It didn’t matter to him, just hours prior, I’d graduated from high school. The fact this rite of passage was the harbinger of my embarkation upon my life’s journey had little to no meaning to him. I should’ve known, right? This was his stage. No matter what, this was his performance. Everyone else’s lives were so much more insignificant to garner any real kind of attention. The people who’d filled my mother’s house to near capacity were there to serve as a platform for the goings-on in his life and no one else’s. Surely, not mine. I mean, what was I thinking? How could I be so self-centered?
This entire gathering was only about him trying to get back at my mom. For what, I had no idea. She hadn’t done anything other than get most of the house remodeled in less than a year. All she had done was turn a “money-pit” into something of real value, something to be admired.
And who could disagree? The house was perfect. She’d done a magnificent job rejuvenating the house, of bringing its’ efficiency and safety levels up to modern standards, while maintaining the look like and feel of a house built at the turn of the twentieth century. He couldn’t even admit it had been her doing. What had he said? The hired help? What a colossal dip-stick.
Now, the dickhead, wanted to sell it.
I didn’t stay too much longer. I wanted to. I did. I wasn’t your typical, shut-off teenager. I love my extended family. I like spending time with them. I like talking with my aunts and uncles. I love messing around with my cousins. I wouldn’t give them up for anything.
…Except to get away from Lenny. I was done with him. I was. He had crawled so far up my skin I loathed being around him, especially with his Craven Raven hanging around like some bird-of-prey hovering over its’ kill.
Actually, if memory serves, it was she who drove me from the house. It was Roxanna who made Myra and I leave for my friends’ party, because I didn’t want anything to do with her.
And Myra… well, my girlfriend wanted to kick her ass.
Sometime after Lenny’s rude announcement, she decided it was time to stalk me. She’d left his side with a whisper in his ear and had come to stand where I‘d been standing, watching my mother and my aunts gesticulate over the house.
I hadn’t noticed her right away and was somewhat surprised when she leaned in and said, “I hadn’t realized you were bigger than your father until now.”
I was about to say something flippant when I noticed it was her and the witty retort turned to sour milk on my tongue. Of course, her statement was rhetorical. Anyone could tell, even at a distance, I was taller, wider and weighed more than Lenny. I’d passed him years ago. Now, with me working out so hard for track, our difference in size was even more exaggerated.
She half-turned toward me, giving me a better view of her chest through the skin-tight sweater-dress she’d worn to the party.
I forced myself to look in her eyes, which were only an inch or so lower than mine. Her heels made us nearly the same height.
She had pulled her hair back in a French braid, a hairdo that had come into vogue in the past few years. I had to admit it was an appealing look. It accentuated her neck line, showed off her tanned skin, even made her jaw appear regal. Her eyes had been boring into mine the entire time.
“I wonder if you’re bigger elsewhere as well…” It was dramatic tailing-off of her words, emphasizing the sexual implications, which was unnecessary.
“Bigger elsewhere”, could only mean one thing.
I was a teenager, but I wasn’t stupid. I gazed back at her, deliberately eyeing her ample bosom. “I don’t bat from that side of the plate, Roxanna.” I didn’t even care if I’d just admitted I’d seen what she and Teej and Lenny had been doing that night. I wanted her to know I wasn’t a freak-a-zoid like my one-time father.
She peered back through her eyebrows. “Maybe not now, but…”
I clicked the roof of my mouth. “You’re sick. Both of you are sick!”
“You sure you don’t wanna… I don’t know… try, at least?” She laughed from deep in her throat.
I was so irate; I wanted to slap her across the face.
She saw this and purred through a smile. “Why don’t you just show me what you got and we’ll go from there.”
I just left. I also left her musing unanswered. It wasn’t worth the effort to put words together and say them aloud.
I meandered through the party, talking to as many people as possible. It was an efficient way of saying good-bye in advance. I knew then I wasn’t going to stay much longer.
I found Myra out back, talking to a knot of my cousins and some of the teenage kids of friends of my parents. I politely extricated her from the conversation and told her what had happened.
Per her typical response to a situation of this nature, she wanted nothing more than to scratch out Roxanna’s eyes.
I thought this was a little too much, so I provided her with an “out”.
“Let’s go to Al’s party,” I offered.
She agreed.
We found my mother, made some hasty good-byes and got the hell out of there.
I could tell she knew something was afoot, but stayed silent for my sake. My mother had always been intuitively astute.
As I sit here and write this, I wish I had sought out Eli just to tell him I was leaving and that I loved him. It would’ve made me feel better, I think.
Why do we always scrutinize every second of a bad situation? Why do we always try to find a way to go back in time and fix it? We know, deep in our hearts, there’s nothing we can do? And yet, we spend hours agonizing over this detail or that nuance as if we had the ability to travel through time. Why do we do that?
I try not to obsess over it too much. But, breaking it down and looking at it for what the night would become, in the least, I wish I had told my little brother I loved him.
How was I to know I wouldn’t get the chance for the rest of the summer?
Lenny and his horny bitch of an assistant had chased me from the house. I left in a hurry, glad to leave everything behind, relieved. Myra’s tiny hand in mine was all I needed.
