Coming Home Again (A Coming Home Again Novel Book 1) by T.I. Lowe Read Free Book Online Page A

drove away, leaving me on the curb with the weight of what
I had just done crashing down on me.
    By the time
Jean entered the house that late afternoon, I had Julia’s bed stripped down and
the room aired out of the stench left behind. The bedding ended up in the
outside garbage. The soiled material was past the point of no return.
    I was lying
on the rope rug in my room, listening to the stereo, when Jean stormed in,
yanking me up off that floor quicker than I had time to comprehend. Fury was
radiating off her, and it scared me.
    “Where’s
your sister? I know she didn’t walk out that door on her own,” she shouted as
she shook me.
    I was
beyond upset, and the fact that Jean openly knew that my sister was too sick to
walk out on her own devastated me. Yet she did nothing about it. She was more
worried about keeping up her image in front of the town than to take care of
her sick daughter. I hated her in a way I wished wasn’t possible in that
moment. It felt purely evil, and I had thoughts about my mother that I’m too
ashamed to admit.
    She shook
me in a violent snatch one more time. “Tell me!” She let me go with a slight
shove so that she could light a cigarette. I hated the smell of it, and she
knew this as she puffed the smoke right into my face. The acrid smoke attacked
me before I could close my airway off, causing me to choke out a cough.
    “Your
parents took her to get some help,” I muttered while staring at the floor.
    She took
another long drag, and my room began to fog with the vulgar smoke, setting my
eyes on fire. “Just how do you suppose they knew to do that?” She looked
nervous in that moment, like she might have been caught doing wrong. This one
sign of weakness from her gave me just enough courage.
    I looked at
her with as much hate as I could muster. “I suppose I called and told them she was—”
    Jean didn’t
allow me to finish. This smart-mouthed comment earned me a handprint across my
cheek. With my cheek on fire, she pushed me back to the floor. I was too busy
clutching my cheek to catch my fall, so my head banged into the corner of
footboard of my bed. The skin on my scalp felt a little wet, but I was too
stunned to check it. My attention was on my mother, who was pointing that
cigarette at me as though she wished it were a gun. And in that very moment, I
had my first suicidal thought. I had desperately wished it was a loaded gun and
that she would use it on me. The standoff between us teetered for mere minutes,
but it felt like a lifetime to me. I do believe we both had a death wish for me
during this.
    She shook
her head and stormed to the door. “I don’t want to see sight of you for the
rest of the day,” she said before slamming my door shut.
    Later that
night, I crept to the bottom of the stairs and spied on Jean while she was on
the phone with her mom. She was demanding that they tell her where Julia was
and to bring her back. Jean backed down when words such as child neglect and
social services entered their conversation.
    “Fine. Keep
her. I was at my wits’ end with her anyway.” The nervousness trembled in my
mother’s voice. Something that was not present often. “I… I tried to get her to
eat. Just ask her.” The conversation ended with little more commentary than
that. She turned around and caught me listening, and I knew I was about to get
the beating of my life. Instead, she seemed to not think I was worth her effort.
Jean retrieved a bottle of wine and a glass and disappeared into her room for
the rest of the night. I went back to my room and pretty much hid there for the
next ten months. That was how long it took before the facility for eating
disorders would release Julia to come back home. Those ten months alone with
Jean were a living hell. Life was lonely, and I felt even more lost.

 
    ~
~ ~

 
    Shivering
and aching all over, I wake up on the bathroom floor and feel right
disappointed in myself. Here I am, in a luxurious hotel suite, and I end