A smirk formed across my lips, I had a moment of clarity.
“What is it, Robert? What do you want to say?” he asked, his cup rattling on his saucer.
“You will fucking burn in hell and so will she,” I said slowly, my eyes moving to where Edith sat.
“You think you know me? You don’t know shit, but one day you will.”
Where had that come from? I looked at the wide eyes of both the Father and my aunt. I loved the words shit and fuck. I had heard them at school recently and vowed to use them at every opportunity.
“What are...? Err, why do you say that?” he asked, his voice shaking, stammering.
“You know what goes on here and you do nothing to stop it. You know what happened to Cara and you did nothing to stop it. Someday you’ll pay for those sins, I can promise you that,” I said.
I got up and walked out of the room, into the woods, the only place I felt safe, secure and the place I knew no one would visit. Edith would never have come looking for me, I could be there all night and sometimes I had, and she’d not noticed nor cared.
What I had said was wrong, wrong in that it meant the beatings became more frequent. I was told it was for my own good, to make me better. I often wondered why I didn’t stop her, I was bigger, stronger, I could have easily snatched that belt from her hands. Yet I sat night after night on the cold, hard, lounge floor with her sitting on the sofa reading the bible to me. I knew the fucking thing back to front and I did not believe one word of it. I was just biding my time.
I became immune to the beatings, I would switch my brain off. I heard nothing. I felt nothing. I would look at my aunt, I would see her mouth moving but I didn’t hear the words anymore. I just stared at her and sometimes I smiled. The more I smiled, the more fear showed in her eyes and the more slaps from the belt I got. I didn’t care anymore. I just stood still, no attempt to run or try to get away and let her get on with it. As Cara had told me it would, that belt had stopped hurting my skin a long time ago.
I found it amusing that Edith talked about and to God. There was no God. If there was, what a cruel, sadistic, evil thing he was. Would a God kill my mum and dad, Cara, have me left here to be beaten until my skin scarred, my body was left covered in bruises? Would He leave me not able to sleep because of one weeping, infected cut or another? Would a God have me slave for a woman who thought she was divine and who thought I was the devil? No, no God would do that and on my eleventh birthday, I finally cracked.
****
I don’t know whether I really meant for it to happen. All I wanted was to stop her beating me, to stop her reading the pile of shit she preached at me. One night I took her bibles, every one I could find, the belt she used and put them in a pile on the floor, in the basement. I found a can of gasoline which I splashed over them and I stood back. I lit a match, watched the flame grow stronger and then I dropped it onto that pile I associated with pain and hatred and suffering.
I watched it ignite, fascinated by the flames, by the colour of the burning books and the smell of scorched leather. I stood back and watched as the fire spread along the line of gasoline I had dripped until it caught the can and the pile of old newspapers. I watched the whole basement catch light. I left the house, quite calmly and made my way outside. I was transfixed by the crackling sounds, the smell of burning wood and the sight as the fire took hold, licking its way over the house and lighting up the night sky. It was a beautiful sight. I watched the house burn, knowing she was in there and I did nothing to save her. I felt nothing. The last tiniest bit of emotion I was able to feel, shut down that day. The aching in my stomach, the pain in my heart, the loneliness I felt, it all disappeared. I was happily numb. I simply made my way into the woods and to the safety of my camp.
I slept, probably the best night’s sleep I’d had in ages. No worrying that she would come for me in the night to make me kneel at my bed and pray with her. No worrying about the sound of the belt as it whooshed through the air before connecting with my body. No worrying about the words that came out of her mouth, how terrible I was, how evil I was, how my parents had died because of me.
In the morning I crept to the edge of the woods. People were milling around, kicking through the still hot embers of what used to be a house. The fire truck had been there during the night but it had been too late. The house was just a pile of ash and scorched wood. I saw the police, I saw the Father and I stayed exactly where I was. I didn’t come forward and tell anyone what had happened, I waited for hours until the coast was clear and then I turned and walked away.
I walked, I hitched a lift where I could, and I jumped into the back of a pick up without the driver knowing until I eventually ended up in a city. I had no idea where I was, but all I knew was that it was better than where I had just come from.
****
It was night by the time I had arrived, I’d travelled all day. I was hungry and I was cold. I found a river, a large one and followed it until I came to a bridge where I settled underneath. I pulled my jumper around me as tight as I could, trying to gain some warmth from that threadbare covering. I hugged my legs close to me, my head resting on my knees and I closed my eyes, I was so tired.
I heard noises, a young voice and waking, I saw a boy struggling to hold onto a plastic bag, two older kids trying to snatch it away. I saw the young boy fight with all his might and a tear run down his grubby face. I stood and walked to the end of the bridge, to where the commotion was. The two older boys stopped and watched me approach.
“Fuck off friend, if you know what’s good for you,” one said.
I carried on towards them. What they were doing was wrong and I wanted to stop it. I felt no fear and it wasn’t until I was close that they seemed to falter, their bravado wavering.
“I’m not your friend. Now, leave him alone,” I said, and I was surprised by my voice.