I was wrong.
~~~~~~~<<< ᴥ >>>~~~~~~~
Chapter Thirteen: Homecoming
“Are you sure it’s ok if you spend the night?” I asked my girlfriend for the ten thousandth time since we’d left our friend’s party. It had only been a fifteen minute drive.
Myra huffed. “Jeez, Jerry, I told you already! My mom thinks I’m spending the night at Susie’s house.”
I frowned, unsure, my hands gripping the steering wheel too tight for comfort. Already, my knuckles were cramping.
“Susie has her own phone line, ok?” She reached over to pry my hand from the steering column after I’d parked my mother’s Chrysler LaBaron in front of my house. “The only number my mom has is the one going directly to Susie’s room. She’s gonna cover for us. It’ll be fine.”
“You’re one hundred percent sure?” I liked Myra’s mother a lot and didn’t want to jeopardize our relationship, or her trust, in any way. I didn’t want to risk losing my girlfriend to one nights’ indiscretion.
“Yes, Jer, it’ll be fine… and, it’ll be wonderful to have you all night long,” she cooed, her hand coming from mine, hugging herself.
I stared at her, watched her eyes roll up into her head as she thought of all the delicious sexual acts we’d indulge over the course of the next few hours. We hadn’t planned on getting any sleep on our graduation night. Hell, no! We were going to spend what remained of it in each other’s arms, sharing our bodies.
It had sounded radical when we had planned it weeks prior, but now that we were about to break about two hundred rules, I was getting cold feet.
Then Myra vaulted from her side of the bench seat, squeezing her petite form between me and the steering wheel. She hiked up her dress and I felt her through her thin, cotton panties. She ground her pelvis into mine, her lips descending. I was lost. I was putty in her female clutches. I would’ve jumped off a cliff if she
’d asked me. Her head came down and I rose to meet her as much as I was able. Our lips touched and blissful electric currents shot up and down my spine. I felt myself enlarge, thickening against the soft folds I felt through the fibrous fabric down below. In seconds, we were consumed.
We emerged from the car ten minutes later, both of eager for what was to come.
We scuttled up the flight of stairs, leading directly from the street, giggling and talking rapidly, warmed by more than just the summer night. Holding hands, we made our way up the walk no more than a few yards.
“I don’t give a shit about this house, you fucking whore. I’m going to sell it whether you like it or not!”
I felt my heart hit the concrete I was walking on. A sickening guilt flooded through me, washing away all the excitement and joy in one, relentless wave. I should’ve never left.
“Don’t you dare call me that, you pitiful excuse for a man!” responded my mother in kind.
From my vantage, I heard the sliding glass doors open and saw her step out onto the deck.
Then, I caught movement out of the corner of my eyes. I turned. I was astonished to see Roxanna come through the front door, her handbag on her wrist, a thin smile etched on the lower portion of her face.
I wanted to yank out her hair by the roots in that instant. She was getting off on my parents fighting. What a sick bitch!
“It’s over, Leonard! I want you out of the house tonight!”
I heard his laugh, drawn out, vile when he’d been drinking too much. “I ain’t going anywhere.”
Roxanna saw us and her smirk melted to a frown. She quick-stepped toward us, in the infuriating way women sometimes do when their trying too hard at looking feminine. “I hope everything is ok, Jerry,” she said the moment she was close enough and didn’t have to speak louder than a harsh whisper.
I felt my head wag from side-to-side. “Just get the fuck out of here, Roxanna.” Though I hadn’t known I could speak with a snarling rasp. It came out just the same.
She paused, sliding her body away from me and Myra, shock written plainly for us to see. “Well… I -.”
“Just go!”
Myra was already muttering at my side. One minute more and this could get real nasty.
Though, I’d hoped for the better, things went horribly.
She went.
I hadn’t known I could frighten an adult. I liked the idea.
That was when I heard the first slap.
My head turned on a swivel.
At my side, Myra gasped, her hand coming to her mouth.
A slap? It had sounded like one, but at the same time it hadn’t. It wasn’t as loud, almost as if…
“You sonofabitch!” yelled my mother.
…I’d heard it the past. It had been a long time, but had heard it before. It wasn’t a slap.
“Come here, you pig,” snarled Lenny.
I’d heard that too. I’d been a boy, but the memory of it came back in a flash – full force, unedited by time. Back then his fists had been balled at his sides, his face a rictus of hate, his eyes blazed like a demon’s. He had given her a concussion that time.
There were footsteps upon the deck.
“You stay away from me, Leonard!”
Everything seemed to slow.
“I’ve only just begun, bitch.”
I was aware I was no longer beside Myra. I had left her somewhere in my wake. I could hear someone other than my mother yelling. The sound was behind me as well. It could’ve been my girlfriend, but I would never know for sure. The sound of my Mom’s screech hit me again, like a ton of bricks. I faltered, almost fell.
The awful sound of knuckles hitting flesh thwacked! in my ears.
My mother’s scream was cut short.
