I walked towards the park, spotting a dark figure standing against the swing. I guessed it was Aiden and moved closer, noticing he was on his phone. ''Hey'' I said, my voice coming out quiet, making him look up to look at me, his grey eyes looking dark, his expression cold. ''Sit'' he said and pointed towards the swing. ''Why a swing?'' I said, chuckling. ''We're at a park at 11 at night, Evelyn. I'm trying to not make us look like stoners'' he said and we both laughed.
When we sat down, his expression changed. It was like he was shutting down, his face forming a pained expression for a brief second before it was replaced by a look of hatred. Who that hatred was directed to, I had no idea.
''There's no need for chit chat we both know why we're here, I think'' he said, his voice serious. I nodded, looking at the ground and playing with the pebbles that were scattered on it.
''I know an apology doesn't fix all the shit I hid from you or fix leaving when I knew you needed me but I swear I had no choice or say in the matter.'' He said, shaking his head, looking away.
''Do you remember George? My mum's ex- husband?'' he asked, referring to Catherine's second marriage. Aiden never called that man his step-dad, his hatred towards him always being obvious. He never told me the reason why he did, nor did he tell anyone. There were rumors that George abused him and his mum but that's all they kept being. Rumors. No one ever confirmed nor denied them.
''Yeah, I remember him'' I responded, turning to look at him. He nodded and dipped his head down. ''When; when my mum got married to him, he seemed like an okay guy. He said he ran his own business and told my mum not to worry about our economics, since he said he would take care of us. It seemed okay, but my mum didn't want to leave her job, she didn't want to have to rely on him entirely, you know. As much as he tried to brainwash her into quitting her job, she still didn't. She was smart.'' he paused and shook his head.
''That's when things went to hell. One morning, George came home from work and told my mum he had spoken to her boss at work. He had the nerve to go find her boss and tell him she wanted to quit her job because she was suffering from a chronic illness. They spent the entire night fighting on it. Of course my mum didn't accept it, the fact that he had taken a choice that affected her life so much and acted without asking her'' he paused again and chuckled bitterly.
''She made the biggest mistake of her life that night. She forgave him, she thought he only wanted the best for her- for us and the worst of all; she stayed with him.'' At this point, his eyes were watery, but I couldn't tell if it was because he was getting teary eyed 'cause he was sad or because of how all the anger he was feeling was showing itself like that. His body was stiff, his leg twitching up and down, his hands looking unstable. It pained me to see him like that, to see how much this affected him the way it did. It was obvious that he was one of the people that were hurt the most out of this situation, yet he chose to become cold, emotionless, hide everything and it's sad how I've only spent a few days talking to him and could see how broken he was through the way he acted.
''Time went by and suddenly he turned aggressive towards us both. He hit my mum, abused her verbally, physically, sexually. When he thought that wasn't enough he turned to me and started hitting me too. That was nothing to what was about to happen though. A year before we left, my mum decided enough was enough and wanted to divorce him. I already knew he was sick but he crossed the line once more that day. He said that he wouldn't give her a divorce unless she payed him back'' he shook his head once again and tugged at his hair.
Did he mean that- Oh, for the love of pizza that's too much.
''He wanted back every penny he had given us, though he said he did it out of love and didn't want anything in exchange when he was giving it. He made sure she would have zero income so that she needed the money he was giving her. That way he made sure the money he would take back would be enough for him to keep his 'business' alive. There was only a small detail. He was a crook. A drug-dealer, who was only looking for his next pray. My mum told him she wasn't giving him a penny and that's when shit got even worse. He came after us. He and his little friends'' his jaw was locked so hard, his usually grey eyes turning so dark it scared me.
''He blackmailed her, saying he would kill our family but she still didn't give him the money he had no right to be asking for. And that Eve, is where you step in.'' he said, making me frown and turn to look at him. ''Are you asking for-'' ''-Is that what you understood from this whole thing, that I'm asking for money I have no intention in giving from you?'' he replied, laughing. ''Well, let's just say you can't give money to a dead person'' he added and I widened my eyes. ''We'll get to that part in a sec'' he dismissed It before going back to the story.
''A little before we left, he; he came to me. He saw that none of his threats could affect me since I knew he would probably go to jail if he tried bringing any of his ideas to life, get sentenced for God knows how long. But that wouldn't be the case if he sent one of his minions to hurt you.'' He said, turning to look a me for the first time since he started the story. ''He saw how close we were, he saw that I trusted you and knew that if he hurt you, I wouldn't have any proof that it was him'' he and sighed. ''You get the point'' he added, bitterly.
''One day, I saw his 'minions' knock on your door, I saw how frightened you were when you saw Jason answer the door and talk to them. One of them saw me looking at them, he turned to me and smirked. After that, he sent me threats, one after the other talking 'bout how he had the power to end your mum's career, make sure you wouldn't get accepted into any university when you decided to join them and have Jason taken away from you guys.'' He almost whispered that last part, his voice turning deeper with everything he said, his face not letting any emotion show.
I didn't know how to feel. Thankful? Sad? Angry? Confused? I felt them all together. He changed his life, left his hometown and put himself and his mum in danger so that my family would be safe. At that moment, I couldn't resist. I got up and went to him, making him frown and look at me and motioned for him to stand up. The minute he did, I gave him the tightest hug I could master, standing there, still. Despite his initial shock, he looped his arms around me as well, putting his head on top of mine and rubbing my back soothingly. I knew he wouldn't want any gratitude from my side but I still, in his arms, whispered the most quiet ''Thank you''. He tightened his arms around me even more, enough to make me feel safe and acknowledged but not enough to hurt me and replied, only for me to hear ''Don't''
We decided to walk around the park as he continued the story since -as Aiden said- his ass was becoming one with the swing.
