TheJunkiesFaust#3(FTDParish)

I just drove off. I knew they were confused and hurt. I knew that I had hurt them. They cared about me and just wanted to know what was going on, how I was, how they could help. And I knew that, I saw that, I felt that and I just drove off. I couldn't care.

I don't know how long I just drove. Or where I'd been. I just drove and drove and thought about my life up until that point. Everything that had happened in my life and whether or not I could have done anything to change what happened....who I was now....what my life was gonna be now.

What was my life gonna be now? I was 17 years old. I had no immediate family. I was an accident that forced my parents into getting married to begin with and they were both far too selfish to make that mistake twice. Having another kid would have meant giving even more of their time, energy, money.......love, to someone else. Unacceptable. So I'm a 17 year old man/boy with no older siblings, no aunts, uncles, grandparents....noone to look after me. I knew I could take care of myself, I'd been doing it for years. Making myself get up to go to school. Making myself study and get good grades. Making myself do the right things....for the most part anyway. Sure I drank some. Sure I smoked a little pot. Sure Bridge and I had sex. But nothing crazy. I drank and smoked a little, less than most of my friends. Our sex was always protected, doubly, and we were monogomous. I raised myself and did a damn fine job of it. I was a good person. Forged in the fire of self reliance and confidence. I had some trust issues because of my parents. And probably innumerable other psychological issues that I wasn't aware of. But for the most part, I was cool. I had it wired. I was in control....

Now? Not so much. I assummed the state would decide I needed adult supervision and place me into a foster home until I turned 18. Not a great deal for someone who has made his own daily decisions, his own meals, did his own laundry since he was 11 or 12....or longer. Now some foster parent looking for an extra $500 a month was gonna be tellin me when and where I could go and when I had to be back. Who I could see and talk to. Telling ME when to straighten up the house or when to do dishes or, My God, making me sit down to "family" meals.

Maybe I'd just take off. By the time they found me I'd be 18. Then what could they do? Fuck 'em!! I could take care of myself. Fuck family dinners!!

I found myself back at the house. I parked...in Dad's spot. I guessed that I would have to arrange to get Mom's car and Dad's truck home......"were they mine now? How did all that work? Was the house mine." It was paid off. At least Dad did that. Working in a coal mine was dirty, life leeching work, but it paid well. Paid for Dad's beer, gambling and girlfriends. Paid for Mom's Vodka. Paid for the cars, the house, the bills. We weren't rich, but things got paid and the liquor flowed.

I of course bougtht my own clothes. Dad would bitch if I asked for clothes from anywhere but Wal-Mart.

"Payin for a fuckin brand name," he'd say. "I ain't payin all that extra fuckin money just so you can wear fuckin Nikes! I work hard for my fuckin money, they got fuckin shoes at the motherfuckin Wal-Mart!"

Old bastard did buy me a car right before I turned 16 though....well, he won me a car, playing cards. But fuck it, it was a nice car. A granny car. It was a 4 year old Cutlass Supreme. Not great....not bad. It was in good shape and had plenty of room.

So fuck it, I got a job(worked a couple of hours after school and a couple of hours early on the weekend mornings at a gas station where the owner knew my dad and what kind of bastard he was, so I think initially he was just trying to help me. But soon he saw my work ethic and integrity and then our relationship was more equal). And I bought my own clothes and had my own spending money.

There was a brief period after I got my first check that my Mom did want me to pay rent(I think she wanted the extra money to buy pain killers) but Dad did put a stop to that pretty quick. Although I think he was doing it to piss Mom off more than to stick up for me.

He said, "You live here for free, drinkin up all my money ya ol' bitch. You're not gonna make the boy pay. At least that dumb fuck's got a job. Fat ol' bitch." And left to go to town to drink and whore around and Mom got drunk....er.

So, at least I got to keep my spending money and could pay for gas and dates with Bridge. "Oh Bridge, what would I do without you?" I thought. She was my rock. The one shining point of light in my otherwise dark and dismal universe. Corny huh? The one thing I could count on. Best girl in the world. It was great. Hell, her parents even liked me.

And Buzzy too. It's hard for adolescent men to articulate, but I loved Buzzy too. Probably the only other person in the world I trusted besides Bridge. We'd been friends since grade school when we figured out why neither of us wanted to have friends over to our houses. Buzzy's dad left when he was just a baby and his mom was a lazy bitch, just laying around collecting welfare and being a bar whore. Hell, the old man probably rolled around with her a time or two. Some people just sucked. The funny thing was that each of us was madder at the others parental units more than we were mad at our own. When I figured that out was when I knew Buzzy and I would be friends forever.

I was mad at myself now for the way I acted leaving after I talked with Jimmy. She loved me and more importantly she let ME love her. I wanted to see her now. To tell her how sorry I was and to ask her to hold me and tell me it was all going be alright. I grabbed a 6 pack out of the fridge and swiped a 5th of vodka off the shelf on the way out and headed for Bridget's to wallow in self pity.