Chapter Thirty Eight

Seven days. It had only been seven long long days. They had finished up with the doctors and returned home, along with umpteen thousand instructions from Jon. She was beginning to hate the apartment she’d lived in all her life. It had become a prison. Dammit it all she hated the sun too. When it went down she had another long long night to get through. After night three she'd given up trying to sleep in the bed, her body kept hunting the heat that was Richie.

She had even thought of breaking Jon's fucking moratorium on going out, but Mom hadn't had a good week and she couldn't or wouldn't leave her alone for even five minutes. The only company she had, were the newspapers who arrived on time and just as quickly ruined the day.

Yeah give them nothing and they will stop. Ha! that had so not happened. The same pictures were being recycled daily, only the stories got more preposterous, always with just enough truth dashed in to make it believable.

The best one to date was how she was fired and why, and how Jon was supporting his mistake. Oh that one grated on her to no end. Mostly because it was true and there wasn't a damn thing she could do about it. Mom had needs she couldn't supply any longer.

She stared at the wall as day 7 turned into night seven on the way to day 8, unseeing when the sun made it last dip into the sky, uncaring that the room was dark. Hell at least in the dark she couldn’t see the fucking walls closing in.

Jon was dropped at the apartment a little after midnight, he was keen to get back there and see CC, she had told him she was fine on the phone but he wasn't stupid,, she sounded more weak and pained than she ever had. He'd hardly got five words out of Frankie all week either, unless they were no, fine, yes, sure and dunno. He pulled his bag out of the trunk and thanked the driver as he walked up to the apartment unlocking the door to find only a dim light in the room, where a figure sat in the corner silhouetted.
"Frankie is that you?" he asked as he could just make out that she was there barely awake. Scattered at her feet were newspapers upon newspapers.

She heard his voice and winced, of all the fucking luck. Finally someone shows and its the warden himself. Her gaze never left the wall, she refused to grace him with so much as a glance. "Yeah."

He placed his bag down and walked over to her turning on more light into the room. "How’s mom?" he asked softly

"Sleeping." She reached over her hand hitting the switch on the lamp, shuttering the room back into it's blessed shadows.

"Honey what's wrong?" he asked as he sat down in the chair opposite her. She seemed too weak, all that Bongiovi fire had flickered out.

"Nothing." She wouldn't look at him, looking at him would mean she'd feel the anger, and frankly she didn’t give a damn to give him that right now either.

"Don't lie to me Frankie, what's going on, is it Richie?" he asked concerned

"Nooooooooooooope." Her eyes flickered for a moment, of course it was always someone else’s fault. She wanted to blast him for the lies, but kept her lips zipped tight.

Jon shook his head. She was obviously not in the mood to talk to him whatever the hell was bugging her. "What's with the recycling? Keeping green?" he tried to make a joke.

Her gaze flickered to him for a brief instant. "Proof."

"Proof of what?" he asked confused; feeling his patience running out, as he was never one for games.

She slowly bent over and picked up the first pile and threw them at him, his nagging finally opening the door to the feelings she'd tamped down all week. "Proof of your lies."
Picking up the next set she tossed those in his lap, "Proof you’re a fucking jackass."

Standing she moved to the set on the counter and threw those his way, "PROOF your a fucking controlling son of a bitch without an iota of understanding."
She moved to the chair on the opposite wall and slid down into its depths, her gaze stormy. "Leave for a fucking week, leave the promise it will ALLL be better if I just stay inside. Guess what Brainiac? IT DIDN’T!"

Jon stumbled back as she threw the newspapers at him one by one. "Frankie. of course they would keep making up stories, I never said that they wouldn’t - if you had gone outside they would just made BIGGER ones. Honey, I am trying to do this for you and your mom, I am not trying to play the devil like you keep wanting to paint me to be," he said trying to reach her gaze but she refused to look at him.

Her voice was whisper soft and full of condemnation. "You weren't the one locked up for a week though were you? YOU got to be outside. YOU got to walk around, YOU got to be alive. YOU condemned me to nothingness. Simple easy words to protect .. Ha.. from what?? God if someone would protect me from you!"

"Frankie, I had to do a job, I had to go and be normal so that they wouldn’t just make up more shit if I went into hiding, they followed me everywhere but I know how to handle them and get them off my tail. You don't and I am not putting you at risk like that. I wish you could see what I am protecting you from but as long as your mother is still alive you aren’t getting that chance, I am not risking it" he said sternly.

She stood, her eyes flashing ice blue and started for the door. "You left me here, left her and went to be normal. wasn't that just grand... Well you can't make me do anything, you cant.. " Her hand reached for the door knob and opened the door, "I’m not a toy you can play with an abandon when it suits you Jon. I have feelings, whether you like it or not. "

Jon grabbed her wrist, "You are not going outside, and especially at this time of night Frankie it's not safe, please god you gotta understand I am not doing this to be an asshole" he shouted at her.

His frustration was reaching boiling point, he just didn’t know what else to do, he knew and believed he was doing the right thing and she just wouldn’t even understand anything he was trying to get across. He could understand how she felt so trapped and cramped in, he really could, he hated it himself but to him he had no other choice.

She yanked away from his arm, her eyes on the open door, her back ramrod stiff. "Ever think, just once, you MIGHT be wrong?" she backed from the doorway he was effectively barring with his body. "Just ONCE did it ever occur to God almighty Jon fucking Bongiovi MIGHT be wrong?" Her back hit the wall and she slid to a seated position. "Get the fuck away from me, don’t talk to me. Prisoners have no rights, I get it now." She laid her head on her knees and turned her gaze back to the wall.

He was determined to be right, she was his prisoner, and there was no Richie to take away the walls. There wouldn’t be for at least a couple days; it was his weekend to be with Ava.

"Fine Daddy dearrrrrrrrest. You want obedience?? You fucking got it.. Deal with it." She kept her gaze on the wall, hopefully the weekend would pass but with her luck it would last a fucking month.