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It’s amazing, how quickly Mom can transform from soothing parent to bitter spouse. Both of them have practiced this trick to perfection.
All of his hatred is focused on my mother. This is not a foreign stare, but never before have we all been confined to such limited quarters while rage inhabited him. None of us could possibly guess how he might lash out.
The moment I got home this evening, it felt like he was begging for a fight, it didn’t matter with who—anybody would do, as long as they could bleed, as long as they could break.
Plus, there is the fear that Amy will finally respond while his vision falls upon the screen. The text message conversation we found ourselves in the midst of will not go over well with my father. The context doesn’t matter. He will go mad. Mad like insane.
The way they act around one another, it’s less like a marriage, more like an epic rivalry. Maybe that’s what all relationships are like. Maybe nobody actually loves each other. They just argue and fight and have babies and scream and break things and eventually everybody dies.
Guys who think they’re owed everything just for having a dick. Delusional assholes who think they’re the center of the universe.
“Maybe if Sissy’s butt didn’t smell so bad, Dad. Maybe then we could have kept going.” Everybody turns to me, awaiting an explanation. “Is this true?” Dad says. “Is the smell of your butt preventing us from opening this door?” Everybody giggles, including myself. “I hate you all so much,” I tell them, still laughing.
Her own expression says everything she needed to say, that she is absolutely disgusted with the man she’d married, that she regrets ever marrying him or having his kids. I do not blame her for this disgust, as I too share similar thoughts.
Bobby and I exchange brief eye contact, communicating telepathically the way only siblings can, telling each other that we oughta count ourselves lucky for avoiding
This time, when I punch Bobby, Dad doesn’t even get upset.
Someone should have come by now.” “Why haven’t they, Daddy?” Bobby asks, fully alert now. “Because they’re all dead.”
“Oh my god,” I whisper, unable to stop myself. “It’s not terrorists.” Dad cocks his head toward me. “Then what is it, smartass?” But of course I can’t tell him the truth, despite how bad I want to talk about
it’s been a long goddamn time since Dad’s had any booze, and the withdrawal’s killing him.
he loves the sound of his voice, loves to think he’s so goddamn smart—when, in reality, he’s just another moron.
At first I thought he was dead, sprawled out in the middle of our front yard, face down in the grass. Instead of fear or dread I felt something more peculiar: hope. Yet, when I approached Dad’s unconscious body and discovered he was still breathing, my emotions evolved into a bitter disappointment.
What kind of daughter kicks her own unconscious father in the ribs? I should have stepped on his face instead.
A thick scab welcomes my fingertips like satanic braille.
Mom shakes her head, confused, then bursts out into a similar fit, and I’m in the bathtub, watching all three of them lose their shit for absolutely no reason. Drenched with sweat, pale, malnourished, laughing, laughing, laughing. I open my mouth to tell them to stop it, but instead I start laughing too.
“I’m a good boy,” the dog says from the other side of the door, only it’s not a dog at all, not with a voice like that.
WTH!?
“I’m so hungry, I don’t even think I’ll care. Another day and I’d probably take a chomp out of that creep’s dick.” “Robert,” Mom says, “don’t be disgusting.” “Yeah, Dad,” Bobby says, “dicks are for peeing, not eating.” The three of us burst out laughing, then Bobby joins us, pleased with his ability to still amuse his family.
“It didn’t matter what I felt,” she says. “Guys like Joe—once they want something, they won’t rest until they have it.”
The next day at school, our homeroom teacher informed the classroom Joe had passed away in his sleep. She didn’t specify how, but I already knew the truth. “He choked to death on his own tongue,” I whisper in the bathtub, holding Amy so tight I’m afraid she might break.
I’ve often considered his rage to mimic a demonic possession; how he’s able to flip from perfectly nice and caring husband and father to something far more sinister and terrifying.
“Maybe . . . I don’t know . . . maybe he’ll finally quit and find a new job. Something that makes him truly happy.” Dad lets out an abrupt laugh, and everybody looks at him, startled. “A little on the nose there, don’t you think?” he says to Mom. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Whether or not he came back because he wanted to be with someone he loved as he died, or . . . ” “Or what?” He leans forward, eyes open, expression blank. “ . . . or if he was trying to take me with him.”
“Amy. He died. We killed him.” “I know. We fucked up.” “We?” She nods. “We’re in this together, aren’t we?”
What if something else was inside me, and that’s what was dead? And when I performed the necromancy spell . . . it woke up? And it’s just been . . . I don’t know, biding its time, waiting for the perfect moment to announce its arrival?”
“Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck,” someone’s screaming, and I realize it’s all three of us, together, as a family.
In a voice so low and calm we can barely hear him, Dad says, “Why hasn’t he come to check on you yet?”
The lover she cheating on her husband with I reckon. Does he drink because she's cheater or she cheats because he's a drinker?
“Have I ever hurt you?” He gestures to me and Bobby. “Have I ever hurt your mom? Huh?” “Sometimes you yell and get angry and make her cry,” Bobby tells him. This response seems to sucker punch Dad into silence.
“I tried. I fucking tried. And I was miserable. I asked you to get sober. I asked you to help out more. I fucking begged you, Robert. I begged you.”
“We have to do something, don’t we?” I wail. “We have to do something.”
She cries and rocks Bobby in her arms and his eyes are half-open but he’s no longer breathing, and we all know it, we’ve known it for several minutes now, but that doesn’t stop her from rocking him, from holding him tighter and spitting tears and mucus from her mouth as all of the world’s agony blossoms into its final form.
What I don’t point out is they’re arguing about a goddamn email address less than five feet from their dead son. His body rapidly decomposing and still they have to bicker about things that don’t matter.
Our existence has been a burden on not only them but also ourselves since day one in the womb.
“Brave enough to destroy the world, but too chickenshit to own up to it, huh?”
“Speak like that to my daughter again and I’ll slit your throat.” He grins. “I look forward to the day.”
