Chapter 24
As Kelly rode away in the ambulance Mark decided he would follow her, but only after he finished a simple task. He was gonna find out if this dollhouse really was fucking cursed. Mark grabbed the thing and carried it out to the driveway. He pulled out the big fat sledgehammer that he used to demo. The long handled sledgehammer, and he positioned himself three feet from the wooden dollhouse when the big iron head smashed through the roof. It shattered. Little bits of wood splintering out in every direction like a firework.
And then Beth screamed. Mark’s eyes went wide, as he realized the look on her face was exactly the same as the look on his face when his dad for no reason known to him destroyed his most prized possession. The cycle of abuse. It was strong and well within his soul.
And he had survived it, and so would Beth. With fury, he swung again. This time hitting it like a golf club, smashing into the side of the house. Little tiny bits exploded, tiny pieces of glass and wood flying across the yard. Beth let out another scream, collapsing to the ground and sobbing hysterically. “Honey, I know you don’t understand but I just can’t explain it. I will get you something better.” A sick, calmness washed over him. He had survived it. She would survive it. If this was a cycle of abuse, well fuck it. The last stage of this curse was murder.
He threw the sobbing Beth into her car seat in the car, and went in and grabbed Coralina. Her shirt was soaked in blood, and her nose had either started bleeding again or hadn’t stopped yet. Once they were all inside his red truck and Beth’s muffled sobs was all they could hear. He turned the key until the engine started up its rat tat tat noise again. The clunking and grinding sound was getting louder, and he kicked himself for not dumping in more oil. But he needed to go to Kelly.
He put on his sunglasses, the anger and frustration blazing behind his eyes. “Ladies, I think that dollhouse is why we are breaking all our bones lately. I broke my finger, Coralina broke her arm, and now your mother has broken her ankle.” He said this with the kind of laced anger you would say to someone after they had destroyed something of yours, not the other way around. He and no compassion and no kindness in his voice. In fact, all he could feel was righteous anger. Fury from the heavens. The kind of anger that Christ must have felt at the temples.
Beth did not talk, as she never talked, instead choosing to stare out the window with big loud sniffles every once in a while.
“Shut up!” Mark shouted, his anger boiling out of him. It was coming off him like steam off of the casserole. He could not concentrate. The anger was all he could feel. How could Kelly have broken her fucking ankle! This was going to cost them way too much money. Here she wasn’t even working, and she was was racking up hospital bills left and right. First Coralina, then herself. He had the decency to break a bone and stay home, and deal with it himself! Where was her decency? A driver cut them off slightly, and his red truck tapped against the rear bumper of the car in front of him.
He wasn’t slowing down, he was accelerating almost pushing the car off the road in front of him. The driver in the front was waving their hands frantically and looking really unhappy.
“Well bitch, don’t cut me off you fucker.” He growled, under his breath. He could practically see the hate in the air lingering in front of him, like a spider web. He was clinching the steering wheel so tightly that his knuckles and turned completely white, and his heart was pounding. He slammed on the gas and bumped against them again.
“Dad!” Said Carolina with a frightened little sound, “You’re scaring me.” Said Coralina, her nose still bleeding, her towel soaked in blood.
“Fuck you.” Mark said, and the first time in his entire life use the F word at his daughter, like his dad used to say to him. Cycle of abuse. No use stopping it now. She let out a wail. What the fuck could they do about it? Nothing. That’s what. Eventually the car in front of them turned, carefully driving away from the angry, caustic driver behind them.
Mark found a spot and parked. He got out of the car, and Beth got stuck for a moment in her car seat. He opened the door and picked her up, car seats still stuck to her bottom and he shook her, until the plastic little booster fell inside the car. He set her on the ground roughly. Slammed the door and locked it. “Let’s go.” It took everything in him not to slap her. Both girls were so stunned by the complete fury of their father that they held hands tightly together, fear coursing through their little tiny veins.
He should be out hunting that mother fucking witch. Instead of picking up his bitch. His broken ankle, useless, jobless, practically homeless, bitch. He had, never in his entire life, felt so incredibly furious. It took every ounce of his skill not to knock over something on the receptionist desk while he asked which room was Kelly’s. The secretary behind the counter, looked very concerned at him, as he clenched and un-clenched his fists over and over again, his broken finger sticking awkwardly out. Then they let him go down to her. To Kelly, the bitch.
“How bad is the break?” He said, abruptly, trying to control the anger that he felt.
“They just did x-rays, will find out in a minute.” Kelly said. “But probably won’t need surgery, is what he’s guessing. Probably just need to cast it.”
“Take the girls I’ll be back in a couple of hours.” And he turned and he left.
