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Finally, an update which should not exist but...eh, I'm allowed a break. Enjoy:

Disenchanted Lullaby Chapter 33

You and I both know that Justin could sometimes be on the wrong side of kinky, that was totally old news, but having two wh-res dressed up as nurses accompanying him to the Billboard Music Awards was a little much, don’t you think?

I know he was just having fun and making a joke out of his reputation or whatever but didn’t it seem a little disrespectful to me? Pretty much everyone knew we were together, and even though it was through my own doing that I wasn’t his date, he didn’t need to have two scantily clad ‘ladies’ all over him. At that stage, Justin’s behaviour was presenting me with issues aplenty. I accepted that he was having a hard time with all the media @#%$ about Britney and Janet and whoever the hell else he was supposed to have been with, but sometimes it was he who added fuel to the fire. For instance, would you like your boyfriend admitting, on national radio, that he had had oral sex with the world’s most famous virgin? No, I didn’t either, but I guess if it gained him publicity and boosted his record sales; that was all that mattered. It was much more important than my feelings, anyway.

Do I sound bitter? I probably was. It’s hard not to be when your boyfriend is openly courting media attention centring on his love life. Rumours of his infidelity were rife, and while he tried to reassure me that they were untrue, it was difficult to remain positive with stories of him with other girls constantly being shoved in my face. The large expanse of land between us proved troublesome, too. How was I to know what he was doing in London?

I was having fun on my own though. Well, I was never actually alone but you know what I mean. I finally decided that sitting at home waiting for Justin to call was totally idiotic and unnecessary when I could be having fun with my friends. So I spent my time learning the finer points of frat parties and experimentation…Justin would have been so proud. Well, the old Justin would have, the a'sshole one just got all pissy that I smoked weed with my friends when I refused to even let him light up around me. I had only done it a few times, though, having initially tried it when I returned from Tennessee to find Richard and the usually chipper Amanda chilled to the point of being horizontal. Metaphorically, of course.

I will quietly admit to exaggerating my usage just to see how big of a deal Justin would make and to prove how much of a hypocrite he really was. I guess after seeing Trace and he so relaxed, curiosity got the better of me so I tried it for myself. I liked it, I discovered. I hear you calling me a big stinkin’ hypocrite and I agree with you. I used to be totally against drugs until I tried marijuana for myself. It was as hard as I ever went, though. It was a cool but expensive way of relaxing and having fun with my friends. It’s true that the college years are the best of your life. I had a total blast doing very un-Beth-like things and experiencing a much more liberal lifestyle. Granted, my grades suffered a little while I found the balance between study and fun but I reigned it in eventually.

Justin even tried to lecture me about my schoolwork; can you believe that? He was acting like an old man and it drove me crazy. I have to admit though; I did enjoy freaking him out with tales of what we got up to when we weren’t in class. I wanted to have fun and it was his own fault that he wasn’t there to party with me. He’d rather be in stinky Europe than in LA so why was he getting pissy like I was to blame? It got to the stage where I was so sick of listening to him talk at me that I wound up making excuses to hang up, even if it did feel horrible to just cut him off like that.

I guess I felt kind of bad about not spending Christmas with him, too, but I really wanted to see my mom and I knew she was excited to see me. I couldn’t just break with our tradition like that. I liked to think that I hid my cheesiness considerably well, but really, I lived the whole year round looking forward to the holidays with my mommy. I guess it was just the whole decorating the tree and watching old Christmas movies with my head on her lap, y’know? She was the one person who just let me relax and act like I was five years old again. I didn’t want to miss being spoiled by my mom and I didn’t want to leave her alone for the holidays so like I said, it was Justin’s stupid fault for not coming with me. He saw his family all the time; they were always on the road with him, and I was with him on Thanksgiving so it was his turn to sacrifice something. Oh, forgive me, why should I ever have expected him to compromise anything for me?

I was feeling a little taken-for-granted, can you tell?

Needless to say, we argued about it until Justin registered the fact that I was not completely under his control. Eventually I think he understood that while I would have liked to see him on Christmas, I wanted to be with the only part of my family that I could really rely on. I still spoke to Rhona and Brandon a lot, I was a little sad but mostly pleased that they were starting a new life in San Francisco, and I was already planning my first visit to them. That was of course taking for granted the fact that my brother would still be there. Not only had my father filed for divorce, but he had sought child custody too. Who the hell was he to try to take Brandon from Rhona? He couldn’t even look after himself, never mind a child.

