Stella

I haven’t let go of the steering wheel since I pulled into my parents’ driveway even though I’ve been sitting here for nearly twenty minutes. The car idles patiently as I stare up to my childhood home. It’s been ten years since I’ve laid eyes on this place, but it hasn’t changed a bit. The house is still white as ever like they had just painted it; the yard perfectly cut, bushes trimmed and the flower garden weed-less. Nothing was out of place besides me.

I finally reach down and turn off the car, pulling the keys out of the ignition. My bare left hand catches my eye and I stare at it for a long moment. My nails are long and painted a subtle nude color, my cuticles are healthy but there’s a thin tan line across my ring finger. It’s barely noticeable but I know it’s all my parents would see. I stuff my keys into my purse and pull out my engagement ring from the zipper compartment. It’s a beautiful diamond ring on a white gold band. I slip it on my finger and ignore how wrong it feels before getting out of the car.

Focusing on the click of my heels against the pavement, I walk up the sidewalk to my parents’ house. I use my hands as a makeshift iron as I try to smooth out my dress after ringing the doorbell. The door opens seconds later, and I’m greeted by a short, smiling woman.

“Hello, can I help you?” She asks me.

I clear my throat. “I’m Mr. and Mrs. Saint-Clair’s daughter. They’re uh…not expecting me,” I tell the maid in a quiet voice.

“Welcome! Come in,” she grins, opening the door for me. I walk in and look around the house. Ten years later and everything is the same since the last time I was here. I wasn’t sure if I should be impressed or scared. “You can follow me.”

I fidget with my engagement ring as I follow the maid through the house. It’s eerily quiet and my heels seem to echo throughout the house with every step I take. I’m tempted to take them off and walk barefoot the remainder of the way but before I can come to a decision, the maid opens the door to what I know is the dining room.

My mother is a slender woman that has sharp facial figures with minimal wrinkles, probably due to the work she’s had done, and black hair that is almost always pulled back into some type of tight up-do. The only warm facial feature my father has is the dimples that present themselves on the very rare occasion of him smiling. It’s the only thing I always wished I had inherited from him but instead I inherited his piercing blue eyes. Both of my parents sat at the table reading the newspaper and both looked up when they heard me enter but neither of them looked surprised to see me.

“I told you she would show up here, Linus,” my mother told my father looking away from me.

My father folded up his newspaper and laid it flat on the table. “Yes, you did, Penelope. Hello, Nora.” my father said. He did not smile at me, but I didn’t expect him to. Just like I didn’t expect him to call me the name I started going by five years ago.

I open my mouth to correct him. “It’s –” but I close it before the name Stella can escape my lips. That’s not what was important right now and if I was going to get through this conversation happily, it would be better off not to piss them off. “It’s good to see you, dad, mom,” I correct myself.

“It’s rude to show up uninvited, Nora, as it is to show up during early morning hours,” my mother tells me.

I haven’t seen my parents since my grandmother’s funeral a year ago and this is how they greet me. I remind myself that I came here because I had no other choice and to turn and leave now would be a mistake.

“Sit down, Nora. Tell us why you’re here,” My father tells me. I do as I’m told and take the seat I sat in for nearly every meal out of sixteen years of my life.

I fold my hands underneath the table. “I need money,” I tell them; better to just get straight to the point.

My mother laughed humorlessly. “I knew it! You completely destroyed the perfect life you had with Liam, didn’t you? It’s just like you to run from the things that could make you happy. You always were a difficult child!!”

“Liam and I are still engaged, mother,” I tell her flashing my ring.

My father cleared his throat. “Nora, Liam called us this morning. He claims you packed your bags in the middle of the night and left without a word.”

Of course, he did. Liam must have noticed my use of the credit card to not only book a flight to Los Angeles but to rent a car. I knew it was a bad idea to use it, but I had no other choice. He must have been sober enough to connect the dots and realize I was headed to my parent’s house; then he – what – called and tattled on me?

“I just need some time to sort things through,” I tell them. I almost believe it.

My mother had a sour look on her face. “If you think we’re going to give you some of our money to help you run away from your made up problems, Nora, you are foolishly mistaken. Liam and his family have been nothing but generous and kind towards you. I don’t know what your problem is, but you will not destroy this engagement due to your fickle-mind!”

I take a deep breath and let it our sharply. “I do not have a fickle-mind, mother. I agreed to marry Liam because I love him –”

“Oh, and that’s why it has been over a year and you have yet set a date for the wedding?” My mother added snidely.

I ignored her. “And I did not come here for your money. I know grandmother left me an inheritance after she died, and I know she left instructions with you to give it to me one year after her death if and only if I remained responsible. Last week was the anniversary of her death, mother and you have yet given me my money. Now, I need it, so I can breathe a little. You can either call the family lawyer now, so we can settle it peacefully or I will call him, and we will settle it my way. Either way, I am not leaving here without it.”

My mother’s frown line was so deep I knew she would be scheduling another Botox appointment soon. My father, on the other hand, was so angry his face was nearly purple. This is not the way I wanted to handle this. I was determined to come here peacefully and smiling, but I should have known that would have been impossible with the two of them.

