by Maine, Miley
I can see that underneath it all, it doesn’t matter whether he has admitted his gambling addiction to himself, he is still tight in the grips of it. His addiction still has him which has turned him into this terrible version of himself. It’s almost sad to see, but I’m not going to feel sorry for him when his actions have been consistently terrible forever. He can blame his actions on whatever has happened to him, because he has made his own choices. He has decided to go down this path and to put an innocent woman in jail, to take an innocent child away from his family, just for a bit of cash… but if it’s money that he wants then I can sort that out for him. It feels like a really messed up way to go around things, but something needs to happen.
“So, if your money problems could be sorted, then everything would stop?”
“How the hell can my money problems be sorted? He won’t even speak to me now?”
“I might be able to help you.” Ronnie’s gaze snaps up to look at me. His eyes nearly pop out of his head. I can tell that this is something he definitely wasn’t expecting. “But I will require some things from you as well.”
“What do you mean?” he asks me with an edge to his tone. “How would you me?”
“How much money do you need?”
He eyes me curiously, as if he’s trying to work out how much he can get from me. He wants to know how far he can push me. I bet he’s trying to calculate right now how much I like Aisha. He won’t even be thinking about how much I like Travis as well. But that’s because as he has proven, he doesn’t give a shit about his son. Not at all.
“A million.” He folds his arms defiantly across his chest, thinking that he has me. “I need a million dollars from you before I can even think about negotiating anything.”
“Sure.” I nod back. “A million. I can sort that out for you.”
“You can?” He sounds genuinely surprised. “I had you down for a flash bastard, but I didn’t think of you as quite that flashy… so, what the hell do you want from me?”
“You have to legally sign over your parental rights to Travis, so he can’t get involved with all of these schemes again. And you have to promise to leave Aisha’s family alone as well. If you have a million dollars, you won’t need any more money, so you have to leave everyone alone. You have to sign a document stating that.”
“So, all you want is my signature and for me to basically leave everyone alone and you will give me a million dollars?” He looks like he can’t believe his luck. “I will do it.”
I can’t believe that he thinks of it as ‘just a signature’. He isn’t even considering what that signature means. And not just the signature about Aisha’s father but about Travis. He doesn’t care about his son that much; he means nothing to him.
But I can’t get angry at him. I can’t let my real feelings show because as horrible as this is, it’s the best solution for everyone. If Ronnie is out of Aisha and Travis’s life for good, then they will never have to go through this sort of drama again. They can live their lives without having to look over their shoulders at all times, wondering when something like this is going to happen again.
“Okay, so let’s go and do this now,” I tell Ronnie seriously. I don’t want him to have a chance for him to change his mind. “Let’s get the legal documents done and your money sorted. You want it now? Don’t you?”
“Oh, for sure.” He grins. Now he’s grinning. “Let’s get going. The sooner, the better.”
Ronnie looks like he has won a fucking lottery. Little does he know that to me Aisha and Travis are worth more than a million dollars. They are worth more than anything in the world to me.
24
Aisha
January 24th
“Argh!” I cry out as I bang my palm against my forehead in frustration. “Why am I getting nowhere? Why aren’t they giving me anything? This is so annoying…”
Admittedly, I do know that Travis isn’t with Ronnie, but CPS hasn’t told me where exactly he is which is driving me mental. All I want is to put my hands on him, to hug him, to hold him close to my chest. I don’t want them to act like I don’t have a right to know about him. He’s my son. I’m the one who has cared for him since he was born, not them.
All of a sudden, the door clicks open and I leap up from my seat. Thank God Marc is back. He has been gone for far too long. I haven’t really coped without him here. Plus, it’s given me a lot of anxiety about what he’s been doing. How long does it take to get things sorted? I really have no idea about anything legal, but it’s really worrying.
“Marc.” I fly into his chest and hold him. My head bangs against his chest and I listen to the sound of his heart pounding wildly. It hammers against his rib cage, almost as if he is anxious about something. I get the terrible, heart stopping sensation that the police are back here and about to put me back in that fucking cell again. I can’t go back there. “What’s going on? Where have you been? You just said that you had a meeting to sort things out…”
I tilt my head back and stare at him, trying to gain something from his expression, but I’m not totally sure what I get. He doesn’t exactly look like he’s happy, but I don’t know if it’s some terrible bad news either. I can’t quite work it out.
“I… I did have a meeting. I think maybe we should sit down and talk.”
He tries to push past me to head into the kitchen, but I remain standing exactly where I am, frozen to the spot to try and work out exactly what’s happening here… only that leaves me in an incredibly vulnerable position as the people standing behind Marc are revealed.
Oh my God. My heart sinks. I blink a few times, trying to wake myself up. This has to be me sleeping, there is no way in hell that this can be real. I don’t buy it. Of all the things that have happened in my life, and I include the last few crazy days in that, this is the weirdest.
“M… Mom?” No way. There is no way. What the hell is she doing here? “Dad?”