I hadn’t really spoken to anyone for ages and I was taken aback by how deep it sounded, made worse by the echo bouncing off the walls. I carried on walking, closer and closer to them. I looked them straight in the eye and I saw that they too were cowards, they couldn’t hurt me. I was taller, stronger and I knew that if they wanted to hit me, they could never do worse than what I had already suffered.
No blow to my body would ever hurt me the way that belt did, the way my aunt had, the way my parents had. There was nothing those boys, or anyone for that matter, could do to me and they knew it. I watched them raise their hands and back off before turning to run when they were a safe distance away. In one way I was totally fearless but I was also emotionless, I simply didn’t care and it must have showed on my face.
“Thanks,” the kid said.
I didn’t reply, just gave him a small smile. When I looked closely at him, I realised he was my age, just a lot smaller. No doubt he hadn’t had to cut logs every day of his life. I turned to walk back to where I had come from and he followed. I hadn’t wanted him to follow, I only wanted to stop him getting beaten, to be able to hold onto whatever was in his bag. I sat and he slid down the wall beside me.
“I’m Travis,” he said, I just nodded.
We sat in silence for a while until eventually he asked, “Are you hungry, I have some food?”
I was starving. I gratefully accepted the bread roll from his bag and we ate, again in silence, together.
“What are you doing here?” he asked, eventually.
“Same as you, I guess,” I replied.
“You can’t stay here tonight, the cops will show anytime. This is the place the drunks come and they get moved on. Half the time the cops end up fishing them out of the river, they get so drunk they fall in,” he told me. “But if you want, you can come to where I sleep.”
He got up and waited for me. He had dark blond hair and blue eyes. His jeans were torn and his T-shirt grubby. He had a leather jacket that he pulled around himself for warmth, his sneakers though, looked new. Seeing me staring at them, he told me he had stolen them from a local store, had to do wi
th two different sizes though. We made our way out from under the bridge and followed the river bank for a while.
“What’s this city?” I asked, looking around.
We were walking along the sidewalk, cars passing us in different directions, their headlights blazing like angry eyes. People rushed about, dodging us, tutting if we hadn’t moved out of their way fast enough.
“Are you kidding me?” he replied.
“Do I look like I am kidding you?” I was tired, cold and really not in the mood.
“Well, no you don’t. Welcome to the home of the President of the United States, Washington, DC,” he said proudly and waving his arms around.
Washington, wow. I hadn’t taken too much notice of roads signs, hiding out in the back of the truck on the way there. I’d never been to DC before, I’d never been anywhere for that matter, but I wouldn’t mind seeing the White House, I’d thought.
“You have a strange accent, where are you from?” he asked.
“I came from England four years ago, lived in Pittsburgh until yesterday.”
I didn’t feel there was any need to lie to him, what would he do with that information? I guess my accent must have changed over the years, I couldn’t tell myself. Perhaps it was a mix of English and American.
“What about you?”
“My mom and dad came from Northern Ireland but I was born here, well, in New York,” he said.
We had been walking for a while until we eventually came to an alleyway between two take out shops. Ducking down this alley, I noticed other people either curled up on cardboard near dumpsters or wrapped in dirty coats and blankets in doorways. At the bottom of this alleyway, before it opened up into another street, I saw a small gang of kids. Well, I say kids, they looked more my size which meant they were older than me and Travis. He greeted them.
“Well, what did you get?” they asked, as they rummaged through the bag he held.
Taking whatever food they wanted, they turned their backs on him, huddling together to eat. Travis gestured that we should sit on a stone step, the back entrance to somewhere, a little way from the group.
“What’s with your friend?” one of them said, noticing I was watching them and they sauntered over.
“He’s cool, leave him alone,” Travis said.
“Why are you staring at me?” he asked. I guessed him to be about sixteen, a cigarette hung from his lip.
I didn’t answer, there really was no need. He kicked his foot out, catching mine.
“I’m talking to you,” he said. Finally I stood up, towering over him and took a step forwards.
“If I want to look at you, I will,” I said, staring him down, there was no way I would back off.
I watched him shrivel away from me, his cigarette drop to the floor. That was the second time that had happened that day and I felt a sense of something that I couldn’t put my finger on, I liked it though. I had so much anger inside me, it felt like it was flowing out of my pores. I’d never been one to shout or fight back and for some reason, it was looking like I would never have to.
“Wow, man, that’s cool. You scared him off and he’s a right fucker,” Travis said, smiling.
I returned to the step, this would have to do for the night. However, I would need to find somewhere a little nicer, somewhere that didn’t smell of piss. I could already sleep with my ears active, I’d learnt to do that in case Edith came into my room, back in Sterling. I settled my back against the door jam and closed my eyes.
“I’m Robert,” I said to Travis as he settled down next to me.
I woke to shouts, something foreign. Someone had opened the door I was leaning against and with a broom, was ushering us out of the way. We jumped up and ran, out of the alley into the morning daylight. It was the first time I had been to any city and I was amazed at the amount of cars, of people walking with a purpose.
