old woman disappears around the corner, I feel like Paul “Lost Boy” Harris virtually knows about the drugs already.

Sarah comes around the corner and asks me what’s wrong. I tell her it’s nothing, and she goes on about how hard it must be without a mother and some such thing.

Like she has any idea what it’s like to be me.

She says, “Come on, Mitch. Don’t let that woman ruin the day, kay? I know it sucks that she left you when your old man died. I get it how it must be. I lost a parent, too, you know.”

This is my fault. I slipped up. I couldn’t keep my mouth shut—that woman taunted me practically into giving it all away. I need to tell Sarah. She needs to know. I can’t let her come with me, or she’ll die the second the gang shows up. I can’t let that happen to her. But I can’t talk to her. She just cuts me off the second I try to say something.

She says, “Just forget about it. I got Nathan to start the car for us and wait there. Let’s just sneak around back and get out of here. But don’t be such a grump. We’re almost on our honeymoon, and you better straighten the fuck out. Or you won’t enjoy it, I guarantee you that, babe.”

If we don’t get rid of the drugs fast, there won’t be noting left to enjoy.

Because we’ll be fucking dead.

---

That went awful. For Mitch, that is. But I, myself, am pretty happy with how this scene turned out. I set up the following scene to really show of the pressure they’re under, of which they all know to varying degree. And we got to look back into Mitch’s messed up history and how much this all still hurts him today.

I have a feeling that we’ll see his mother again towards the end. What do you think?

---

Like what you see? Consider supporting my Patreon campaign and join these awesome people already being part of it.