My brain races, I can’t even begin to fathom what has brought me in front of them. Especially after the way that they talked to me before. This is too much, now it’s my hearts turn to race like crazy. I understand now why Marc was acting so weird.
“Marc!” I turn around to face him with what I presume is horror in my face. “What the hell have you done? I trusted you. I told you things about me and you betrayed me. I am at the lowest point in my life right now and this is what you do to me? You pile on…”
I shake my hand away from his and stalk off into the kitchen. All I want to do now is storm off, but I really don’t have anywhere else to go. I will never ever get Travis back if I don’t have a place to live. Fucking Marc has me stuck here. Stuck here to betray me.
“Why would you do this to me?” I toss my hands in the air. “Why would you invite them here knowing what they have done to me, Marc?” I don’t even care that my parents can hear me. Let them listen and know how they have completely twisted my opinion of them. They should know what they have done to me. “Why would you let them anywhere near me?”
“Please,” Marc says pleadingly. “Please just listen to them. Hear them out.”
“Wait… wait…” I slide my eyes closed and block the world out for just a moment. “Wait a moment., So, when you said that you were in a meeting today, you were with my parents?” I exclaim in horror. “You left me on my own when I was at my most vulnerable, to speak with them? I assumed that it was something to do with the police or something…”
A heat creep up through me. I don’t want my parents to know that I was in jail… although thinking about it, Marc might have let them know anyway since he is such a snitch.
“I didn’t just go to see your parents,” he tells me firmly. “I went to see Ronnie as well.”
“He better not be here.” I glance over his shoulder as an ice cold bolt of panic shoots through me. “If you have brought that asshole here as well then I will kick you.”
“No, he isn’t here.” Marc pulls out a piece of paper and slaps it down in front of me
. “And he won’t be in your life again either. He has signed over all parental rights to Travis.”
“What?” Those words alone are enough to stop me in my tracks. “What do you mean?” I narrow my eyes in on the paper to see that Marc handed over a million dollars to make that happen, proving to me that money was always on Ronnie’s mind, never our child. “And what does this bit mean as well? He has to stop blackmailing my father. What is that about?”
I stare at Dad now who hangs his head in shame. It doesn’t seem like he is about to say anything to me to fill in the gaps. Luckily, my mother has a big enough mouth for both of them.
“The money that I thought your father was sending to you to keep you afloat was actually going to Ronnie.” She stares at me with a strange expression on her face. “That is why I was so sharp with you when you called that time. Because I assumed that we were already supporting you and since it seemed to me like the payments were getting bigger, I was annoyed.” I can’t say anything. I feel like a goldfish, opening and closing my mouth like an idiot. “So, I do want to apologize to you for that. I didn’t know…”
“Why were you sending money to Ronnie?” I ask my father desperately. “I don’t understand. I have been struggling for all of these years with Travis, but you helped him?”
This doesn’t make any sense to me. Especially since as far as I am aware, my father always hated Ronnie. He never liked us dating, and even less so when I fell pregnant.
“I hate having to tell you this, Aisha,” he finally speaks out. “But I am the reason that he was so horrible to you when you went to his house with the baby news.” He can’t meet my eye and I understand why when he’s telling me this. “I’m sorry, Aisha, I only ever had your best interests at heart, but I went about it in the wrong way. I didn’t want you to have a baby with such a low life when you were so young. I knew then that he had a bad gambling problem…”
“He did?” I jump in. “How did I not know about that? How did I not know any of it?”
“He still does,” Marc informs me. “Hence why he picked the money. He is in a mess again.”
Urgh, what an idiot. What an absolute fool. I can’t believe that I ever liked him. Not that I want to focus on that right now because so many layers are being pulled back and I’m starting to see a very different side of things than I have before.
“So, I told him that you would have an abortion if he rejected you, which I really believed you would,” my dad continues. “I didn’t expect you to run off and have a child by yourself.” I huff in irritation. Of course, that’s what I would do. “I just wanted to help out. But then he found out that I have been lying to him. So, he started black mailing me.”
“Oh my God.” Wow, I don’t know what to think of that. I’m really not sure how to take it. All the time I have just assumed that my parents hated me and didn’t care about me and Travis at all, but maybe I haven’t been right to make assumptions because there is always more going on. “I’m sorry, Dad, I didn’t know that any of that was going to happen.”
“No, I know. None of us knew what was going to happen, and that’s been the issue.”
After a weird beat of very thick silence where it seems like none of us know exactly what to say, Marc pipes up once more. He makes sure to look at all of us in turn.
“Well, we are all here now, aren’t we? We are all together at last, and we can work to make things better. We can work as a family to take things down, and now you don’t need to worry about Ronnie. He is well and truly out of the picture now.”
I nod slowly. Marc is right. This is true, Ronnie is well and truly out of the picture so at least I don’t need to worry about him anymore. He might be an idiot, but this contract seems legally tight to me, I’m sure that he isn’t allowed to deviate from it. And even if he has a massive gambling problem, I’m sure it will take him a while to spend a million dollars. I’m hoping so anyway. The longer that he is out of my life the better. The more he’s gone, the better it will be. Especially if it’s forever. I could do without ever having any more dealings with him.
