The last few days have been a blur, Anthony has had his friends around every night, drinking until the early hours. He calls it breaking in the new house, I call it slowly breaking your body.
I had just put Amelia down for a nap when I pass Anthony in the hallway, he didn’t look that great, probably from all the drinking.
“I have a raging hangover, I’m gonna have a little nap” he groans out, rubbing his face as he spoke, he looked like he might puke, faint or all the above!
“Okay, I did just put Amelia down for her nap, so please be as quiet as you can” I smile, not wanting to start any drama, I’m hoping if I play ball for a while, it’ll be less obvious when I plan my escape.
He just nods walking into the bedroom closing the door behind him, I shake my head making my way downstairs to grab a drink.
I walk into the kitchen heading to the cabinet to get a glass, when I close the door John’s face was staring at me, causing me jump.
“John, you scared me I didn’t see you there” I say, placing my hand to my chest, I didn’t want to be alone with him anymore due to the whole Tammy situation.
“Your husband here?” is all he says in a dark tone, I fill the glass with water looking at him strangely.
“Yeah, he’s trying to sleep off his hangover” I explain, drinking down the water, he walks over pulling something out his pocket.
I look down and notice what looks like a gun, without thinking I take off running out the kitchen. I turn to see him chasing me, gun fully in his hand, I bolt towards the upstairs and where Anthony would be, this is the one time I’ve wanted to be in the same room as him. I burst through the door shouting his name, he immediately jumps out of bed asking me what was wrong.
“John is here, he’s just chased me up the stairs with a gun!” I cry, as the door flies open John standing in the doorway, Anthony looks down seeing the gun in his hand pulling me to stand behind him.
“John, what the fuck are you doing?” Anthony asks with his hands out, John laughed looking down at the gun in his hands, scaring the crap out of me.
“You thought you were so smart, you thought you covered your tracks so well that no one would find out” he calmly says, his eyes still on the gun, I look over to Amelia who was awake in her cot staring at me kind of scared “but I’ve known you too long to not see all the signs, I mean it took me awhile at first, but when I saw one they all fell into the place” he continues, while taking slow steps into the bedroom.
“What are you going on about?” Anthony asks confused, but I had a feeling he knew where he was going with this.
“You killed my mother! Than acted like nothing happened! You made it seem like you found her when you’re the one that put her there!” John shouts at the top of his lungs, Amelia starts to hysterically cry in her cot.
I walk over picking her up and holding her in my arms to calm her down, John looks over at me with a smile which causes me to hold onto Amelia even tighter.
“Don’t even try to lie and tell me you didn’t, I got the report from the police about her cause of death” he continues still with a raised voice, he was waving the gun around like a mad man, I was worried it’ll go off by accident and hit one of us.
“She was in the shed too long to get a concrete cause of death, but the injuries they could find, were a bunch of head wounds” he tells us, looking mainly towards me, does he think I did it? Maybe he thinks I don’t know and is explaining it to me.
“They say she could have been hit around the head with something multiple times, it was so bad it was like she fell down the stairs but they just don’t know!” He shouts, but you could tell by his voice he was having a hard time keeping it together, Anthony goes to take steps forward but John shouts pointing the gun at him.
“Just admit that you did it! it’s exactly the way you like to off people and discard of their bodies! And the way your house blew up destroying any evidence they could find that points to you!” He shouts, I got the feeling he just wanted Anthony to say he did, but I knew that’s something Anthony wouldn’t.
“I had to set fire to the house cause of Ink, that had nothing to do with your mother’s death like I had nothing to do with it” Anthony says lying through his teeth, John shouts you liar and runs, tackling Anthony to the ground.
I move further away holding Amelia tightly, as the two men wrestle on the floor, somehow John takes the upper hand pointing the gun towards Anthony’s head. I knew I had to step in as I didn’t want to witness Anthony die right in front of me, if he did kill him what would he do with a Amelia and me?
“Anthony didn’t kill her, she did it to herself!” I shout, causing both men to stop and look at me, Anthony saw his as a way to get out johns grip.
He kicks John in the stomach sending him flying into the wall, Anthony gets off the floor opening the bedside table pulling his own gun out. Both him and John point their guns at each other waiting to see who pulled the trigger first, John held his stomach as he stood up against the wall.
“What did you mean Freya?” John asks looking over at me, still aiming towards Anthony who goes to speak “not you! Freya explain” he once again says over to me, I look to Anthony who didn’t turn, he was just focused on John.
“Well a few days after Anthony took me and Amelia home, your mum burst through the door making up all these stories in her head that weren’t true” I start my story, saying exactly what Anthony said back then, I knew I had to continue but change the story to where Anthony doesn’t hurt her, before I could continue John interjects.
“What stories?” He asks, looking over at me but quickly back to Anthony, I sigh knowing I’m gonna have to start bad mouthing Tammy.
“She kept saying that Anthony kidnapped me and Amelia, we’re not his real family and how she already called the police” I explain, actually telling him the truth, but I knew now wasn’t the time to try and escape Anthony, I need to escape John “she grabs my hand and tries to pull me out the house with Amelia, but in her state of mind we didn’t know what she’d do” I start to make the story up as I went along, he seems to buy it telling me to continue.
“Well Anthony manages to make her let go of my hand and starts to lead us upstairs, he was gonna call you to come get her before she got hurt” I say, John just looks over at Anthony but back at me.
“If he was gonna call me to come get her before she got hurt, how did she end up dead?” He asks, which was the golden question, that I somehow had to find the answer for.
“Well on the way up the stairs she starts to follow us, but somehow she slips and falls down the stairs, Anthony ran down but she was already gone” I say, looking down feeling terrible for lying, but I knew in this situation I had no choice.
“If she did it to herself, why didn’t he just ring me and not hide her body?” He asks actually believing me, why does he keep asking questions that I’m having to make up answers for?!
“He cares about you so much, he knew how hard it would be for you to deal with your mothers death, but then to learn the circumstances it happened” I say, looking at him with sad eyes to add some effect, just in case the story falls through “he did this for you, as a friend” I finish my story with a sad smile towards him.
John stares at me than back at Anthony, he holds his hand up to his mouth tears beginning to fall. He also falls to the floor dropping the gun just in floods of tears, Anthony cocks the gun back, I knew what he wanted to do. I walk over taking his arm pulling closer to me.
“Please don’t kill him, I know what he did was bad but he’s already lost him mum” I whisper in his ear, he shakes his head slowly moving the gun towards John “Anthony please for me, I’ll explain why I don’t want you to hurt him later but just take him home and leave him to grief” I whisper, pulling him closer as John continued to cry on the floor, Anthony looks over at me studying my face, but nods pulling the gun down throwing it in the draw.
He goes to John pulling the gun away from him so he wouldn’t go crazy and try to shoot him again, he somehow manages to get him off the floor and out the door. I remain in the corner holding Amelia, that could have gone a completely different direction.
A few hours pass, Anthony still hadn’t come home since the John thing. I was scared that he killed him anyway, but I knew I just had to trust him, I lay down with Amelia and somewhere we both fall asleep.