28 chapter 28
Vukan parked some short distance from Oliver's house, upon sighting the driveway already had two cars stationed there. He turned off his engine and stepped out of the car with the will and desire to atone for his sins and hopefully get back in the good graces of the Douglas family.
"We don't know darling", Vukan heard Gemma Douglas's voice as he approached, prompting him to hide behind the truck closest to their house.
He peered through to see what was going on and there they were; the entire family sat on the front porch, discussing. Sofia was there too and the sight in itself was terrifying even more because of her.
"Did you guys do anything to provoke such unruly actions from him?" Sofia asked.
Sarah shook her head. "Ask your brother. He has a problem with everyone. He must have done something which made the Adamson angry." She stood against Oliver.
Vukan thought of his deeds again and couldn't believe how badly he behaved. Oliver's folks had been on the receiving end of what could be termed as transferred aggression and nothing else. He motioned out of the darkness but stopped after hearing Oliver's voice.
"I don't think I want to have anything to do with him again", Oliver said to his mother.
Vukan waited and hoped to get some backing or form of support from anyone there but they sadly and quite rightly went silent. The sight broke his already cracked heart. Without any hopes of rekindling any love and respect the Douglas family had for him, he turned away, seething and blaming himself for being very stupid.
Vukan sought to return home; to the one place where he would be accepted even in his worst days and on his worst behavior. While he drove back, he could feel stings and what felt like sharp pinches against the walls of his heart. It felt as though he was being targeted by everything he had done. It felt as though he was being paid back for the emotional trauma he caused everyone.
"I thought I had been given another chance?" he asked himself as he stared at the coin in his hand.
Tempted to toss it out of the window and hopefully never have anything to do with the coin again, Vukan refrained and decided to keep the coin in hopes of using it whenever he returned to the river. Well, that was if he had any cause to return there. The river felt as though it had failed him. It felt as if it had failed Oliver too.
Finally, he arrived at his house to see the lights were still on. He parked just across the street, hoping the lights would go off and his parents would head back into their rooms to sleep before he made the short walk across the street. It wasn't the best time to have them confront him and he would rather they didn't.
Regardless, the closer he got, the easier it was to tell that there was just no way out for him. They were waiting and for God knows how long. Their bickering seeped through the front door and he attempted to stick his key into the lock and it prompted him to stop for a moment. He hardened his ear to their complaints, hoping to listen to whatever it was that they were speaking about.
Yet, he got nothing. The walls were too thick and intentionally so. It was how his father wanted it, since he ran business dealings in the house and often wouldn't want his voice to be heard by those passing by.
"Be a man and get in there', he encouraged himself.
It sounded far easier than actually getting it done. For starters, the keys in his had kept falling to the ground whenever he tried to get the right one into the lock. If his parents came pouncing with a gun or any weapon, he deserved it. He could easily be confused for being a thief by the way in which he couldn't seem to find his coordination.
"Damn it!" he fumed while he continued to struggle with the key before feeling the door creak open under his hand.
The creak came slowly and for a prolonged period of time before it finally stopped with the shadow of a female standing just behind the door, reaching through. His parents stood side by side, arms folded across their chests and without words.
"Hello", Vukan whispered, stepped into the room and locked the door behind him as slowly as possible.
He didn't want to turn around. If he could prevent himself from turning around, then he would do it without a doubt. Yet, they had stayed up for him and there was no avoiding them. There was the option of racing up the stairs and leaving them there, standing and fuming, but that was another recipe for disaster.
Henry Adamson's gaze tore through his son as though he had a rival before him. His deafening silence bothered Vukan more than any words the man might eventually spill.
Vukan stepped closer to his mother, attempting to take her hand into his but she nudged them off. "Mom… I'm… ".
The ability to apologize felt hard to come by. It was harder than he had assumed not because it wasn't possible but because he didn't know what words would weigh in equivalence with everything he had done to them. Henry Adamson's pride had been trampled upon by his only son and Vukan had never seen the man get that enraged.
Agatha Adamson on the other hand, had felt her reputation as a respectable mother and one who taught her son morals, smeared in the most nauseating manner.
"Are you on drugs?" Agatha Adamson asked her son. "Don't lie to me. I will turn your room upside down if I have to. Or is it in the car? Is that where you hide your stash?"
Vukan wished he was on drugs. He shook his head, lowered his gaze to show he wasn't trying to challenge their authority, and hoped they would accept him.
"You can answer with words, boy!" his father's thunderous tone tore through the entire room. "Answer with the same words you were quick to use wrongly earlier today at the restaurant!"
Vukan wanted to speak but the words hung deep within his throat. He chalked down his words and with its, his pride too.
"I am sorry", he said without giving any explanations.
While he had so much to explain, he just couldn't bring himself to speak at length in that moment.
"I should never have acted in such a manner and I am sorry", he apologized again.
Vukan looked to his mother for some measure of closure but the woman turned her back to him.
"I have been going through a lot lately and I didn't know how to process how I felt", Vukan explained abstractly.
