But this wasn’t quite that—it had nothing to do with the end of his mother’s suffering and everything to do with the end of his.Maybe once she was gone they could get her medical debt—allher debt—squared away.Jessica wouldn’t have to work two jobs anymore: she could go to art school like she’d always wanted, having dreamt of following in her brother’s footsteps.He could get help for David, bring him to a therapist.And maybe… maybe he could have something for himself, too.
He boarded the elevator upon reaching their apartment building, the doors opening to a peculiar scene: Jessica and David were standing in the hallway before their front door.Jessica looked grim while David was as blank-faced as always.Adrien was shocked to see his little brother outside the bedroom, let alone the entire apartment.
“Hey,” Adrien said, reaching out to him.David dove wordlessly into his open arms.“Hey, hey—what’s going on?”
When Jessica looked at him, he could see tears gathering on her lash line.“Mom found Marcos’ letters.”
The world fell out from under him.
Adrien didn’t need to ask anything else.
He stared at the closed apartment door.It was like he was about to step into a courtroom to be convicted of murder.
“You should leave,” Jessica told him point-blank.“Don’t even bother getting your stuff, I’ll send it to you.I’ll—here.”
Something wet and warm was pressed into his fist.Adrien looked down in shock to see that Jessica was handing him a wad of money damp with tears.
“Jess, where did you get this?!”he hissed.She smiled at him ruefully.
“I’ve been saving my tips,” she told him.“Just in case something…”
Jessica trailed off.She didn’t need to finish her sentence.Adrien could sense the myriad of situations implied by her words.
“No, it’s yours,” he handed the money back to her, turning to face the door instead.It loomed in front of him, like the entrance to a mausoleum.
“You don’t have to go in there,” Jessica told him.“You don’t have to hurt yourself like that.”
But he did.He was beholden to his mother and her words and her opinion of him.Because some way, somehow, this was all his fault.If only because she had said so.
“It wouldn’t have been like this if you’d stayed at State.”
He opened the door.
The apartment was eerily silent.
Joyce was sitting on the ashy sofa, smoking through the hole in her neck.In the past few years, it looked like she had aged two decades.No one would have ever believed that she was only forty-four with the way her skin was lined in wrinkles, plastered to her bones.Marcos’ letters were sitting in a pile next to her.
“You really thought you could keep this from me, huh?”she croaked, voice so placid that it was disturbing.“Between the art and theboys.” She scoffed.“I should have known something was up.The only thing out of your goddamn mouth that summer was Marcos.Fucking.Flores.”
Adrien stood there and listened.
“And here I thought you cared about your siblings,” she sneered at him, eyes beading up with tears.
“What?”Adrien asked, taken aback.
“You really thought it was okay to come home and exposeme, expose yourlittle brother and sisterto thatfucking faggot disease?!”she screamed.“I’m already dying and you thought it was okay to come home and act like you’re some sort of goddamn saint prancing around here infecting us with—”
“What the hell are you talking about, Mom?!”Adrien asked, shaking his head.“What disease?!I’m not sick!”
“LIAR!”she screamed, picking up the handful of letters and chucking them at her son.“You think I didn’t see those homeless homos down in the Castro dying in the streets?!You expect me to believe you weren’t spreading your legs for that queer boy like some kind of little—”
“SHUT UP!”Adrien shouted.The timbre, the depth of his own voice shocked him.He’d never yelled like that before.“Don’t youdarecall him that!”
“YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO COME INTO MY HOUSE AND GIVEMYCHILDREN AIDS!”Joyce countered with a snarl before she broke into a coughing fit.
“You’re insane!”Adrien sobbed.“Mom, I don’t have HIV!I don’t have AIDS!It doesn’t evenworklike that—you can’t catch AIDS fromlivingwith someone!Why would you even think that?!”
“It’s all my fault!”she started to sob in turn.“I should’ve gotten remarried, should have given you a father figure before you turned to sin!Now I’ll have to watch my only son burn in Hell!This is my punishment for raising a queer son!It should beyoudying, Adrien!Not me!”
