Page 6 of The Deadbeat DILF
Once he pulled to a stop in the street, I thanked him and got out of his black sedan before crossing over to the sidewalk, stepping around the cracks and splits in the marked concrete.With every step closer I took to my old home, my stomach churned more and more.
I didn’t want to be back here, but I didn’t have much of a choice. I couldn’t be the woman who abandoned her own family as soon as she became successful.
I stopped in front of a small brick house with a worn-down wooden front porch. The grass on either side of the walkway was overgrown, tumbling onto the concrete in front of me. The windows were slightly foggy from their old panes, and if I got close enough, I’d see the dust on them too.
“Come on,” I whispered to myself, willing myself to get this over with.
Swallowing hard, I walked up to the front porch, the wooden steps creaking and groaning beneath me. I knocked on the front door, able to smell the aging wood and the dirty welcome mat.
The door swung open a few seconds later, revealing my mother in her usual pair of blue jeans and a pink shirt that hung off her body. Her hair was the same shade of golden blonde as mine, though hers was streaked with gray. Her hair had been pulled up into a tight, short ponytail.
“You showed up,” my mother stated.
“I said I would,” I replied with a forced smile. “Is everyone else here?”
“Sure are,” my mother said before turning and disappearing back into the house.
I followed her inside, my nose immediately assaulted with conflicting smells—my mother’s favorite vanilla wax burner melts, leather from my father’s jackets and boots lying around in the small foyer, barbecue sauce, and smoke from the kitchen.
“Brooke is here,” my mother announced as I entered the attached kitchen and dining room.
My father, my older brother Brandon, and his wife Gemma were all sitting around the dining room table.
“Hey, Dad,” I said as he stood from the table with a bottle of beer in his hand.
“Good to see you, girl,” my father told me as he gave me a side hug, the smell of grill smoke lingering on his shirt.
“You too,” I said before walking around the table to hug Brandon, who looked more like our father with his shaggy black hair and thin, tall frame. “Hey.”
“Hey,” Brandon replied as he patted the back of my shoulder. “Glad you could come all the way out here. I know you’re busy and all that.”
“I always have time for my family,” I said, before being swept into a hug by Gemma. She was five feet tall, and had dyed her hair platinum blonde.
“Ohh, you smell good! What is that?” Gemma asked after a deep inhale.
Shit. I’d dressed down, but I still sprayed my usual Coco Mademoiselle perfume on today. If I said it was Chanel, my mom’s eyes would roll out of her head.
“It’s just a free sample I got from the mall. I forgot the name,” I lied.
Gemma plucked a leather Coach bag off the empty seat next to hers and dangled it in front of me. “Like my new bag? I got it last week.”
I glanced over at my brother, who didn’t say anything, just took a sip of his beer. Everyone liked nice things, but I knew that as a beautician, Gemma couldn’t afford all the designer handbags she bought without the credit card debt that came with them. Given all of my brother’s failed businesses over the years, he didn’t exactly have extra cash to give her for luxury goods.
“It’s nice,” I told her, giving an impressed smile before sitting at the other end of the table so I didn’t have to sit directly next to anyone.
Mom carried over a platter of barbecue chicken to set next to the bowls of mashed potatoes, green beans, and dinner rolls already on the table. She sat across from my brother before gesturing to the food. “Alright, everyone. Go on.”
I waited for everyone to grab their fill before placing a piece of chicken breast and a serving of green beans on my plate. If I was honest, I never had much of an appetite when I visited home, but if I didn’t eat something, my family would accuse me of being on some sort of fancy diet or, God forbid, a juice cleanse.
“Work going good?” Dad asked before picking up a chicken thigh with his hands and biting into its side.
“Yes, busy as usual,” I said, keeping my eyes on my plate as I rearranged my green beans with my fork. “Are you … working?”
“Of course,” Dad scoffed. “I’m helping my buddy Joe at the auto shop.”
That would last a few weeks before my father ultimately pissed Joe off and got fired—or he got bored and quit. My father always claimed to be employed, but when I was working part-time in town as a teenager, I often caught him day drinking or gambling instead of working. I doubted that had changed.
At least my mother kept a steady job at the supermarket.
