And there he was this young boy, stranger to my eyes...

Exhausted, I fell into to bed somewhere around 10:30 on Thursday night. I fell immediately to sleep which is not my normal sleep pattern. The phone ringing somewhere around 11:15 p.m. startled me into wakefulness, with a feeling of dread, cause you know that the phone ringing after 11 p.m. is never a good thing. My father in law was on the other end and he was asking to speak to AH. I asked why, and if everything was OK with the Prince and he kept insisting to talk to AH. I got a bit nasty and insisted he tell me what the F was going on with my son. He told me that the Prince was being taken by ambulance to the local hospital, that he apparently was in some kind of fight and needed stitches on his face and he wasn't sure what else.


I went downstairs and woke up AH and gave him the phone and then I went to get dressed to head for the hospital to see how this latest drama would unfold. AH came up and asked me where I was going. When I told him I was going to the hospital, he was annoyed and asked why I was going. I mean seriously, is this a joke or what? My son is being taken by ambulance to the hospital, regardless of how minor or major the reason for it, I need to be there. Period.

I arrived at the hospital before the ambulance did. I waited for him to arrive and was relieved to see when he did, he was basically OK. He was bloody, he had taken a nice punch to the face that resulted in him cutting up the inside of his mouth enough to require stitches, and he was drunk. He was mostly coherent by that time, but he reeked of alcohol and his eyes were bloodshot and he had been crying. This is a kid who simply can not handle alcohol at all. We went outside so he could smoke a cigarette and so we could talk and I could try to get an idea of what had happened. He had somehow ended up at his ex-girlfriends (#2) house, and her parents, and my mother in law were all in the ER waiting with us.

OK, first things first, where did he get the alcohol? Not that this is an impossible or even difficult task, but the answer was disturbing to me. Earlier that evening he was at my house to clean out his fish tank full of stagnant water and rotting dead fish after my many, many requests. I had taken La Petite to the movies and was not home when he was there. Apparently AH decided to go out as well. The Prince told me when he was at the house he decided to check and see if his father was still drinking and he rummaged through his work bag and found his vodka, and he stole it. Not for any particular reason, he just decided to take it and drink it. Maybe he was subconsciously trying to punish his father, maybe he is looking for his attention, or maybe he just wanted the free booze. Only he knows the answer to this particular question.

He kept babbling that he was going to get "whoever" had done this to him, as he had no idea who had hit him. I had managed to get from him that he had called his old ex-girlfriend (#1), the one who I have referred to a while back in this blog as the Toxic Princess. (I have spent the good part of an hour trying to link to the post in question: http://cloudiebay.blogspot.com/2007/02/beautiful-disaster.html with a pretty little tag, I just cant do it, sorry) . So either he called her or she called him and then he went to the more current ex-girlfriends (#2) house to be "safe". This is where the story becomes a bit convoluted. The police told me at this point, he was antagonizing whoever it was that hit him, provoking him, saying, c'mon, go ahead, hit me, and the kid hit him. One clean shot to the jaw that sent the Prince to the ground, blood spewing from his mouth. Too drunk to withstand the punch, to identify the puncher or defend himself or recall what had happened.

The ex-girlfriends (#2) parents came out, and seeing so much blood and the Prince lying in a pool of it, they called an ambulance in case he was seriously injured and then called his grandmother. Thankfully, after 3 or 4 hours in the ER, the extent of the injuries sustained by the Prince were nominal. A few stitches to the inside of his mouth, no fractures to the jaw and a very badly bruised collar bone which was initially suspected to be broken. A few Motrin and some antibiotics to ward off infection and we were sent on our way.

Throughout our time in the ER, the Prince kept asking me where his father was. I told him he was home with La Petite. I did not have the heart to tell him his dad had no interest in being there with his son. And I have to be honest, it took every inch of restraint I had in me to hold this back. It just amazes me that this kid is still desperately seeking his fathers approval. When I got home somewhere in the vicinity of 4 a.m. I realized AH did not bother to call or wait up to learn the outcome of his first born sons injuries. How sad is that?