“Augusta,” my mother called through her teeth. The same maid that answered the door walks into the room a few seconds later.

“Yes, Mrs. Saint-Clair?”

“Call Albert Geragos and ask him to come over immediately,” she demands without taking her eyes off me.

“Yes, ma’am,” Augusta replied before disappearing from the room.

The time until Albert arrives is awkward and so quiet that when the doorbell finally rings, I nearly fall out of my chair. Albert gives me a warmer welcome than my parents did, but I'm not surprised. After all, in my teenage years, Albert made a lot of cash off my parents from all the times they needed a lawyer to keep my misdoings out of the newspaper. “There’s no way in hell a Saint-Clair will be associated with those lowlife’s and their delinquent behaviour!” My father would say every time he wrote another journalist a check. He didn’t consider that the fact I was being associated with “those lowlife’s” was because I was regularly hanging around them.

I always told anyone who would listen that I was born into the wrong family. The Saint-Clair’s were very prestigious and well-respected. Where normal little kids had tea parties with their stuffed animals and imaginary friends, I was having actual tea time – complete with white gloves and an elegant up-do that rivaled my mom’s - to practice manners and posture.

Growing up, I just wanted to have friends that went to the skate park and swam in the ocean. I wanted to run and skip and play but everyone saw me as this delicate little lady when they learned my name. It was almost like royalty, except way less fun.

I was thirteen when I finally met a group of kids that would allow me to hang out with them. Matt, Jimmy, Brian, Zack, and Johnny were my escape to the real world. Besides Johnny, they were two years older than me and completely owned the “we don’t give a fuck” attitude. Maybe that’s what drew me to them, maybe that’s why they allowed me to stick around. I never really was sure. All I really knew was that they were my absolute best friends and finally, for the first time in thirteen years, I felt like I belonged.

The older we got, the more chaos we caused and the angrier my parents got. When I was fifteen, I started dating Zack. I kept it from my parents as long as possible, but they eventually found out. I fought with them to let me live my life as the person I wanted to be, and they fought with me to try and shape me into the person I was meant to be. All I wanted to do was graduate high school, get accepted to an out of state college and get away from the name Saint-Clair.

Zack was two grades above me and was in his senior year when he dropped out of school to tour with his band. This was completely absurd to my parents and they knew they had to get me away from his influence before he came back to Huntington Beach. So, in the middle of my school year, my parents pulled me out of school and put me on a plane to New York. This would be a blessing, however, if there was anyone worse than my mother and father, it was my father’s mother.

Grandmother Saint-Clair was the founder of an all-girls etiquette school in Manhattan with a very strict visitor policy. So, not only were my parents getting me away from Zack and my friends, but they were going to whip me into daughter they always wanted me to be. We were only allowed phone calls to our family, but I used every chance I could to write Zack. I knew he was on tour and it could be weeks or months before he even got home to receive them, but I had to let him know what happened. I knew I couldn’t trust my parents to tell him the truth.

Zack never wrote back to any of the letters though, not weeks, months or even a year after the first letter was written. Then, on my graduation day, my parents told me the truth. “Oh, Nora,” my mother said with her most uptight smile, “you sweet, naïve, little girl. We were able to pay Zachary off with enough money to help him and his…band achieve success. We just needed to separate the two of you long enough to realize what was more important in your lives. Zachary chose his band and look at you – finally becoming the young lady you were always meant to be!”

I stayed in Manhattan after that, never attempting to contact Zack or the others again. A part of me wondered if my parents lied but I knew how important his band was to him. And I mean, he had already left me once to go on tour so who’s to say he wouldn’t do it again for money?

After hours of going back and for the between me, my parents and the family lawyer I finally leave the house with a check gripped tightly in my hand. My nerves are shot, I’m exhausted from the plane ride and drama over the last two days and I want to go home – until I realize I don’t have one of those anymore.

I pull the perfect diamond ring off my finger and throw it into passenger side floorboard before sobbing into my hands. Everything felt so wrong and I had no clue how to make it right again. All I wanted was a bottle of wine and a good cry before I figured out my next steps, but I could still hear my grandmothers voice in the back of my head. “Now, Nora, the only appropriate times for a lady to cry is after the untimely death of a loved one or a cry of joy and even then, it must be done tastefully. On the count of three, you’re going to stop. Do you understand me? Focus on your breathing and when I say three I do not want to hear any more of this sobbing. I want dry cheeks and bright eyes; do you hear me? One…two…”

I take a deep breath and wipe my cheeks dry. “Three,” I mumble.

Notes

Hey guys! So this is a "new to you, old to me" type of story. I was going through my stack of stories and came across this one. Reread it and cringed about 1000 times because of how poorly it was written and decided it had to be rewritten. So, let's see how it goes this time. i was going to change it up a bit and write a Brian/OC or Matt/OC but Zacky V just does not get enough love on here! So, I'll continue writing about him. Haha.

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Title credit: Panic! at the Disco “House of Memories”