88 Tom's POV
I felt like I couldn't breathe as I had told everyone about dinner, still felt my stomach and chest tighten as everyone settled in the dining room. This wasn't right, I was just talking about dinner, not suggesting we all did something permanent and insane. And yet I couldn't help but feel so sick at the thought of telling them that I had cooked something for them without asking first.
I always used to ask, always used to discuss it with my wife. She always told me exactly what she wanted, and lord help me if I didn't have the right things to make it. But I always did my best, and I always asked first, I never did anything without asking, or without being ordered to do it. I wasn't used to just choosing and doing something without anyone's permission, apart from my own. It wasn't... it didn't feel right.
But it was just dinner, not a permanent thing, like I said. It was just dinner. Just one damn dinner. Yet it felt pivotal, like everything rested on it. if nobody wanted that to eat that day, or if they didn't like it, I'd upset them, and if I upset them, it wouldn't end well. I didn't like upsetting people, upset people always got angry, and when they got angry, the shouting started. Once the shouting started it didn't stop, the words cut deep, and I'd be stuck sleeping on the sofa again, being treated like I was completely incompetent and stupid. I didn't want that again, not here, not with these people, not with Danny, Harry and Dougie. They were all I had left, literally all I had left. I couldn't disappoint them, let alone lose them.
"This is really good Tom, did you do put something new in?" Danny asked, nudging my hand gently, stopping it pushing small pieces of mince around the plate. All the worry about this had taken all my appetite.
"N-No. I just, I cooked it like normal." No way was I going to do anything different, especially when I just decided to do something on my own. No way in hell was I going to do anything different.
"Ah, well it tastes really good. Thank you." Danny smiled, taking another big mouthful. He looked genuinely happy to be eating it, but was he really? Was he really happy to be eating it? Did he actually want to eat this meal today? Did anyone?
Harry and Dougie seemed to be enjoying their meal too, and Buzz was having fun squashing it between his fingers before eating it, but was it actually okay? I couldn't, I couldn't tell. They could have been lying to me, but why would they be lying? Why would the lie about something so simple like a meal? I could have made something else if they wanted it, no problem, I had done it before just fine! Were they all just being nice? I couldn't tell! I couldn't tell!
The world span uncomfortably with the stress of it all, an overwhelming sense of doom coming over me in huge waves. I felt like I was going die, that I'd made a fatal mistake and it would be the straw that broke the camels back. But everyone was fine, but I didn't know if it was all an act or if they were genuinely pleased or anything! I couldn't read their faces, not like I could my wife's, they looked happy but I couldn't tell if they were but if they weren't why weren't they shouting?! Unhappy people shouted and made it known and took it out on me because I was the one making mistakes and getting it wrong why weren't they reacting why weren't they reacting?!
"I, I have to go." I had to get out of the room, away from their faces. I needed air, space to escape and think things through. Away from the tension and the fear, from what could cause me harm later on.
Ignoring their calls, I escaped from the room, pushing myself outside into the garden, heaving in breaths, trying desperately to get rid of the need to be sick, to stop my whole body from shaking almost violently. This wasn't right, this wasn't right in the slightest. This wasn't supposed to happen to me, this wasn't supposed to be how it felt to cook a meal for people I cared about without asking first. I had made a decision for myself and it felt awful, this wasn't right. It wasn't right at all. It couldn't be right. Nobody else felt like this, why did I have to? Why did I have to feel like this? Why couldn't I be normal? I wanted to be normal, I wanted to feel normal again.