Chapter Text

After a while there was a quiet, tentative knock at the door and Frank looked up, startled. He had assumed his mother would just leave him alone and focus on calming Daniel down, and the chances of it being his step-father coming to apologise were very small. Slowly, Frank got up and dragged his hand across his face, praying it didn't look like he had been crying his eyes out just minutes earlier.

Frank's mother launched herself into her son's arms and sobbed hysterically when he wrapped his arms around her after a while, once the initial shock had worn away. Frank felt like telling her to get her face off his shoulder because he had just washed this shirt, but he could tell she needed comforting and so he let her vent her feelings onto his clothes.

Once she had stopped crying, she pulled back a little and wiped her nose, smiling pathetically.
"I told him to go." she said simply, holding her hands behind her back and looking at her feet guiltily as though she was waiting for approval. Frank almost choked on his own saliva, not believing what he was hearing.
"You what?" he cried incredulously, noting the dull blush creeping up his mother's neck and he realised she looked like she was about to start weeping again.

"I ... Frank, I'm so sorry. I can't believe he hit you. But that was it - the last straw, y'know - he's done. I told him to get out and never come back and he left. Are you happy?"

Frank just nodded, his eyes wide, and opened his arms to hug his mom again. He didn't have the heart to tell her that Daniel had hit him plenty of times before, and he also didn't tell her that he had been beat up much worse the day before by a bunch of drunk strangers, but in that moment he was so proud of her, he couldn't do anything but hug her.

Frank wasn't stupid; he knew getting Daniel out of their lives wouldn't be that easy. He would come back later, or maybe the next day, sober, and try to persuade Linda that he was sorry and he would never do it again and that he loved her and Frank, and Frank knew his mother would crumble if she was left alone with him for too long. He just had to make sure that didn't happen.

"Frank!" his mother exclaimed suddenly, snapping Frank out of his thoughts and dragging his attention back to the woman in front of him who now looked a little less like an insecure little girl and more like a fiery, over-protective mother. "What the hell happened to your face?! Daniel didn't do all that!"

Frank gasped slightly, remembering all the other bruises he had acquired over the weekend. He shook his head furiously and ducked, burning holes into his shoes with his eyes. He had been planning to sneak in and cover the worst of it with make-up. That idea was out the window now.

"Frank, baby, what happened?" his mother asked softly, touching his chin with two fingers and lifting his head up to look at her. She bit her lip and her eyes welled with tears again when she saw the state his face was in. "Don't wanna talk about it?" she guessed, nodding understandingly, and Frank replied with a sniffle that was anything but reassuring.

That night, Frank went to bed content and - relatively - happy for the first time in ages. He felt safe knowing that Daniel wasn't in the room along the corridor or down the stairs from him, able to burst in any second and beat the crap out of him or, even worse, his mother. Knowing they were both fine for now was the best feeling in the world, Frank decided. He was asleep in no time, exhausted by the confusing and mentally draining weekend.

Notes