Henry Adamson chuckled, but in a mocking manner. "You want to speak about not knowing how to process things with us? Does that even sound right to you? Think about it again, son!"
Henry approached his son but his wife stood in between to prevent a fracas between the two.
"I have lived with having to sort your mess and stand by you even in the face of adversaries!" Henry Adamson continued. "I was there on the day you came out of the closet. I was there and I defended you against my own father! I defended you against your grandfather!"
Vukan recalled the events during those periods. He was young but the memories still remained within him. Coming out as gay in their family turned a lot of things on its heels and one of them was his grandfather who just couldn't accept the revelation. Vukan had done it before the entire family, to show them what he was and who he was.
His grandfather, a man of old times and whose beliefs didn't come anywhere near the modern acceptances, had simply fought against his parents choosing to stand by him or choosing to agree with him as regards wanting to be recognized as gay.
"This has to be the stupidest thing you people are trying to allow with this child!" the man yelled. "We all watched him grow up to be who he is! My son had the tendencies and I whooped them out of him!"
Henry Adamson stood between Vukan and his own father, Vukan's grandfather. "He is my son and I will accept whatever he wants, provided that is what will bring him happiness".
The elderly Adamson scoffed, looked to Agatha and waited for some kind of support. His face fell flat when he realized he wasn't going to have her support.
"Well, I cannot allow this to happen", the man protested.
Coming out as gay would make what Henry Adamson called a tear in his family and a strain in the relationship which he shared with his father. The proceeding years became one with different castigations and tribulations from Vukan's grandfather against the entire family.
"if I could stand by you back then", his father whispered in a heartfelt manner. "Then nothing stops me from standing with you when things go crazy".
Vukan looked at his mother. The woman's swollen eyes could only mean one thing; she had been crying. He had never seen her cry. In fact, he had never seen either of his parents cry.
"I really wish I can make it up to you guys but I am sorry, Vukan reiterated his stance. "I wasn't myself emotionally and I took it out on Oliver's parents".
"Well, them and the servers and anyone who didn't offend you in the first place", Henry Adamson was like a dog who had sniffed a bone out; he wouldn't let it go easy.
Agatha Adamson led her son to the couch and settled him into the single chair nicely. She ran her hand through his hair for a while and seemed to like the silence they shared while Vukan's father paced around the room.
"We have to do something", the man said as he paced to and fro. "We cannot allow them to make the first move. It would tell us badly on us".
Vukan glared at his mother and sought some answers to whatever his father was on about.
"It is only right that we try to reach out to the Douglas family and apologize first", his mother explained. "We need to show them who we really are and what this family's values stand for".
Vukan felt compelled to tell them he had made an attempt and failed.
"I went there", he blabbed out without even intending for the words to come through.
"You did?" his mother asked in an excited tone.
Vukan cocked his head. "They don't seem too happy about having anything to do with us anymore. From the little I heard before turning around, I doubt they even want to speak to any of us".
His father looked at him with a raised brow and then looked to his mother, before looking back again. "You went there? Did you apologize?"
Vukan stuttered, trying hard to get the right words out.
"I had the feeling you acted like a coward and backed out", his father put him right down.
Vukan shot up from his seat and replied in a hot tone. "I didn't act like a coward. I went there to apologize but they were having a family moment and I didn't see the need to make things worse".
Henry Adamson cackled annoyingly, tossed his arms in the air as he made a mockery of Vukan and shook his head.
"You worried about making things worse? You had their entire family before you and instead of swallowing your pride, knuckling down and for once in your goddamn life act like a man, you chickened out", the man said.
Vukan felt foolish for believing the tense period between him and his father had come to an end. It was like always; he would get blamed for the simplest of things while his father would avoid the point entirely.
"Maybe insulting them was a good thing to do!" Vukan sought to take his previously tendered heartfelt apology back. "Considering you still haven't asked me what triggered such a dastardly act!"
He stormed off and up the stairs before pausing to shoot his father a despicable look.
"I really wish you would act like a father sometimes!" Vukan yelled. "Mr. Peter didn't deserve the insults leveled against him because he is an excellent man and a doting father!"
The words left the duo in the living room in what could best be described as a pensive mood. They continued to stare at the staircase as if Vukan was still there barking down his angry words at them. The comparison he made before he left was highly critical and it tore through Henry Adamson's soul. He groped his chest and finally looked to his wife.
"What would my father say if he was here?" he asked his wife while he tried to rub some feeling into his chest.
"Your father isn't the best judge of character. More so, you know how he feels about gay people", Agatha reminded her husband. "Maybe he is right".
Henry Adamson shot his wife his most perplexed expression.
"Yes. Maybe Vukan has a point", his wife reiterated. "I have a feeling he is acting out because something is bothering him. We don't really give him much space to be expressive about his worries and pains and I believe this might just be the effect".
They both looked towards the staircase again and back at each other.
"What do we do?" he asked.
She wondered too.
