Paul was a good kid, so he knew there was no way they would kick him out the house. Unless he beat his little sister up, though he occasionally thought that might even be worth it, just to get the chance to get back at her. Obviously, he never really wanted to hurt her but she got him in so much trouble that sometimes that he just wanted to get back at her. He would be in his room playing video games or reading a book when his mum would storm in yelling at him for the dish he had broken or for the mess he had made in Lily’s room. He would tell his mum that he hadn’t done anything, that he sat in his room the whole time but she never believed him. “Why would Lily lie?” was always the response. Paul wished that, just for once, he could prove that she was lying; maybe then he would stop getting the blame for everything and could relax a bit more.
Besides taking the blame for Lily all the time, Paul thought he was lucky. His parents always went out of their way to make sure he and Lily had exactly what they wanted for Christmas and for birthdays. He knew that his family wasn’t exactly rich so that meant his parents were saving and sacrificing as much as they could just to keep them happy. They had done the same for Jack as well, right up until he moved out, even though he didn’t deserve it. There was always chocolate or ice cream to have after dinner. Paul had sometimes complained that he wanted it whenever and not just after dinner but when he had seen the way Gavin's parents treated him.
Paul realized that by comparison, his own parents treated him like a prince. His father always helped him with his homework, his mother always made sure to give him a kiss and a hug when he got home from school. Sure, maybe sometimes he felt a little bit embarrassed, but it was good to feel loved.
“No,” Paul said to himself, “there is no way my Dad would ever hurt us.”
Chapter 4
Gavin ate his dinner as fast as he could, shovelling the next fork load into his mouth before swallowing what was already there. His mother stood behind him with her hands on her hips. She was wearing a flowery dress, her hair was short and dark and her skin very pale, which made her red lipstick stand out more. She looked like one of the wives from a 1950’s advertisement.
“Slow down there, son, no one is going to steal it from you," she said.
Gavin replied with a grunt and continued to shovel the food into his mouth. When he finished he almost ran to the counter to leave his plate. “Thanks, Mum!”
He sprinted towards his room, but before he could get safely inside, he heard the front door shut. He was too late.
“Where are you going, boy?” his father asked.
Gavin’s dad was a big man, very tall and very broad. Up until his injury, he had worked in construction his whole life so his physique was solid muscle. His hair had started to thin at a very young age so now he kept it shaved to hide the baldness. He lost his job three years ago; he was on a building site when a careless work mate turned around and hit him on the side of the head with a plank of wood. The impact made Gavin’s dad lose his balance and fall from his platform, a ten foot drop before he hit the ground.
He was told he had been lucky, the injuries he sustained could have been a lot worse, but his leg was in such bad shape that he was no longer able to work and now walked with a permanent limp. He received a big insurance payout and was now paid multiple benefits from the government for his disability. He now spent his days in the pub, drinking that money away. It isn’t until he returned home that his attention turned to Gavin.
“Hi, Dad.” Gavin sighed. “I was just going to my room to umm, do some homework.”
“Homework, eh?” Gavin’s dad limped towards him. “It’s Saturday, how do you have homework on a Saturday, when I tell you to do it as soon as you get home from school?”
Gavin knew that there was no correct answer to this question. His father had never shown any interest in Gavin’s school work. This was just the small talk that usually led up to the beating his drunken father was going to give him. Gavin lowered his head and turned back towards his room.
“It’s just some I had left over,” he said as he tried to hurry.
“You come here when I’m talking to you, boy!” His dad limped towards him, faster now.
“I’m just going to my room!” Gavin shouted.
He ran into his bedroom and slammed the door shut. He grabbed a chair, ready to prop it up against the door. He could hear his mother talking.
“Not tonight, George, can’t you just leave him alone just for one night?”
Gavin had always resented his mother for the way she ignored the beatings. How could she just sit and listen to it over and over again? His father was bad for beating him but surely his mother was just as bad for allowing it. Why couldn’t they move out and leave his father on his own? Why couldn’t she call the police or Gavin’s grandparents or just anyone to help? He loved his mother, but just wished she would do something to help him, just once, and not leave him to the hands of this drunken madman every night.
He hated his father. He wanted him out of his life.
“Don’t tell me what to do, you stupid whore!” Gavin heard his dad shouting from the hallway.
“I’m sorry,” his submissive mum replied. “I just think…”
“You just think what?”
“I just think you’ve given him enough, you need to stop this!”
Gavin couldn’t believe what he was hearing, his mum was finally sticking up for him. Maybe now his dad would realise how bad he had been and they could be a happy family again, before the job loss, before the drinking.
“I need to stop what? Huh?” His Dad shouted. “I need to stop what?”
“Ow, no George, please!” his mum replied. “I didn’t mean, ouch, please, no George, you’re hurting me!”
Gavin sat on his bed then leaned up against the wall. He pulled his knees up to his chest and held himself and began to rock back and forth. He could still hear the shouting from the hallway.