I felt sheer fury race through me. I regained my balance. Everything was tinged with red. My heart was in my head, no longer in my chest. I could feel my legs pumping for more speed, though it seemed like I was going no faster than a snail. I hadn’t noticed that everything else around me had slowed as well, even moreso. I didn’t have time to notice, to care, or even bother. I had to get to my Mom. She was the only thing that mattered.
I came around the house, the deck before me. I could see Lenny bent over, his hand balled, arm bent at the elbow. It was a piston-like movement and it was heading down once again. Though I couldn’t see her, I knew she was on the floor. I knew he had her by the hair, keeping her head in the direct path of his now descending fist. He was going to hit her again. He had all the leverage he was ever going to get. The blow would injure her, severely.
My foot hit the bottom stair of the case leading to the upper portion of the deck. I grabbed the handrail and squeezed. I was ready to vault up and over the balustrade. It would’ve been a tremendous athletic feat. I would have to move my body like a high-jumper. It was a motion I’d seen a million times from the track, watching my counterparts on my high school team as they practiced their field events. I could do it no problem. I would be next to my mom in a flash.
Something out of the corner of my eye distracted me. Instead, of catapulting myself forward, I slowed, my head turning toward the flowing white entity that had emerged from the house.
It wore a nightgown, long, billowing in the warm night air. It was barefoot. It had long hair, wispy, the finest I had ever seen. Its’ eyes were crazed. Its’ hand before it seemed like claws with nails three inches long. It was howling in such an inhuman fashion. When I realized who it was, I was astonished.
It was Valerie.
“You leave my mother aaaalooooone!”
Her voice was so otherworldly, it was ghastly. It was shrill, desperate, raging. It was ripped to the bone.
She tackled Lenny form the side, grabbing him by the arm with both of hers. Her momentum knocked him off kilter. For a moment, I thought they were going to go down in a heap, but Lenny shifted his back foot, bracing himself. The moment he felt resistance, he turned violently to the side. The move was intended to use my sister’s motion against her. It worked. She went sprawling past him and fell hard onto the wooden surface of the deck. She cried out, her hands and knees scuffing.
Lenny gazed after his daughter, hand still gripping a fistful of his wife’s hair. “You want some of this, you little slut?” He struck my mother, hard, right over her left eye.
I was suddenly woozy when I heard the thin bones of her face crack.
He chortled, through spittle and a leer. “I’m going to kill her right in front of you, Valerie. I’m going to kill your mother tonight. How do you feel about that?”
My sister was weeping uncontrollably, her hair obscuring half her face. “No, no, no, no…,” she kept saying
Lenny wrenched my mother brutally, dragging her upon the deck, so my sister had a better view of the carnage about to unfold. “You watching, Valerie,” he asked drawing out the words. “I hope so, because you’re next…,” another chuckle, “Daddy’s gonna have so much fun with you tonight.”
I saw his fist rise again. He was going to hit her once more, in the exact same place. My mother’s head was listless in his grasp. He was going to kill her.
I saw my sister gather another horrified wail within her chest.
I heard Myra scream from somewhere in the yard.
I charged. I couldn’t wait any longer. He was going to kill my mother. I could see it in his eyes. He had crossed that line. There was no turning back for him. He had been flirting with it for far too long now. He knew it. He understood the ramifications, the consequences and for some reason he didn’t care. He was going to kill my mother.
I was accelerating, faster than I ever have, faster than if I’d blasted out of the blocks, gunshot in my ears.
I still wasn’t faster than him, though. He must’ve been gaining speed from the middle of the living room, using the distance between him and us to attain a velocity that was shocking to witness. Maybe it was adrenaline. Maybe it was no more than fear. Maybe it was primal, beastly, the prime directive
in full bloom – to protect what is special.
To him, there was no one more special than her. He adored her. He worshipped the ground she walked on, and now she was going to die.
I had no more than an inkling he had passed me. He came from behind, on my right side, so close he must’ve traveled directly underneath my armpit. He came hurtling forth, a six-year-old. He was barefoot too, in his pajamas, with a primordial ululation upon his lips so strident it sounded as though his vocal cords were tearing.
He left the surface of the deck ten feet from Lenny, who was now turned away. He landed upon his back like a big African feline taking down its’ prey. He did the only thing he could do, being of diminutive size and strength. He began to rip at Lenny’s eyes, his thin nails gouging into his brow, his lids, the bridge of his nose with such alacrity I had trouble following.
Lenny stood there stunned for a few moments. Then, he jerked away from the pain, letting go of my mother.
She fell the rest of the way to the floor, unconscious.
I was no more than a step and a half away when I saw Lenny’s hands grab Elijah by his pajamas. I reached out, fingers made claws as the other man’s grip tightened about the thin fabric my little brother was wearing. I touched Lenny’s shoulder before he spun swiftly, like an Olympic hammer-thrower, firming his hold.
My little brother lost his balance. He slipped further into Lenny’s clutches.
I saw my one-time father’s muscles bunch just before my body collided with his. Even then, I was too late.
Lenny heaved.
Elijah flew.
Valerie scrambled after his tiny form. She missed.
Myra’s footfalls hammered up onto the deck. “Noooooo!” She was so loud.
The Birth of Bane Page 14