My dad and I weren’t really talking, mostly because I had chewed him out for taking his piece of a'ss to Cancun for Thanksgiving as well as for trying to ruin everybody’s lives. He had attempted to yell back at me and remind me of my place but I didn’t think he had any right to. So for the first time ever, I told my father to ‘get a f-cking clue’ and grow old gracefully. It didn’t really go down well, as you may have guessed, and he told me to watch my attitude just before I hung the phone up. I felt that I was right, though. He had picked Antonia over me and that wasn’t fair. I knew my mom would never do that, so I was looking forward to spending some time hanging out and confiding in her.
So my plan was to fly up there the four days before Christmas Eve and to stay until the twenty-eighth when I would go back to LA to meet Justin. It didn’t pan out like I had imagined, though.

“Do you even remember half of what we talked about last night?”

“Yes,” I whined, resting my throbbing head on my desk, “Of course I do. Stop yelling at me.”

“You don’t remember at all,” He snapped, “How could you? You were so f-cking drunk I don’t even think you knew you were actually on the phone.”

“Justin…” I trailed off agitatedly, not knowing how to express how much he was irritating me, “I haven’t done anything that you haven’t been doing for years so what’s your problem? What do you want me to say here? Do you want me to turn back time and be sober when you call me? Do you want me to wait by the phone like a good little b'tch for whenever you have a spare second for me?”

“Don’t even turn this on me,” He warned, “I’m not the one burning out and flunking classes.”

I paused for a while just to make sure I had heard him correctly, “I failed one test, one stupid test! What does it matter to you, anyway? Don’t you have enough to worry about with your little tour and everything? Isn’t that all that matters to you?”

“See now you’re just being stupid.”

“Great, Justin, call me names.”

“I just want you to grow up and start taking care of yourself.”

“Excuse me?” I screeched, “Grow up? Who died and made you the boss of me? I’ll do what I want with my life without your input.”

“That’s how you want it, huh?” His menacing tone was starting to make me nervous, “Well fine. I see how it is, and you know what? I’m done with this conversation. Why don’t you give me a call when you grow up?”

He knew how sensitive I was about my age but I don’t even think my feelings entered his big thick head. I was just about to slam the phone down when I heard a resounding beep in my ear. I knew he didn’t…

No, that b-stard actually hung up on me.

He called me stupid, too, let’s not forget that. Part of me was hurt, sure. How could I not be hurt after he had spoken to me like that? I didn’t want Justin to think badly of me but then again, did I really care? I mean, he was totally overreacting and while I was a hypocrite for partaking in what I had criticised him for doing so often, he didn’t want me to do it so he really had a double standard and also, I had a will of my own. He was my boyfriend, not my owner. So what do you do when you’re mad at your possessive significant other? You get wasted and slightly stoned, obviously, and call him to boast about it. It didn’t go down well, I think you can guess, but it made me feel better even if he did hang up after telling me to pull myself together and go to bed. But since I was in the habit of doing the opposite of what he wanted, I drank myself into unconsciousness and woke up in a pool of my own spit. Not really attractive, but fun apart from the uncontrollable vomiting the following day. I had to miss class because I couldn’t physically stand light of any kind, or noise, for that matter. Which was why when my phone rang, I just answered to get it to desist with the ringing. When I heard Justin’s voice I was expecting another lecture and a lot of yelling, so I considered hanging up but when I registered that he sounded more hurt than mad, I decided to listen to what he had to say.

“Do you really feel bad?”

“Yeah,” I whined softly, “I have a headache and my throat and stomach hurt.”

“Now do you understand why I want you to slow down a little?” He asked gently, “I’m worried about you.”

He was overreacting, but I loved that side of him; the part that always kind of murmured softly to me and was only concerned that I was safe and didn’t feel the need to yell at me.

“I know, but you don’t have to be,” I responded equally as quietly, “I just have a hangover, it’s no big deal.”

“But you’re sick and you’re missing class…and that’s not all that bothers me about this,” He said cryptically.

“What?”

“You just…” He trailed off into a short silence but my head hurt too much to question him before he continued, “You’re like…pulling away from me.”

“What?” I was genuinely surprised, “No I’m not, what are you talking about?”

“You are, you don’t listen to me any more, it’s like my opinion doesn’t matter to you and you’re living your life without me.”

“You’re never here, Justin, how am I supposed to live?”

For a few long minutes, all I could hear was his breathing and what sounded like him fidgeting with something, “That’s not fair. You know that this isn’t any easier for me than it is for you, sometimes it sucks but it’s my job. It’s what I do to make a living and I love it, it’s not fair for you to get mad at me for not being there. School keeps you away from me, but do I get all pissy about that?”

“All you do is yell at me.”

“Because you never listen!”

“You’re yelling again,” I whined, burying my throbbing head in the pillow, “You treat me like I’m five years old and you know I hate when you do that.”

“You didn’t used to hate it,” I heard him mumble, “You used to love when I tried to take care of you and sh't, you never used to be this complicated.”

