Short Story: Z

Parents fall into categories. There are the huggers and there are the hitters. My dad Earl is a hitter. He has been abusive towards me since I was a kid. I am eighteen and still too scrawny to fight back, not to mention too terrified. Earl is a big guy. His white tank tops make up a large part of his wardrobe and I cannot forget to mention his musty denim jacket. That jacket is worn too many days through out the year. Off his scalp grows his long bleached blonde hair. This hair is not clean. In fact it is so dirty that it forms thin greasy dread locks. He has big hands decorated with scars from drunken accidents. He beats me up like its going out of style and every day I worry about my little sister Seven. Just the thought of her growing up witnessing such violence from her makeshift high chair. I live right down the street from my school, Oakland High. Each and every day I run home from school during my lunch and free period to check on her. Earl is supposed to take care of her, but it has not been out of the ordinary for me to come home and find Seven all alone wailing away in her high chair. On many occasions I have to miss class to stay with her. She has always come first. I would never leave my baby sister home alone, especially when she needs to be fed. Some days she goes hours on end without eating because Earl never comes home as planned. I am used to missing school, not being able to go out with friends, or having a life of my own. This is okay with me though. Seven is my little companion and deserves so much more than I can actually give her. She doesn’t have a mother, well neither do I, but she needs her more than anyone.

Our mother was hit by a car when I was seventeen. It has never been the same and I lost much of my youth because of it. From then on I have had to take care of myself. Make all of my own meals, get a job, clean the house, and take care of Seven. I couldn’t rely on Earl for anything. He was always so flakey and inconsistent, but I could count on him for one consistency. His beatings, they were like clock work. Every night he drank too much and then I became the outlet for all his rage.

One night I was in my room doing my homework while cradling Seven. I had been trying to get her to fall asleep forever. I knew Earl was up to no good in the living room. Since our apartment is so small you can hear everything through the paper thin walls. He was yelling because the stove was broken and he couldn’t make his Ramen Noodles. I tried to drown it out so Seven wouldn’t get startled and I starting singing a soft song my mom used to always sing to me. I heard him coming. I put Seven down in the little bed I set up for her and left her with the doll I made.

--Z!!! You broke the stove didn’t you?! You idiot. How stupid do you need to be in order to break a stove?!

-That happened last night when you smashed the frying pan and knocked off the knobs.

-Look at you, trying to blame me for your stupidity! Your not going to get anywhere in life. If I had known you were going to be such a problem I would have left you on the side of the road.

I am sorry you feel that way, I will try and fix it.

He grabbed my arm and dragged me out to the kitchen. Arriving in the kitchen he shoved me up again the wall and hit me, again and again and again.

That next morning I woke up to the smell of pancakes! My dad was whistling in the kitchen to Christmas tunes on the radio. “Z! You awake? Grab little Seven and lets eat breakfast together!” he yelled. I found Seven cuddled up in her crib in clean clothes and a fresh diaper. Dad had already bathed and changed her! Upon my arrival to the kitchen my dad began telling me about a trip we were going to go on. “ Were going to Mt. Shasta and staying in a cabin I reserved for us! Were leaving in a few hours.” I was so excited! We all ate and then packed our bags. During our weekend trip I took so many pictures! I had the best time I had had in years. The night we arrived home I downloaded my pictures to the computer. They were on the desktop in a folder named, “Mt. Sashta Weekend”.

My eyes slowly opened. I had an extremely bad headache. Seven was next to me in her bed beginning to cry. The smell that filled the room was a clue as to why, she needed to be changed. I laid there thinking to myself. We had such a great time on our trip. I can not wait to show him all the pictures I took. He is going to love them. I got out of bed to see if dad was awake and to look at the pictures. I sat down at the computer chair. The pictures I took were no where to be found. I wondered if dad knew. I thought it was very likely he could have deleted them by accident. I got up to go ask him if he knew. I turned the corner to find him passed out on his recliner chair, he must have fallen asleep there.

-Hey dad? Where our are pictures? I had them on the computer last night.

He didn’t move a muscle. What is up with him? Dad didn’t drink last night when we got home..he doesn’t do that kind of thing.

Hello? Dad are you okay? Your scaring me.

His hand was bloody. My head began to throb even more. I went to the bathroom to get some tylenol. When I looked in the mirror I saw why I was in pain. I had a black eye and a bloody lip. Dad couldn’t have hit me? We went camping, maybe I fell and just don’t remember. Dad and I get along so well. He loves me and Seven...he would never hit me.

I stood there as if I were paralyzed by the realization. Then my hands began to tremble. The pain increased by the second and my heart was pounding harder than ever. This couldn’t have not been real. The trip was not a dream, it couldn’t have been. The camping trip was real! We went to Mt. Shasta. The pictures were probably just deleted. No..no. This is not what I think it is. This is not paramnesia.

I tried to think back to the night before, when I was doing my math homework. I walked back to my room sat on my bed and held on to Seven’s tiny hand and took a long deep breath. My memory now was becoming clear allowing me to recall more of what had happened. My dad had grabbed me and brought me into the kitchen to show me the broken stove. Then what..?I know there was more, there had to be. Oh right.. In his rage he threw me up against the wall. His dirty, long fingernails dug into my skin. They went deeper and deeper as if they were tiny knives cutting into cake. His right hand dragged up my arm until it reached its final destination, my neck. That is it. That is all I can remember. Nothing else happened after that. Z, don’t lie to yourself. Something did happen, something worse than ever before. Close your eyes, breath, and think. I looked into to his eyes. I had never looked into his eyes while he was in his rage. As his grip became tighter and tighter a smile appeared on his face and became wider and wider. There was no use for me to yell at him for being a sick bastard, the noise would frighten Seven. I couldn’t fight back, I was too weak to beat his rage and I was slowly becoming unconscious. Black blotches soon overcame my vision.

I knew right away that I had to leave. Earl had knocked me out. Who knows what happened to Seven while I was unconscious. I needed to save her and myself. Earl was not going to stop his abusive ways. It has been this way since forever and he clearly had no intentions to stop. I bundled Seven in her pink fleece blanket, packed her clothes and her one doll. I left everything I owned behind except for my savings that I stowed in a bag under my bed. I grabbed the car keys off the kitchen table and took a look at Earl. He was laying on the torn up recliner chair, his bloody hand was dangling a few inches above the grungy carpet. I opened the door and turned back one last time. I clenched the car keys in my hand, kissed Seven on the head and then closed the door behind me.