The Carrero Heart - Beginning (Friends to Lovers)

They live close by, their house practically a replica of this one and I guess they came over for a reason and got into it. My mom, as sweet and unassuming as she may appear has always been a lot like Sylvana. A momma any child can run to, even when they hit their thirties and I guess it’s partly why I wanted to come here and see her.

I needed her.

I sit Bree on the couch as she continues to sob and put a protective arm around her, silently watching him walking around like a caged animal and feel that detachment for him I’ve had for a while, when he’s this version.

“She knocked it over, not me!” He barks at my mom and I scowl furiously that he would dare talk to her like that. The woman who loved and raised him and saved him from a life that was destroying him. My mom takes a deep breath to calm herself and turns to him appealingly.

“Rylanne, you know what drinking does to you… She came here to see me. I think you should leave and let her do that.” My mom is trying for gentle and appealing to his better side, but Bree’s wailing and sobbing seems to be fueling him. He can’t stop glaring at her over my mom’s small height and red hair and it’s agitating everyone.

“So she can sob on about how shitty a husband I am and make me look like an asshole to my own family?” He’s ranting, stamping, and my anger is simmering only below the surface. I have to take breaths to cool myself before I throw something at his stubborn pig-headed face.

“You called her.” Bree sobs softly and then breaks into another pathetic sob and my mom turns on him angrily.

“You told me you cut ties with her, Rylanne? The affair was over. Why did you do that?” She’s losing her cool and I can see him bubbling up rather than backing down and know only too well all the signs are there. Rylanne has been drinking a lot. I can quickly summarize that Bree caught him calling his new side bitch or broke-off side bitch and came running to my mom to break her heart again. He followed in a rage and world war three broke out.

Nice, Rylanne, you complete asshole.

He can’t keep using the excuse of a shitty childhood to justify the shitty person he has become. Bree may be a doorstep, fragile and old-fashioned, but she deserves so much more. She won’t leave him though. She views his affairs as part of his addiction problem and refuses to acknowledge he can control it. He’s a cheating scumbag and she won’t divorce him.

he has punched my dad in the face before. If he ever laid a hand on my mom, I would stab him with the nearest sharp thing. My protector psycho switch is angling to be flicked and I haul her back with me

who it was. She’s overreacting… Making me jump through hoops when I’m doing more than enough to make up for what I did.” He slurs a little and stumbles into the bookcase when he tries to pace back, to where he had been before. More evidence of how wasted he really is, and I cannot even imagine living with someone like him. Bree needs her head

He really is.

me. Ben was always the one to control him, but since he moved out and married Grace and left to go stay in long island, Rylanne has become my

home.” I pull my mom by the cardigan to get her attention, knowing when it’s a futile cause and knowing that if she takes the source of his rage away then he might be more manageable. Not that I want to be left

her and she won’t say anything about it, but he actually turns it off when faced with his siblings who won’t put up with the same shit from him. I don’t want my mom to hear what I have to say to him. They pandered to us all because we were all broken in our own ways and sometimes my mom really needs to bring out the harsh and take us all in hand. She’s too soft and

Bree’s hand as she passes to pull her out of the room. I don’t stop to ponder the importance of that and face my brother instead. He’s

don’t let him see it at all. I pull up all my courage to look brave and lift my chin defiantly. That little warrior inside of me who pops up when faced with a man who thinks he can throw his

Arrick, I wish

an adult. Sober! Don’t you dare come into this home and start this shit here. This is our safe haven, Rylanne, and you have no right to bring this kind of shit into it or bully Bree into submission when she runs here for the same kind of support. Some of us depend on the sanity and calm that mom and dad built here. Who the hell do you think you are? Marriage does not equal ownership. She has a right to come here for the same kind of safety the rest of us do and you should learn some god dam respect for your parents, if not your wife. For all they did for us in bringing us into their home and giving us a chance at better lives. Stop disgracing them and throwing it back in their faces. Grow the fuck up.” Tears bite at my eyes when I say this to him, low and steady, the tone severe and strong and he stops scowling at me and blinks hard before swallowing. I have

what I have been through.” He starts with the same whimpering victim shit that he always plays

you have been through? Is that right? Tell me, Rylanne, how many times did your daddy hold you down and rape you in between beatings, huh? How many times were you defiled and stripped bare of all dignity and made to endure some things so horrific that you wanted to die rather than keep living through it? Being beaten was a far easier cruelty to deal with than what I endured when he was in the mood for something

course they did. My mom made sure all her children were aware of each other’s reasons for their being, to teach us compassion. Never have I said

as my own words filter through at me and I realize how much shit I do throw at Arry because of my past. The way I behave and shut him off sometimes. The diva I can be when I go into defensive mode. I try to push it aside and concentrate on the here and now, but

I waiver a little, but not enough to feel less pissed at him.

Stop making the people who love you suffer because you’re so fucking self-absorbed. Stop making her feel like she’s to blame for your issues.” I bite this sentence at him and swallow hard when a huge pointy arrow metaphorically pokes me in

Likewise, Sophie.