Page 89 of Pride High 2: Orange

Trevor reached for his glass before remembering that it was empty. Then he sighed. “Don’t get married. Ever. You’ll regret it eventually. No matter how much you think you love her when starting out, it won’t stay that way. People change. You never realize how much until you look back. Then you can’t help but see it. That’s the problem. You’ll both be different by then, and there’s no guarantee you’ll like who the other person becomes. But you can’t do anything about it, because your lives are so entangled by then that you’ve got the same friends, a house, a kid…” Trevor’s eyes darted to his and away again. “I envy the freedom you have. Don’t waste it on whatever the hell it is you think you’re doing.”

Cameron stared at him in disbelief. Then he stood. “Nice talking to you, Dad.”

“Remember this conversation,” Trevor called after him. “I can guess what you think of me now, but give it another twenty years. Then you’ll see.”

Cameron was sure that wasn’t true, since he planned on doing everything he could to avoid ending up like his father. Still, he hadn’t come down here to piss him off and make things worse. That was the opposite of what he wanted. So he stopped when reaching the entryway, his shoulders slumping.

“Let’s set everything aside,” Cameron said. “Just for tomorrow. Okay? I want to have a nice Christmas with you and Mom. I want us to feel like a family again. Remember how it used to be?”

“From my perspective, this is how our family has always felt,” his father said, sounding bitter. “But I know what you mean. Get some sleep.”

That was as close to a promise as he was likely to get. Cameron went back to his room and rolled into bed, where he tried his best to erase the entire conversation from his mind.

* * December 25th, 1992 * *

Diego was tired. His entire body hurt from two days of nearly nonstop work. People didn’t realize how physically demanding fixing a car could be. You were always stooped over an engine or on your back while straining to reach different areas. The tools were hard and unyielding, even the powered kind that shook his bones, making him feel like he had the arthritis his grandma always complained about. But with Jasper’s help he'd gotten most of the backlog cleared. He was still waiting on some parts and had a transmission to rebuild, but he could finish the rest during the holidays when people didn’t bring their cars in as much. For now, he was done. Thank fucking god.

Diego barely remembered going upstairs to his old room—as he tended to think of it—and taking a few bong hits before crashing. He’d been in too much pain to sleep on the couch in his dad’s old office. Now the morning light was bleeding through the cheap plastic blinds. Diego yawned and stared at the ceiling. There wasn’t much else to see. Toward the end of junior high, he had ripped all the dumb kiddie posters off his walls and threw out his old toys. He’d never replaced any of it. The walls were marred but empty. The only sign that anyone lived there was the mattress on the floor, an old dresser, and a pile of clothes that needed washing.

“Get your hands off me!” he heard his mother yell through the wall.

He sat upright with a jolt. She sounded angry. No surprise there. When he heard a thud and a crash, followed by more shouting, Diego rushed out of the room after pulling on his jeans.

“You crazy bitch!” he heard her boyfriend yell. “Look what you did!”

“You want more? Get the hell out of here!”

The apartment above the auto shop was small but sufficient. Diego was in the kitchen that bled into the living room when his mother’s bedroom door flew open.

A scrawny white guy stumbled out, wearing nothing but boxers. His nose was bleeding. A heavy glass ashtray flew through the air and hit him on the back of the head.

“Motherfucker!” the man yelled, spinning around. Diego couldn’t remember the guy’s name. He was just the most recent in a long line of assholes. “I’m going to beat the living shit out of you!”

Diego tensed and moved toward him. His mother appeared in the doorway. Marti’s bathrobe was hanging open, but he couldn’t avert his eyes, because he needed to know that she was okay. His mom sure didn’t look scared.

“I’d like to see you try!” she spat.

When the man lunged toward her, she met him halfway, knocking him to the floor with a right hook. He was lucky that she noticed Diego then, or she probably would have stomped on his head until the idiot begged for forgiveness. Instead she tied her robe shut, sparing only a split second of attention for him before she yelled at her boyfriend again. “Go cry to your wife, you piece of shit!” she spat.

The guy was scurrying away at this point. Diego opened the door to the outside and considered tripping the man so he’d fall down the stairs. He settled for watching him tremble and shake as he slunk past.

“You can forget about the easy paycheck,” Diego said with a vicious grin. “You’re fired, fuckface!”

The man spun around at the bottom of the stairs, hopping back onto the lowest step after his bare feet touched the cold concrete of the walkway. “I need my clothes! And my car keys!”

“Oh yeah?” Diego asked before shutting the door.

He turned around to find that Marti had disappeared into her bedroom. When she reappeared, she had the guy’s possessions in a bundle, which she threw out a window on the other side of the building. He would find them eventually. Probably.

“Good riddance to bad rubbish,” Diego said after she’d shut the window.

Marti turned around slowly, her expression haunted. He’d seen that look before. Usually when he said something that reminded her of his dad. Like the first time he’d gotten the Trans Am running again and pulled up to the shop after taking it for a test spin. She had touched the car with a shaking hand before breaking down into tears. Moments like those never ended well. She could go from sad to pissed faster than a twin-turbo engine. Like now. The muscles of Marti’s face spasmed before she glared. “Don’t start with me,” she warned.

And with that, she retreated to her bedroom and slammed the door.

“Hey, Merry Christmas!” he shouted after her.

His heart still pounding with adrenaline, Diego went to the fridge and took out the milk. He sat at the table and ate two bowls of cereal while trying not to think about how things used to be. His father’s knowing smile when Diego would open a gift to discover exactly what he’d asked for. Or the way he could always make his wife laugh, steering her away from bad moods. Strange how families were like a house of cards. Take one away and the rest came tumbling down.