Mom was shouting again. I didn’t know what set her off this time, but she was tossing things and swearing at the top of her lungs. Her rants were usually about Dad and always turned on me because I was there to take it.
She grabbed my head and forced my face to the mirror. “Look at yourself. You’ll never be anything. You’re nothing. Do you hear me? Nothing.” Her lips curled up like I had seen in my cartoons, but I didn’t laugh because when she did it, it scared me.
“He took the best years of my life and left me with you. He’s a monster, a fucking devil, and you are just like him. His evil little spawn.”
My body started to shake as the tears fell. I didn’t want to cry, I was nine, but sometimes I couldn’t stop them. Dad never came back; he had moved on and married someone else. He said he wanted me, but I knew that wasn’t true. He left me just like he left Mom. And Mom hated Dad, hated him as much as she had once loved him. And I hated both of them. There were times I even thought terrible things, wanted to hurt them, wanted to make them feel what I felt every day since Dad left. I knew it was wrong. You were supposed to have kindness in your heart, love and understanding, but I felt hate and anger and rage. When she hit me, I wanted to hit her back. When she screamed curses at me, I wanted to scream them back. I had even thought a time or two how easy it would be to smother her with a pillow when she passed out from drinking too much.
“No fucking good,” she said as she grabbed her glass and headed out of the room. “He should have fucking taken you with him, but he didn’t want you either.”
I wasn’t any fucking good. The ugliness that burned inside me was wrong. Maybe that’s why they didn’t want me; because they knew I was fundamentally bad. Maybe I really was the devil.
Only eight months, I only had eight months and I was out of here. The events of September 11, 2001 put things into perspective…as shitty as my life was it could always be worse. And watching the first responders, running into hell to help others…I wanted to be a part of something that made a difference. I couldn’t lie. I wanted to get away from the hell I lived in too. I had met with an army recruiter and had taken the aptitude test. I was enlisting. All I had to do was complete high school.
My home life had gone from bad to a nightmare. My mother was a drunk and the more she drank the nastier she got. I took to staying out late, coming home only when I knew she was passed out for the night. I often hung out near a garage in the neighborhood because I liked cars and working on them. After a couple of months of coming around, the owner offered me a job. I had only been sixteen at the time and didn’t have working papers, but he paid me under the table. I never told him about my mother, but he knew. He even opened a bank account for me in his name so she couldn’t touch my money. And she had tried. Screaming and raging that I had stolen it and that I was no good and then she took it and spent it on vodka. I had gotten into the habit of not carrying much money and often went without food since there was never anything to eat at home.
It was lunchtime and I had forgotten to hit the ATM, so I was going without lunch again. I’d stop later to get something to eat on my way to work. I took a long drink from the fountain and didn’t realize anyone was behind me until I turned to see Cam Ahern. He was in some of my classes. I usually avoided people, but he had the kind of personality that made it hard not to respond to him when he set his mind on talking to you.
“Have you got money for lunch?”
He was also one of a few who knew the situation at home. He had somehow gotten me to talk about it during one of the conversations he had instigated.
“I’m good.”
“No you’re not. I’ve never heard a stomach growl like that. When was the last time you ate?”
I didn’t like pity or charity. “I’m good.”
“Bullshit. You can treat next time.” He pulled out his wallet and I was about to object when my eyes landed on a picture that caused my chest to grow tight and my pulse to pound. She had to be his sister, they had the same eyes, but where his hair was blond, hers was brown and wild with curls, and she was smiling so big it took up her whole face. I couldn’t look away, just stared because I had never seen such unabashed joy before or someone so beautiful.
“Crazy hair, isn’t it? That’s Thea, my twin sister.”
His words jarred me from the moment and I wiped my expression because no way would he want a guy like me sniffing around his sister.
“It fits her personality because she’s a goof.” He handed me a few bills. “Let’s eat, I’m starving.”