“Hello? Is anyone there?”
I sighed. “Yes. Hi. I’m not really sure if it’s an emergency, but there’s been some domestic issues at my house and I think my mother needs medical help.”
“Sounds like an emergency to me. What’s going on?”
“Her ex boyfriend stormed in and broke a lot of our things. Mom’s bleeding from some glass shards. I also think she might need some mental help.”
Mom slowly looked back at me, and the daggers she shot from her eyes were forever etched into my memory.
“Is the assailant still there?”
I shook my head. “No.”
“Do you have a name for him?”
“D.J. I don’t know his last name.”
Mom snarled. “You hang up that phone now.”
I licked my lips. “No, Mom. You need help.”
“What was that?”
I cleared my throat. “Sorry. Are you ready for my address? I won’t be here, I have to go to work and I can’t be late. But I’ll make sure someone keeps my mother here until you arrive.”
I rattled off my address to the 9-1-1 operator. Then I hung up the phone. Mom picked herself up off the floor, but every time she dusted herself off, she created more cuts. My feet crunched over the glass as I wrapped her arm around my shoulders and guided her to the couch, easing her down. She refused to look at me as hot tears burned their way down her cheeks.
Then I spoke my own truth.
A truth I’d wanted to proclaim the last time she pulled this.
“Mom, I need you to stay here.”
She snickered. “No, thanks.”
I sighed. “I know you hate me now, but once you get the help you need—”
“I’m not fucking crazy, Raelynn.”
“No, you’re just depressed, anxious, and addicted to any man who will give you attention because you never healed from Dad leaving.”
And when she didn’t say anything, I brushed her hair back.
“You’re going to stay here and wait for the paramedics to get here. They’re going to offer you help and you’re going to take it. Okay?”
She leaned into the couch, away from my touch. “And if I don’t?”
I stood upright. “Then I'm moving in with Allison and never coming home.”
She snickered. “So you’d leave. Just like your father.”
“If anything, I’m the only one who’s stayed and fought for you. Fought with you. But I can’t fight against you any longer. I’m tired. I’m eighteen
years old. I’m at a point where I’m about to go live my own life. And you expect me to dig you out of your messes and pay your bills and watch you tramp around with men coming in and out of this house at all hours of the night. What kind of life is that for me?”
She refused to meet my stare. “I can change, you know.”
“I know you can. With help, Mom. So you’ll take their help once they get here. Or I move out. Your choice.”