''So, when you left, you left entirely for, me?'' I asked. Aiden had a big heart and I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case but it was; too much. Moving to a different state, changing your entire lifestyle and leaving everything you knew behind for a girl just seemed too much for me, even if that girl was me.
''You were one of the reasons, yes, and my biggest concern for the most part but no, you weren't the only reason.'' He explained, putting his hands in his pockets.
''What were the other reasons?'' I asked, turning to look at him.
''Our safety. George was determined to get his money, and we already knew he would do anything to get them, even though he didn't deserve a damn penny from us. From time to time, we'd see strange men walk around our neighborhood, especially looking towards our house, as if scanning it. After some point, me and my mum decided we had to leave. We had a plan to go find Jagger's dad in New York. He knew all about the situation we were in, he knew George. That's why Jagger knows what happened, it's because I couldn't hide it from him. One way or another he found out. From his dad, from me.''
My mouth nearly hang over but I shut it quickly. I already knew Jagger knew what had happened but I didn't know how close to the mess he was. I remembered how 'strict' Ivory had acted towards that party and I frowned looking away. If Jagger was that deep in the mess, was that the case with Ivory too?
''Go on'' I muttered, urging him to keep going. I knew it was hard for him to say all this and from what I could tell it would be very likely that he could even get in trouble by doing so.
''Leaving wouldn't be easy, considering we'd have to leave the state along with everything behind, my mum would have to get another job and until all that happened there was a good chance his little friends would find out we were leaving and potentially even kill one of us.''
''You really think they'd go that far for some money?'' I asked. They were messed up enough to do all the things they had done so far but killing them? That'd be just a step over the line.
''It's not just the money. We knew they were drug dealers, if we left the state it'd be way easier to, you know, turn them in and something tells me they wouldn't like that.'' He responded and suddenly I felt like I was stuck in some dramatic/cliché movie where I'm running for my life. Only in my case, I wasn't the one running for my life, others were doing it for me.
''Aiden, why didn't you ever tell us anything? We could've helped. I don't know how, but it'd be better than handling it on your own'' truth to be told I had no idea how in the hell we could've helped them, probably because my mum wasn't in the best phase of her life and I would probably change my name to Juan, grow a mustache and move to Mexico if I had known the story back then, but my mind still couldn't bear how the hell they managed to stay alive and somewhat sane during this whole thing.
''If we had talked to you about this then we wouldn't be having this conversation right now.
'Cause you'd be dead''
My eyes widened and I slowly started coming to the realization of how serious things were. I looked down, my eyes blank, my mind full of information I wasn't ready to absorb. The guy I thought was careless and free was proved to be far from that. I wanted to help, I wanted to show him I cared and didn't know how.
''The night when you left, it sounded like someone was breaking stuff in your house when you talked to me and your mum was in the car. What happened then?'' I asked, remembering what had happened. From what I could tell there was definitely someone into their house that night that was pushing them to leave so I'm guessing they hadn't planned to leave when they did.
''We knew we'd have to leave at some point, we weren't safe, but considering how hard it'd be for us to leave everything behind and start over, even with Jagger's family helping, so we postponed it as much as we could. We had bags ready with things that we'd need so that if something happened we could just get up and leave.
That night, they tried to break in from the back door, but it was sealed so we had time to leave before they managed to get in and realize we were leaving.''
Noticing my confused face, he continued ''We recorded ourselves talking, in case we were put in that position. That way they'd think we were inside when we weren't'' he explained.
''Smart''
''Thanks. So, it saved us some time and I managed to come see you''
''But, when you came, you said things weren't going the way you thought they would. What did that mean?''
Right as he was about to reply, his phone rang, cutting him off. ''What'' he said, annoyed. ''Do I have to?" he asked the person in the other side of the screen. ''Fine. We'll be there'' he finished and came back to me.
''Ready to party'' he said with a smirk, sounding and looking way more excited than he did moments ago. ''Hold up mister, you still have some explaining to do''
''I know, but I can do that later now come on''
''Waiit how do I know you will'' I asked, hoping I could just finish the talk, go home and spend the rest of my night eating and watching Netflix. No need for the chill part, I have my teddy bears and my broken Pokemon alarm to keep me company, thank you very much.
He sighed and pushed his lips into a thin line, shaking his head ''How about this. If you come with me tonight, I promise to tell you the rest of the story first thing tomorrow or when we get home, depending on if I'm wasted or not''
I thought about it for a sec, trying to weigh the possibilities of him actually keeping his word, the scale moving towards the wrong end as I didn't know when I'd manage to get him to talk about this again.
''Alright time's up'' he said, already walking away. I stood in my spot, not moving an inch, hoping he'd just forget about me and let me be but NO he just had to turn around and throw me over his shoulde-
WAIT WHAT IS HAPPENING
WHY AM I UPSIDE DOWN
Oh, probably because he threw you over his shoulder
Oh, cool.
WAIT WHAT-
''I just hope you know that all this time that you've been hitting me to get down, you've been slapping my ass and not my back so...''
I think if the writer of Fifty Shades of Grey saw my face when he said that, she'd be inspired to write a new book called Fifty Shades Redder.
After a lot of walking, we reached Aiden's car where after a lot of fighting I gave in and decided to just go along since the window was too small for me to jump out of and jumping out of a moving car just didn't seem like a very good idea.
Party full of drunk, horny teenagers, here I come.