52. (BoyxBoy)

Page 30.

Chapter 25

Morning blasted through the single glazed windows with streaks of colour. It was early: a simple, nude Monday of prosaic, early life. The humdrum buzz of society and a few late tweeting birds woke Aiden gently.

Running away and staying in a hotel may seem romantic, right? But simply walking down the road to sleep in a crappy, falling down B&B, only to be kept awake all night by your loudly snoring boyfriend and having about 20 pence left for two train tickets to London is less so.

Dressing silently in yesterday's clothes, Aiden tiptoed along the room. He took a few minutes to wash his face with cold water and stare into the mirror. He found a pen on the poorly put together desk on the left side of the room and wrote a note for Matt on a napkin.

Then he left without a sound, not even the creak of a door.

*

He entered his house slowly. He could hear his mother call out to him. He ignored it. He collected a few tatty belongings and shoved them in a Sainsbury's carrier bag.

"Aiden," she murmured from the lounge. Aiden turned to face her, from across the hall. His face was as cold as ice: frozen with a lack of true emotion and feeling. Her expression was a little more blurred. 

Her head was in her hands and she sat cross legged on the small tatty sofa centred in the room. 

"Aiden," she stretched out the letters of his name almost silently. She didn't lift her eyes, but instead hid them with her raw red hands. She shook her head and eventually tore her hands from her head and rested one on the arm of the settee. With her spare hand, she patted to the empty space next to her, motioning Aiden to sit.

He shook his head firmly, refusing to go any closer to the woman that made his life hell. She sighed deeply and looked up at him. For the first tone in his life, he didn't see his mother. 

He saw a vulnerable, scared, young woman. She had smudges of make-up everywhere. That wasn't new - but this time it wasn't related to drink or drugs. The ted blotched beneath her eyes confirmed her pain and sheer misery. 

And Aiden didn't care. 

His mother, in sense, was beautiful. But she dressed like a chav-stripper - a quite common hybrid. 

Her roots were fading and her platinum blond hair was dying. She hadn't fake tanned for weeks and her nails were bitten and broken. Also, aside from the blotches of black eye make-up around her face, she had a more au-natural look about her. 

"I got pregnant at 14, Aiden," she said calmly. "When I first saw you' tiny little face, y'know. You wa' so innocent, so … small. 'N' all I wan'ed was t' ge' rid off ya." She shot him a dark look, but he avoided it. "'N'way, found out I'd get a council 'ouse eventually, if I 'ad you, mind. I never cared about ya. Not really. Didn't have time t'. I ain't been in m' righ' mind for 17 years."

She sighed again and left the room in a loom of silence.

"Aiden, I been a bloody awful mother. Almost worse than 'he one I ‘ad," she paused with pursed lips. She stood up and dragged her legs towards Aiden. Looking him right in the eye, she murmured, "Soz."