Season 1 - Episode 2 - Prologue

           “God damn it, Terry!  I told you to take out the garbage!” Terry’s father yelled from the kitchen.

            Terry rolled his eyes at Christina.  “I did take it out!”

            “Then what the hell do you call that bag full of trash in the kitchen?”

            “That’s the recycling.”

            “Oh for…” John Trebichavsky sighed and entered the den, where Terry sat on the floor with Chrissy and his two-year-old sister Brittany.  “I thought the blue bin was for recycling.”

            “The blue bin is full, so I started filling up a bag.  I’ll put it on top of the bin so the recycling dudes will know to take it.”

            “You know, we should really just get a second bin,” suggested Vicky, John’s wife.

            “Terry, look into that,” John commanded.

            “Fine!” He agreed, shaking his head at Christina so she’d know he was fully aware of what an asshole his father was.

Vicky came into the den and picked up Britt to give her a kiss goodbye. She said hello to Christina and told Terry to heat up the leftover macaroni for Britt’s dinner.  Then she headed out with John and as soon as the front door closed Britt started crying.  Terry held her and rubbed her back, assuring her that mommy would be back later.       

It was Sunday night and Monday was Labour Day so it was a long weekend.  It was actually Terry’s mother’s week to have the kids but Terry always offered to babysit his half-sister when his brothers were at his mom’s because that meant his dad’s house would be empty.  Perfect opportunity to hang out with a chick.

             John’s house was an imposing greystone in Kirkland built in the early 21^st century while Terry’s mother, Louise lived in Beaconsfield in a little brick house from the ‘70s.  It was only a seven minute drive to get from one house to the other so pretty convenient but still annoying to have to go back and forth between parents.  Terry preferred staying with his mother because she was less of a pain in the ass than his dad and even though she often complained about what a mess the house was, she never actually forced Terry to do anything about it.  His father’s house always had to be immaculate because both Vicky and John were neat freaks.  According to Louise, Terry’s bedroom at her place was a ungodly mess but that’s how he liked it.  At his dad’s place his bedroom always had to be kept neat and tidy and it really had no resemblance to a teenage boy’s bedroom at all. 

Nevertheless, his bedroom at John’s place had a TV and it was in the basement, while everyone else’s rooms were on the second floor.  And the bed was bigger, big enough for two.  It was the perfect place to bring chicks, so regardless of which parent he was staying with in a given week, he often brought girls to his dad’s place after school.

His mother was always a little bit resentful when Terry chose to stay at John’s on one of her nights but she let it be when he indicated that he was going to babysit Brittany.  She couldn’t be too upset with him wanting to bond with his little sister, even if the kid was the product of John’s second marriage to the person Louise referred to as that woman, or sometimes if she was really pissed: the child-bride. 

Vicky wasn’t actually that young.  She was thirty-two, which was totally old, but still young enough to be hot and definitely way younger than Louise, so Terry understood why his mom was resentful about it.  He was also sympathetic to his mom’s anger, since his dad had totally cheated on her when they were still married.  And now the woman with whom he’d had an affair was his wife and they had a brand new kid while Louise was going through menopause.

Still, you’d think his mom might have gotten over it when she had remarried, which she’d accomplished only a year after John had tied the knot.  Her new husband was kind of dorky but basically ok.  His name was Rémi and he’d brought his two kids into the family.  A ten-year-old boy named Olivier and a twelve year-old girl named Danielle.  They were both little shit-heads who liked to speak to each other in French as though it were some sort of secret language the others didn’t understand.  They were even more retarded than Terry’s two spastic brothers, Evan and Joey, who were fourteen and twelve respectively.  This made Terry the eldest child and therefore the one who had to shoulder the most responsibility and do tons of work like changing diapers and driving the kids around and listening to his mom rant about hot flashes and John’s complete inadequacy as a parent. 

            “Sorry about my dad being such a dick,” Terry said to Chrissy as Britt calmed down and went back to playing with her alphablocks.

            “It’s ok, I like your step-mom.”

            “Yeah, Vicky’s cool.”

            It was still weird to think of Vicky as a mom type figure, since she was so hot and everything.  She had long blonde hair and a supermodel body.  But at least he’d stopped fantasizing about her after she’d gotten pregnant.  Even Terry wasn’t that perverted. 

            “She has such nice hair,” Chrissy babbled.  “She kinda looks like Kylie Minogue.  You know, pre-cancer.  Don’t you just love the video for Can’t Get You Oughta My Head?  I always think of you when I see it.”

            Terry never knew how to react when Chrissy said such retarded things so he just smiled and suggested they watch TV.  Chrissy coyly bit her lip and recommended they hurry up giving Britt her dinner so they could put her to bed and then go down to Terry’s room.

            “That works too,” Terry grinned.