Some were in suits making their way to work and as we weaved our way in and out of the throng of people, some would look at us with disdain, with disgust in their eyes. It was those people that I hated the most. Those people that I would stop and stare back at until they felt uncomfortable enough to look away and scurry on, like little rats. My stomach was rumbling, I needed something to eat, but I had no money.
“Breakfast?” Travis asked, a smile on his face, his eyes twinkling with mischief.
“Sure, but I don’t have any money,” I replied.
“This is the land of opportunity,” he said. “We don’t need money.”
I followed him to a street vendor selling donuts. The vendor obviously saw us coming, Travis stood out like a sore thumb. As brazen as you like, Travis asked him if he had any donuts he was going to throw away and, if so, could we have them, we were hungry. To my surprise and to the surprise of the vendor, who was expecting Travis to try and steal something, he handed over two donuts. We stuffed them in our mouths quickly.
“Thank you, mister,” he said. “That was really kind of you.”
Before he had finished his sentence he stole a bag of them from the counter top and we ran, laughing, through the streets.
“Easy,” he said, sharing the donuts with me. “If I ask for stuff sometimes they give it to me and when they do, they don’t expect me to pinch it after,” he added, laughing.
He was quite a strange person and I began to like him. He told me that he had run away from home a while ago, he had been on the streets for about a year. His parents were still around, his dad and brothers were drunks who beat him and his mum until one day he walked out. He had convinced his sister’s dumb boyfriend to let him ride with him to Washington and didn’t go back.
“What’s your story?” he asked.
“Similar. My parents died, I came here to live with an aunt. She thought she could beat the devil out of me and one day I had enough. I burnt down her house and here I am,” I replied. I had purposely omitted the part about killing her.
He didn’t look shocked, he simply nodded as if he understood. He was easy to get on with, he showed me around the city, well, as much as his little legs would allow. We stood outside the White House and looked through the iron railings. The head of the USA lived there and I wondered, if he was looking out, did he see two dirty, homeless kids right on his doorstep and was he ashamed of that?
“If I was the President, no kid would live on the street,” I said. I spat on his lawn and walked away.
Since, at that moment, I looked a little cleaner than Travis, the next dinner run was mine. To be honest, it wasn’t hard. Pick a small grocery store where the owner was behind the large counter, designed to stop me getting to the other side but equally, it stopped them getting to me. I would wander around picking up things and placing them in my basket as if I was supposed to be there. Once I neared the check out I would make a run for it. I became an expert at shoplifting although sometimes someone would intervene and grab the basket but never me. Often, I simply walked out without anyone really noticing. On the odd occasion that I was caught, generally one look had them backing off.
I started to understand what this thing was, what made people back away from me. The lack of fear, the emotionless look on my face scared them and I was glad of that. Being able to scare people without doing anything gave me a sense of power, a crucial survival tactic. Travis and I became very good friends. He was fun, he was cheeky but he wouldn’t survive long term. He had exhausted the people he could rob for food so I made some plans for us.
First, we needed some clean clothes. We couldn’t enter any store without raising suspicion because of how we looked and probably how we smelt. Arriving at a local hardware store that sold pretty much everything, we entered separately. With two of us it was easy. I walked purposefully to the counter and asked for some advice.
“Sir, my dad asked me to come and talk to you. We have a splitter at home and it’s not working properly. He wants to know whether we should repair or replace it,” I said.
“What kind do you have?” he asked, probably testi
ng me.
“It’s a Woodstar but quite old. The blade has been sharpened but it’s just not splitting right through.”
We had a conversation about the blade, maybe the angle was off and he asked if the splitter had been dropped. Because I knew the piece of machinery it was easy to keep him distracted.
“Okay, let’s have a look and see if we can find a replacement for your dad,” he said.
I had as long a conversation with the store keeper as I could. In the meantime, Travis exchanged his T-shirt for one of the same colour, placing a slightly larger one over the top, he hid two pairs of pants under his jacket and whilst I was shown some brochures on new blades, he made his way out the door. I thanked the guy, took the brochures and promised to return later that day. I found us a local swimming baths, we snuck in and I made him take a shower. We had no towels so we sat and drip dried but at least our hair and our bodies were clean.
“Well, that was easy,” Travis said as we sat on a bench. “I wonder if we could open those lockers.”
“Trav, in the corner of the room, see, there’s a camera. We won’t get out of this door before we got caught,” I replied.
“Oh, so someone is looking at us, sitting here butt naked right now. Perverts,” he said with a laugh.
Travis was always laughing and being with him made me feel better. He was starting to have the same effect on me as Cara had, he calmed the anger inside me. The vile words that still swum around my head started to lessen and I could think clearer.
“I don’t suppose someone is looking at us,” I said, shaking my head. “Just get dressed and let’s get out of here.”
The difference when we wore clean clothes was unbelievable. No longer did we receive the looks of disgust, but perhaps a smile as we bade good morning to someone. I vowed from that day that people would never look at me in disgust again.
Robert (Fallen Angel Series Book 1) Page 4