“You never used to get mad at me this much, you never yelled at me all the time and you never thought any less of me for doing anything, especially stuff that you do all the time.”

“I don’t drink so much that I make myself sick or can’t work. How many classes have you missed this week, Beth? Do you realise that you aren’t in high school any more? You can’t just repeat or charm the teacher into giving you a better grade, you know. You really have to-“

“I am so close to hanging up on you,” I interrupted wearily, “I know all of that, Justin, but it isn’t going to happen. I’m just having a little fun like every other person on this campus. This isn’t a big deal, and I keep asking you to stop lecturing me but you’re still doing it.”

“I’m just looking out for you!” He almost-yelled, “How the f-ck do you think it feels to know you’d rather be with your friends than me? How do you think it feels that you’ll get high with them and do whatever the f-ck else it is that goes on in that place when you won’t even let me smoke around you? What this boils down to is that you don’t trust me. I don’t even think you give a sh't about me any more, do you know that? I don’t think you care about anyone but yourself.”

“That’s not fair,” I defended myself softly, “And you’re yelling again.”

“Look,” He exhaled a heavy breath; “I’m sorry…I just think we need to spend some time together. I don’t know what’s going on with you or how you’re feeling about anything because I haven’t actually seen you in so long. We just need to touch base properly, y’know?”

“We’ll see each other in a little over a week, though, right?”

“That’s not enough, it’s only for a few days, if we had the whole of Christmas-“

“I’m not going to Tennessee, Justin, so you can stop that thought right now.”

“If you cared about this relationship like you say you do, you would come with me.”

Justin-logic infuriated me. “What the hell? Just because I won’t leave my mom who I haven’t seen in like, six months, all on her own on Christmas, I don’t care about the relationship? You insist on being with your family, doesn’t that mean that you don’t care either?”

“Now you’re just twisting sh't.”

See? You try arguing with that.

“You’re the one twisting sh't here, Justin, I don’t even want to spend Christmas with you if you’re going to be like this.”

“Well you know what?” He shot back quickly, “I don’t give a f-ck what you want, because I don’t want to spend it with you either. I don’t know what the hell got into you because you never used to be such a b'tch.”

“I wish I could say that you’ve changed too, Justin,” I said calmly, “But I can’t, because you’re still the same selfish, arrogant, ignorant b-stard you always were. Have a nice Christmas.”

I was shaking when I pressed the ‘end’ button on my phone. How could he even speak to me like that? He didn’t even try to ring me back to apologise, so I was definitely standing by my previous comments, even if I did regret them a little. I hoped I hadn’t hurt him too much, but if I thought about it, that’s exactly what I had wanted to do because he hurt me first. If I was such a b-tch, why was he pushing for us to spend Christmas together in the first place? I guess he had retracted that, though.

I wanted us to be in love again like we were in the summer, but I was also aware of how much we had both changed. Was I pulling away from him, though? Obviously you grow as a person with every new experience, of which I had many, and everyone says that college changes you, right? I felt the same, though. I mean, I was still me even if some of my feelings and opinions had changed. My feelings about Justin were still pretty much the same, despite the frustration I felt at his pigheadedness. Hopefully we would work stuff out, though, we usually did. My flight to Canada was spent in deep thought as my eyes rested on the in-flight movie while my brain was working through my very own drama. I thought that he might have at least sent me a text message or an email just to check in if he didn’t want to actually talk to me, though I guess I didn’t try to contact him either. But he had been mean to me first, so he should have been the first to apologise. It left me with a heavy ominous feeling when the plane touched down in Toronto; he was at least going to call me before Christmas Day, right?

I was just looking forward to getting my mom to make it all go away, but from the moment she greeted me in the airport, I could tell something was up. She was acting all creepy and false and kept changing the subject from her life to mine as we drove to her penthouse apartment. I think I’ll just take a moment to show respect for my mom’s bad-a'ss house. She has amazing taste and I loved everything about it. It was really modern and spacious with a stereo and TV system almost as good as Justin’s. I had my own room, of course, and I think I probably felt more at home there than anywhere else. When mom first moved there she said that I had absolute control over how my room looked, and at my request, she had the walls painted a light pink and stencilled with a glittery star here and there. Needless to say, I loved it. I had what we called the four-poster ‘princess’ bed, which was surrounded by pink netting and lots of unnecessary frilliness, and sat in front of my own entertainment system. It also housed what was left of my childhood, mainly cuddly toys and a few dolls, most of which sat by the dollhouse that took up one corner of the room. I was a big baby, I know, but you don’t just throw that stuff away, they’re memories. Anyways, on arrival I headed straight in there to dump my bags, and after registering the picture of Justin which my mom had obviously left on my nightstand as her own cute little way of making me welcome, I turned it face down and decided to check out the junk I had left in my closet. I remember my first thoughts on opening the door being something along the lines of ‘what the f-ck is this?’ as my eyes landed on what appeared to be male clothing. So deciding to do the obvious, I ventured into the kitchen for information. She was unable to answer me, however, because of the very male face attached to her lips.