And Marc is also right that this gives us the opportunity to rebuild, if we want to. It’s been such a long time for me and my parents that I don’t know how we will even begin to break the ice again. It has thawed since now we know a lot more about one another, since I understand better what has been going on in their lives, but does it repair seven years of hurt? I don’t know.
“We are going to help you get Travis back,” Mom blurts out, shocking me to the core. “That’s why we have come all the way out here. Of course, we want to make things right with us as well. We have missed you a lot and there is definitely a lot that we need to make up for, but our main priority at the moment is Travis. We haven’t been around for his life, but there is no way that I am going to let Ronnie take his revenge in this way, because this is why all of this has happened… because of him and your father stopping his payments.”
Oh my God, there is so much to unpack here, so much to take in, I don’t know where to begin. But staring with Travis I think is for the best.
“You are here to help me get him back?” I gasp out, so grateful because the more people who I have on my side the better. “You will come to the CPS with me?”
“We all will.” Marc rests his hand on top of mine. “And we will make sure that we don’t leave without Travis. Together, we will make this work for you.”
I feel like I could burst into tears, but the happy kind. It’s the first time in a while that I haven’t felt alone, and I couldn’t be happier. This is when I need people around me the most.
25
Marc
January 25th
I can’t look at Aisha as I play the recording of my conversation with Ronnie. The one that he didn’t know I was taking, but that I had to take for this exact meeting. I knew that the CPS were going to be awkward about Travis, I knew that this wasn’t going to be a simple process even with my document with Ronnie signing away his parental rights, but I’m still a little nervous as the words blast out through the room. I can’t help but wonder what Aisha and her parents think of me right now. They must assume this was a bit of a bold move and that I put a lot at risk, and I hope they realize I did it for the right reasons.
Instead of looking at anyone I know, I watch the CPS lady instead, desperately hoping that this is getting to her. I don’t see how Aisha can leave this place without Travis now. The police report, all the character witnesses, everything that I have gathered as well... they can’t just ignore that.
At least I hope they can’t. I have all of my fingers crossed just an extra bit of support.
“I see,” the lady says quietly. “That is very useful information.”
“But what are you going to do about it?” I say before I even think about what I’m doing. “What happens now? Ronnie doesn’t want custody of Travis, and as you can see there is no reason to keep him here now, so what happens?”
I only stop my rant when Aisha grabs hold of my hand and squeezes it. She’s trying to reassure me, but I can also feel her trying to calm me down as well. She doesn’t want me to ruin this for her, which I can obviously understand since this may be her one and only chance to get her son back.
“Sorry.” I shake my head sadly. “I don’t mean to overreact; I’m just worried about Travis. I don’t like not knowing where he is.”
“But you are not the boy’s father...”
“He has done a damn sight more for Travis than his biological father has ever done,” Aisha surprises me by biting out. She has been silent up until now. “I don’t think it’s fair of you to say that he has no right to speak about Travis. He can ask questions about my son.”
The CPS worker looks shocked. I should probably tell Aisha to calm down as well just like she did for me, but I can’t stop myself from smiling. It’s just really nice to have her stick up for me like that, to recognize how much I care for Travis, even if this woman doesn’t.
“I am going to
have to speak to my manager,” she finally says. “I would appreciate it if you all waited here.”
I turn to see Aisha and her parents nodding in agreement. I guess that means they think this is good news. Well, if that’s the case, then I will try to be positive as well. Try to think that the manager is going to ensure that Travis comes back into Aisha’s care.
“What do you think will happen now?” I ask nervously as soon as the woman has left the room. “Do you think this is going to end up going well? Have we done enough? Is there anything else that I need to tell them?”
“You have done more than enough,” Aisha does her best to reassure me. “I wouldn’t even be in this position if it wasn’t for you.” I meet her eyes and she gives me a smile. “I’m really sure that everything is going to be fine now.” She holds on to her stomach. “I can feel it. I can really feel it.”
“You can?” I don’t know if I can trust gut instinct, but if it’s helping Aisha then so be it. Who am I to argue? “Okay, well I hope so. I can’t stand the tension...”
Just as I feel like my head might explode, the door swings open and much to my surprise and relief the woman hasn’t come back alone. She has Travis with her, and he immediately looks over the moon to see his mother.
“Mommy!” He runs up to her and holds her tight, sobbing against her chest, which reminds me that the last time he saw her, Aisha was in hand cuffs and pretty much hysterical. I bet he has been incredibly worried the whole time he’s been stuck in this nightmare. “Mommy, I missed you so much. I love you, Mommy.”
I stare at the woman from the CPS, trying to silently communicate with her that this is why I fought so hard. Because she is a good mother because she did nothing wrong to deserve any of this. I do want to yell that, but I’m not going to get into a fight now that everything’s been sorted.