CHAPTER 73

"It all started last night at the bar." George began, before stopping. "You know what? I don't think I'm the best person to describe the insanity that happened given that Thank God I wasn't there. You should call the bartender. He probably knows better about what happened… what, with him putting in for a restraining order against you and everything."

"I'm sorry what?" Miguel grumbled, completely confused. He had absolutely no clue what George was talking about as he had a 0 recollection of what had happened last night.

"Go on. Call him." George stated, throwing his phone at Miguel. Miguel cautiously picked up the phone and dialed the number he knew was the number of the bar.

"Hello?" The bartender's voice greeted him. Miguel took a deep breath.

"Hi. Yeah, um… this is um… Miguel Diaz. I was…"

"Yeah, I know exactly who you are!" The man immediately shouted angrily upon recognising him. "I put a restraining order on you, and obviously you don't obey any laws!"

Miguel raised an eyebrow.

"Look, I'm, uh…"

"You've got your nerve calling here!" The man yelled, interrupting Miguel as he attempted to apologise. "Cops say you had to stay 50 feet away! Pretty sure that includes phone calls!"

"Listen, I'm very sorry for whatever it is I did last night. I don't have much of a recollection." Miguel murmured. "Uh, so if you could help me and tell me, did you happen to see how I left your bar?"

"Yeah, in handcuffs in the back of a squad car!" The man snapped, causing Miguel's eyes to widen. "You lucky cops came when they did! I was about to kick your ass!"

Miguel rolled his eyes at the aggressive sentence.

"Alright, again, I'm very sorry for anything I may have done." Miguel repeated.

"Yeah, well sorry ain't gonna fix my jukebox!" The man spat. Miguel's eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"Your jukebox? What…"

Suddenly, Miguel remembered…

3 hours into Miguel's night and he was no longer in charge of his body's movements. His mind had been completely drowned by all the alcohol so he was completely in auto-pilot mode as he drifted over to the bar's jukebox. Typing in the name of a song, Miguel stood a step back and began to listen as the music began to ring around the bar. He let the music play for what seemed like eternity, whenever it would reach its end he would pay to restart it. He kept on doing on this over and over again, until a large, scowling, tattooed man walked over to him.

"Hey! Change the damn song! Now!" The man growled at him. Miguel turned to him and smirked drunkenly.

"No." He grunted in reply. The man snarled at him and walked nearer, standing with his face a mere couple of inches from Miguel.

"I said… turn. it. off." He spat. Miguel scowled back at him.

"It's my girlfriend's favourite song so you're damn right I'm gonna keep listening to it if I want to." Miguel snarled at him. It was the song I Won't Give Up, the same song Miguel had heard Emily sing the night they met, and the song they had danced to during the final song of the Valentine's Day dance, the last day they were together before the accident. It was Emily's favourite song, and as days went on, Miguel found himself listening to it more and more as it reminded him of her. So as the man demanded he change the song, Miguel paid no attention to him.

"I'm going to give you three seconds." The man snapped. "3… 2… 1…"

Miguel merely rolled his eyes at him and then turned away from him, facing the jukebox again. At that point, the other man was done talking. He grabbed Miguel by his collar but before he could do anything, Miguel, even in his drunken state, was able to use his skill to overpower him. He clasped the hand the man had placed on his shoulder so the man couldn't let go, before shifting sideways and then driving the man head-first into the jukebox.

The bar was filled with an echoing SMASH as the man's head went through the glass face of the jukebox, smashing it to pieces. The whole bar immediately went dead silent in shock. Well, apart from the sound of the man coughing and spluttering as he stumbled backwards, moving shards of glass from the side of his face. Groaning in pain, the man stared daggers at Miguel before charging at him…

Once again, Miguel managed to overpower the now extremely weakened and stumbling man with relative ease. He blocked the man's heavy punch, before sending two punches of his own. The hook uppercut combo hit the mark perfectly, and the man was sent crashing backwards into the table behind him, destroying the table in the loud CRASH. He was out of it, knocked completely unconscious.

At this point, the fighting truly began. As soon as the man was knocked out, several other men in the bar advanced on him. In his current state of intoxication, Miguel knew he wouldn't be able to physically take them all on at once, so he had to get creative. He picked up a chair that was in the center of the restaurant part of the bar, and held it aloft like a baseball bat.

"You guys wanna tussle? Let's tussle." He growled, before stumbling over to the first person and swinging the chair with all his might. He made contact right with the man's skull and had him unconscious before he even hit the ground. He continued doing this with person after person who approached him, smashing more people than he could count. The bartender had called the cops and was waiting impatiently for them to arrive as the property damage bill rose higher and higher with every passing second. Soon, the cops finally made it, dragging Miguel out of the bar and throwing him into a squad car, driving off into the night…

"So yeah, the cops then took you back to the station, called your mom, and… yeah, that was pretty much it." George finished the story. "You know you're lucky none of the men pressed charges. Any of the men you've fought in the past week. Because one of them could press charges and you could land in juvie!"

Miguel shrugged. Honestly, at this point, juvie didn't sound so bad. Constant fighting, and he wouldn't have to face all of the people who he had failed every day. Only bad thing was there was no alcohol.