“How dare you question me?” his dad roared. “I’ll show you who’s in charge around here, you stupid bitch!”
Gavin sat still and quiet, continuing to hold himself. Tonight, he was getting the night off, he thought, and tonight that madman was going to concentrate on his mother instead.
“No please, George! Ahhhh! I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” she screamed.
He couldn’t stand to hear the sounds of his mother in pain; he put his hands over his ears and tried to drown out the sound. Then he realised that if he hid in his room and ignored the beating, he was being just as bad as his mother. Now that she had finally built up the courage to try to stick up for him, he couldn’t just leave her to take his beating. They had to stick together and if they could do that then maybe they could stop his father.
“No, I can’t let him hurt her.” he said to himself.
He jumped up off his bed, ran to his door, and threw it open.
“Leave her alone!” he shouted.
His father stood in the hallway. He had hold of Gavin’s mother, one arm gripped around her neck while he used his other hand to pull her hair back. He looked to Gavin and smiled.
“Oh, so here comes the big man, eh?” He laughed. “Finally grown a set of balls have you?”
Tears streamed down Gavin’s face, he could feel his cheeks burning.
“Just leave her alone,” he said through clenched teeth.
“Or what?” His father laughed again. “What you gonna do?”
“I’ll kill you.” Gavin said.
He was shocked when he heard the words come out of his mouth. He couldn’t believe he had just said that to his father, his tormentor, but he had never been more certain of anything in his life. He wanted to kill him.
“Oh, really?” His father threw his mother through the kitchen door. “I’d like to see you try that, come on then, you little bastard! Let’s see what you got.”
George waved his hand towards him, beckoning Gavin on. “Come on then.” He laughed.
“Why can’t you just go?” Gavin said quietly, but i
n a stern voice.
“Go?” his dad shouted. “Because it’s my house! I’m not going anywhere, now come on and let’s see you take on your old man.”
The realisation of what was happening came flooding into Gavin’s thoughts, he couldn’t take this man on, and he knew he couldn’t. He had taken enough beatings from him to be sure of that.
“No.” Gavin sighed. “I’m sorry, Dad, can we, can we just leave it?”
“Yeah, thought so,” his dad said, almost in a whisper. “Now you go back in your room like a good little boy while I talk to mummy.”
His dad turned to grab his mother again.
“No!” Gavin shouted.
His father turned to see Gavin charging towards him, he didn’t have time to react. Gavin lowered his shoulder and thrust it into his dad’s stomach, then he pushed up with all the strength he had in his legs, throwing both him and his dad to the ground. Gavin sat on top of his dad, and for a split second he wasn’t sure what to do. Then all the memories of the hundreds of beatings he had taken from this man over the years rushed into his head.
He punched his father in the face.
He looked up, shocked, while Gavin punched him again, and again. A smile began to emerge on his father’s face, it was almost as though he couldn’t feel any of the punches. Maybe he was too drunk? Maybe Gavin was too weak? Gavin threw another punch, and now blood began to pool in his dad’s mouth. His father started to laugh.
“Ha, ha, ha! Now, that’s it!” he shouted. “Come on boy, hit me again! Harder! Harder!”
Gavin stopped and looked at his father in shock, was he actually enjoying this?
The second it took for Gavin’s thought to pass was enough time for his father to recover. Gavin felt a shooting pain in the side of his mouth. He heard a crack. Another pain followed in his eye and he fell backwards. His father rubbed his knuckles as he stood up.
“You little shit! Think you can take me on?”
He kicked Gavin in the stomach making him gasp for air.
“Come on then. Get up and fight me!”
He kicked him again. Gavin lay on the floor, dazed, then looked up to see his dad almost foaming at the mouth as blood poured from it; his face was a terrifying picture of rage. His dad kicked him in the side of the head. A bright light flashed through Gavin’s eyes, then he passed out.
Gavin woke up in bed. He had no idea how long he had been unconscious. He sat up and saw his mother on the edge of his bed. She was crying.
“Mum?” Gavin asked. “Are you OK?”
She looked at him, her cheek was swollen and her eye had started to blacken.
“I’m sorry.” She began to cry.
“Mum, what did he do to you?”
“Nothing. I’m OK, Gavin, but I think you may need to stay off school for the next few days.”
Gavin’s head was pounding and he could feel a huge lump forming around his eye. He turned to look in the mirror. He was covered in blood and bruises, his left eye was almost closed over.
“Where is he now?” Gavin asked, scared in case he was going to get a beating again.
“He’s gone now.” his mother replied. “He won’t be back till tomorrow at the earliest. He took all of his money.”
She slid down the bed and held Gavin in her arms. They sat on the bed hugging each other and crying.
“We have to get out, Mum.” Gavin said. “He’s gonna kill us, just like Paul saw on the news. One day he’s going to come home and kill us.”