Somebody forgot to tell me something.

Leaning against the wall, I cleared my throat loudly, jolting my mom and the mystery man out of their little make-out session.

“Hi,” I smiled questioningly.

“Uh…Beth!” My mom blushed but tried to hide it with a broad smile, “Honey…you uh…you unpacked pretty quickly…um…”

“Yeah,” I interrupted, nodding, “Well, the actual unpacking process was a little hindered by all the guy’s clothes in my closet.” I smiled again at the man standing to my mother’s right as he nervously walked forward, extending a hand.

“I’m Liam, I’m a…friend of your mom’s.”

My mother sighed and pouted, “Beth, this is my boyfriend, Liam, some of the clothes in your wardrobe are his and the rest belong to his son, Ryan. Was that the doorbell?”

“No it wasn’t,” I blocked her way out of the room, “Excuse us, Liam, I need to talk to my mom.”
Smiling sweetly at him, I pulled her through the hall and into the living room before closing the door behind us. The inquisition was intense and it took several minutes before she actually spilled details. Apparently we had had new roomies for a month before I discovered their existence, and even before that, Liam had been lodging on a temporary basis. It took a while for me to get used to, of course, but by Christmas Eve everybody was pretty much comfortable with each other and having a gay old time. Being of similar age and opinion, Ryan and I spent most of our time watching TV, listening to music and eating Candy while our parents sucked face where they thought we wouldn’t notice.
Justin was still there in the back of my mind, poking at my conscience and whatever part of my brain controls the hand that dials the telephone, but I ignored him. He hadn’t made contact so obviously he didn’t want to talk to me and that was fine. I could be just as stubborn as he was, maybe even more so, and he knew that, so why in the heck hadn’t he called me?

Mom knew something was up and tried to bug me about it but I wasn’t really in the mood for discussion. It hurt that he didn’t care any more, of course it did, but part of me had assumed nonchalance about the whole thing. Maybe we didn’t need to talk every day, he would just yell at me, and he was probably busy with his precious family anyway. But when everyone had finished opening gifts and had gone to get dressed on Christmas morning, I found myself alone in my room, turning his picture the right way up and wondering if he was thinking about me. I figured that it had to be around ten there so if I called his cell phone I might get through to him, or at least to his answering machine. It took several deep breaths and some hair pulling before I found the courage to dial his number, but I stopped just before the last digit. Did I want another fight on Christmas Day? Was it worth yelling and getting upset and ruining everyone’s holiday? Then again, it was Christmas, the season of good will, a time for family and friends and loved, pigheaded boyfriends. I was still fighting with myself when the distinct sound of ringing came from my cell. I eyed it warily. It was probably just Erika, nothing to be excited about.

Actually, it was a lot to be excited about. Well, more scared than excited but you know what I mean. I cleared the words ‘Justin cell phone’ from the screen with a swift press of the ‘answer’ button and raised the device cautiously to my ear. “Hello?”

I heard a quiet, “Hey,” and what sounded like an “um” before I finally got a ‘Merry Christmas’.

“Merry Christmas,” I echoed, trying to form speech through my surprise, “How’s Tennessee? You having fun?”

“Yeah,” He conceded finally, “Yeah, everybody’s here and we just opened presents so it’s cool. How about you?”

“Same, mom’s new boyfriend and his son are both here so it’s a little louder than usual,” Why was I suddenly tongue-tied? I didn’t usually have conversational problems. Unless you count conversing too much, “Did you get anything good?”

“Usual stuff, clothes, cologne, videogames. You?”

“Clothes and stuff too.” What else was I going to say, ‘Actually my mom bought me some really sexy underwear but you won’t get to see it because you’re being an a'sshole right now?’ I could be mean but I drew the line at unnecessary childishness…sometimes.

All this tension was doing nothing for my skin, I can tell ya, and there was yet another awkward silence filled only by background music from Justin’s end while I tried to think of something to say that didn’t start with, ‘So are you still being a jerk?’ Luckily he saved me the effort.

“I had better get going, I think my aunt and uncle just arrived so uh…I have to do the whole…greeting and stuff…um…I guess maybe I’ll talk to you later?”

“Sure,” Why was my voice just above a whisper when I was most definitely not feeling sad? Why did it suddenly feel like we were strangers? “Merry Christmas, Justin.”

“Yeah, you too.” I don’t know why his weary sigh had stubborn tears pr'cking my eyes, “Bye.”

That wasn’t as scary as I had thought…

Actually, it was worse.