Suddenly, a thought occurred to Miguel.

"Wait… you said the cops called my mom. Why am I here then? Why aren't I at home?"

George looked down and sighed.

"Look… your mom called me last night and told me to join her at the station and asked if I could bring you here because… because she didn't want you at her house."

Miguel furrowed his eyebrows in confusion.

"Huh? Why not?" He asked, confused. George sighed.

"Because she's sick and tired of your shit, okay?!" George exclaimed. "You've been an absolute dick to everyone who cares about you and people's patience doesn't last forever!"

George sighed as he saw the look on Miguel's face at his harsh words and continued in a softer tone.

"Look, Miguel, I know you're going through a lot, but you need to look from her point of view. How do you think your mom feels when she has to get a call from the cops that you've snuck into a bar and assaulted a bunch of guys?" George said. Miguel looked up again, a hard expression on his face now.

"I think she realises I'm in a lot of pain right now, and if she can't see that, she's blind." Miguel murmured roughly, before slowly standing up and walking towards the front door. "Thanks for picking me up from the station, man. See you."

With that, Miguel walked out of the house and headed back home for an inevitable showdown with his mother…

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Miguel walked into the house that afternoon, and at the beginning, he thought the house was empty. All of the lights were off, and the house was dead quiet. However, as he walked into the kitchen, he realised he was wrong. The lights snapped on and he found himself standing opposite his mother, who was sitting at the kitchen table, staring at him.

"Sit down." She said, in a firm tone Miguel had rarely heard from her. He knew immediately that he wasn't going to be able to walk away, and he was definitely in for a confrontation.

Miguel sat opposite her at the table and Carmen stared at him in silence for several moments. She looked at her son, looked at the dishevelled, emotionally broken young man before her, and her heart ached. She couldn't believe things had gotten so bad so quickly. She wanted, more than anything, to help him but there was literally no way she could. He didn't want help, and he was smart enough to avoid anything he didn't want to do. This was Carmen's hail mary to try and help Miguel, so she took a deep, shaky breath as she began to break the deafening silence.

"Miguel… do you have any idea how scared I was last night?" Carmen started. "To be woken up at midnight by a call from the police, telling me that my son physically assaulted 5 people and is being detained at the station."

"Mom, listen, I…" Miguel started, but Carmen raised a hand to cut him off.

"No. Stop. My turn to talk." Carmen murmured. "Do you have any idea how bad it could have gone? Miguel… things are different for you than they are for all of your friends because of where we're from and what we look like! The police treat our people different, you know that?! Had it been a racist policeman, you could've been seriously injured if not killed!"

"Yeah, I get it mom." Miguel murmured.

"No, you don't get it!" Carmen exclaimed. "We're not citizens, Miguel! If you go too far, you'll get deported! No, no, WE'LL get deported! They'll take our green cards and send us back to Ecuador! Is that what you want?"

Miguel glared at her.

"Come on mom, of course that's not what I want." Miguel snapped.

"Then everything you've been doing this past week… it needs to stop!" Carmen demanded. "You need help, Miguel. Now look, I've been talking to a psychologist in the hospital who…"

"I'm gonna stop you there, mom. I'm not talking to any therapist." Miguel murmured. Carmen shook her head vehemently.

"Yes. You are." Carmen stated. Miguel raised an eyebrow and laughed.

"Right, and who's going to make me?" Miguel remarked. "Look, mom, I don't need some kook who has been through absolutely nothing in their life to sit opposite me and tell me that it gets better. It's a waste of my time, your money, so I'm not going."

"Miguel, you are going and that's not a debate. I'm your mother and you will listen to me." She stated in a commanding, no-nonsense voice. Miguel, however, was unfazed.

"Yeah, well, news flash mom… I'm not a kid anymore. You can't force me to do whatever you want me to do! I'm practically an adult! I'm independent!"

It was Carmen's turn to laugh at this.

"That right? Well, last time I checked independent adults don't live in their mom's house. So… leave." Carmen responded, coolly. Miguel's jaw dropped. He was extremely taken aback.

"I'm… I'm… what?" Miguel stammered, struggling for words. Carmen shrugged.

"You heard me. If you're going to be a kid, my kid, you are welcome to stay in my house. However, that also means you follow my rules. I don't think it's unreasonable to say if you want to live at home, you sit down with a therapist for an hour or two every two weeks."

"Let's agree to disagree." Miguel grunted. Carmen sighed.

"BUT… if you want to continue to abstain from therapy… fine. I won't stop you. You are, after all, turning 18 in November. But if you're going to be considered an adult, you don't sleep under my roof. Eat my food. Take my car. So which is it Miguel?"

There it was. The inevitable ultimatom. Carmen had finally reached her limit with Miguel so she had laid down the law. Miguel scowled at this. He did NOT want to see a therapist. His mom was acting like she had the power to control his whole life when she wasn't the one who would be picking up the pieces when it all goes to shit. His problems, his decisions.

Miguel gulped and thought for several moments, before looking back up at his mother, a steely expression on his face.

"Fine. Just let me pack a bag or two. I'll be out by tonight…"