The desire to push himself away from these two people, to stride out of the room, to wrench open the front door and run into the street rose in the son, like sap in a tree. And, yes, to strike his father, to do some harm to that body, to take his own fists and arms and fingers and give back to this man all that had been dealt to him. They had, all six of them, from time to time, received the blows and grips and slaps that resulted from the father’s temper, but with nothing like the regularity and brutality of this eldest son. He didn’t know why but something about him had always drawn his
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