Chapter 5
Smoke rose from the barrel of the gun like a serpent crawling up from its wicker basket. The killer stood in the corner of the room looking at the weapon in his hand. He looked at his victim on the floor, smoke rising from the hole in his head, blood dripping through his dark hair. It was a boy, a thirteen year old boy. It was his son. The man dropped to his knees and began to cry as the memory of what had happened in the last ten minutes came rushing back into his mind. Jack McKenna had been happily married this morning, hell, he had been happily married an hour ago. So why did he go and shoot his whole family?
He didn’t know.
He stood in a daze, staring at Stephen, the last of his victims. The blood had begun to pool around his mutilated corpse. He knew that his other two sons, Tom and Luke, both lay in the kitchen where he had gunned them down. He didn’t need to go into the hallway and look to know that his wife was face down in a pool of her own blood from a hole in the back of her head. She had been his first victim. He didn’t need to question whether he killed his family, he knew he had. The memory was fresh and it was real. It was as real as the gun in his hand.
No, he didn’t need to question if he had killed his family, but he needed to know why.
His mind raced, searching for thoughts. Had he seen something? Was it something so bad that he had blacked it out and in a blind rage murdered his family? No, it couldn’t be, he loved his family, there was no reason he would ever want to harm them. He was happy!
Wasn’t he?
He paced slowly around the house, looking at his path of destruction in detail. He was hoping for the moment that he was going to wake up and discover that this had all been a horrible nightmare. A sick and twisted nightmare that he would never in his life tell anyone that he’d had. It was just too horrible and people would think badly of him. He stopped and looked at himself in the mirror. He didn’t even have a speck of blood on him; he could walk out of his house now and no one would question him, until they found the bodies.
No, this was a dream, it had to be. He knew with all his heart that there was no way on Earth he would kill his family. The people he loved. He stared into the mirror, gazing into his own blue eyes. Something looked different, were his eyes always blue? Were they his eyes? Was that his reflection? He couldn’t remember anymore.
He pushed the muzzle of the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger.
Chapter 6
Classrooms buzzed with atmosphere, with story tellers and gossips all huddled in the hallway. There were lots of different groups, but all the whispers were the same.
“Did you hear about Stephen?”
“I heard his whole family was killed.”
“I heard that his dad did it.”
“No, his dad was killed as well.”
“No, his dad killed himself.”
“Yeah, well I heard it was burglars, offed the lot of ‘em…”
“Shut up, no it wasn’t.”
“No, man, it was a serial killer, I swear it was on the news.”
Gavin and Paul walked together through the huddled groups. They had both heard the news about Stephen, their fellow classmate. They weren’t really friends with Stephen but they knew him well enough to be freaked out that he was dead. Neither of them had spoken about it yet, they were both working up the courage. The last time they had spoken about something like this it had been really uncomfortable.
Finally, Paul broke the silence. “So, do you think it’s related?”
“Think what is related?” Gavin asked, knowing full well what Paul was talking about.
“Come on, man,” Paul said. “You know what I’m talking about, Stephen’s dad killing his whole family. It has to be related to that other guy.”
“Shut up, Paul, we don’t know his dad killed them, he was dead himself as you well know. And if the other guy was already arrested, how could they be connected?”
“I dunno, could be some weird cult or something.” Paul said, maybe with a little too much enthusiasm. “Maybe all the guys have to off their families. I guess Stephen’s dad just couldn’t handle it so killed himself too!”
“Paul,” Gavin paused, “you're sick.”
Gavin put his head down and walked faster, making Paul almost break into a run to keep up with him.
“Gav, come on, man.” Paul said. “I’m just saying, you know, it’s all over the news that his dad did it and then killed himself. Don’t you think it’s a little bit weird that it’s only a week after some othe
r guy killed his whole family?”
“Yeah, it’s weird, but it’s also sick to get a hard on over it!” Gavin shouted.
“A hard on, wait, what? Shut up Gav! I’m just saying, it’s a bit messed up and these things seem almost identical.”
Both boys finally reached their classroom, and the whispers seemed to have stopped as children were faced with their teacher waiting for them in the classroom.
“Gavin.” Paul whispered.
“What now, Paul?” Gavin answered
“Be honest though, do you think Stephen’s dad really killed them?”
“Well,” Gavin sighed. “That’s what the papers say, isn’t it?”
Chapter 7
“I’m sorry, what did you say?” Paul asked his father, his mind had wandered elsewhere.
“I said eat your dinner, son. It’s going cold. You don’t really seem with it today. Are you OK?”
“I’m fine.” Paul replied.
“You sure? You can talk to us if you want you know. What do you think, Kate?” he asked Paul’s mum. “Does he look OK to you?”
“You know, he does look a bit pale.” Kate replied. “Tom, do you think we need to call the doctors?”
Paul’s mum was always worrying, even the slightest sign of a sniffle and she would have him wrapped up in bed. She was even more protective over his sister. Lily must have been dragged back and forth to the doctors at least once a month ever since she was born.
Paul’s dad replied. “Well, I was thinking more that he looked worried, rather than ill. Are you having any trouble at school, son?”
Twisted Shorts: Ten Chilling Short Stories Page 5