Page 10

Chapter eight

Nadia

Past - The Bonfire

M y arm is on absolute fire.

Dad’s grip is harsher than normal as he drags me back to the truck, effectively throwing me into the cab. I struggle to climb over the center console before he tries to touch me again, quickly dropping down into the passenger side seat and pulled on my seatbelt. My opposite hand instinctively reaches to soothe the pain in my bicep while dad settles into his own seat. Anger rolls off him in suffocating waves. He is livid, I know that, but part of me does not care. He abandoned me on an important day in my short life. He is supposed to be there to support me, whether he resented me or not.

Then for me to walk in on him and his flavor of the week?

Disgusting.

It’s like he hoped I would have disappeared today and never came home after the ceremony. Yet, when I did leave, he went ape shit, throwing a temper tantrum even though I followed his instructions and got the hell out. So here we are, he is pissed, and I am the one to blame, like always.

Listening to the truck fire into a rumble, I stare out the passenger window at the shocked faces of my friends. Their gazes following us as we peel out of the spot I parked in. My friends know my dad is a dick, but this is one of the only times he has put his hands on me, let alone threatened to harm me where other people could witness it. As terrible as it sounds, I supposed I should have anticipated this. Though I am an adult, he will never treat me as one; he only ever belittles me and embarrasses me in front of those that I considered my true family.

Sitting silently, I can hear his heavy breathing while he internally wars with himself over what he is going to scold me over next. Is it the half empty gas tank? The distance back to the house? The time, knowing I should have come home earlier? Who knows. He will find something to nitpick on and I know it’s coming, like fucking clock work.

The tension is so thick I am going to need a chainsaw to make it from one side of the truck to the other. He hates me and I hate him, it is mutual at this point.

“What in the absolute hell is fucking wrong with you, Nadia? Didn’t I raise you better than this?”

There it was, the blame.

Always putting the strife between the two of us on my head rather than taking any sort of accountability for the way he treated me—like trash. And no, he didn’t raise me, my neighbors have. There were so many nights I snuck out to their houses for dinner because my dad was too busy drinking himself into a stupor.

“I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“The hell you didn’t! How dare you yell at me in front of your friends, I don’t allow you to speak to me like that at home, so makes you think I would allow you to take that tone with me in public?”

“All I did was agree with you!”

I turned to scowl at him, but I was met with an explosive pain that radiated through the left side of my face, throwing me to the side and into the door. I immediately reach for my face, feeling the skin beginning to burn, my thoughts struggling to get back on track.

He just hit me.

With his hand, or his fist, I don’t know, either way he hit me.

Actually hit me!

Dad has not hit me since I was a child, and even then, that was with a belt and because I had broken a rule. Which, how do you punish a child when they are learning and not mature enough to make sound decisions. Now though? Simply raising my voice isn’t enough to warrant getting hit across the face.

Keeping my distance, I fight the tears that threaten to sear down my now-burning cheeks. Swallowing periodically, I do my best to keep them at bay, all while his raging voice echoes from his side of the cab. I am unable to focus on him, outside of a few choice words, the shock factor of what has just happened to me is too much to process right now.

“Worthless… just like your mother… should have given you away.”

What a way to talk to your child.

We were the picture of mental health, abusive parents, and poverty, bound to repeat itself time and time again until a force comes in and rearranges everything we know about life. What I would give to belong to a different family, to have been raised by my mother—whoever she was, wherever she was. I use to beg the night sky to send her back to me, or to lead me to her, so I could change my life but she never showed. I am stuck here, with this man who loathes my very existence; the very one who has just slapped me, his only child.

He raved all the way back to the house, until tires screeched across the pavement as we whipped into the drive way. If we were any other family on this road, our neighbors may have been concerned with the commotion, but sadly, this is normal. Domestic disturbances, to the degree the city cops knew who we are, but not once did they ever consider pulling me out of here and saving me from this life.

The fuck were the watch dogs for if they never protected me?

Grabbing the door handle, I try to escape as quickly as I can, but dad reached over and snagged the collar of my shirt. Yanking me back into the truck, the cotton around my neck making me choke, his free hand grabs my face to the point his fingertips start digging into my now tear-trailed face. He glares down at me, disdain in every ounce of the words he growled out next.

“Do I make myself clear, Nadia? You so much as step out of line, not do what I say, and I will throw you the fuck out of my house. You can live in the damn gutter, just like your mom. You will get a job, you will hand over your money, and you will keep that god damn mouth shut.”

“Y—yes Sir,” was all I could manage, my body going limp, unwilling to fight back. My face is throbbing, a headache settling deep in my skull, and I am a whole sissy when it comes to pain which he just keeps causing more and more of.

Staring back at him, eyes filled to the brim with tears, I look at the man that was supposed to care for me. The person who was supposed to protect me from the world and help me grow into a better person; instead of love and adoration, all I can see is unbridled hatred.

When he shoves me, I nearly fell backward out of the semi-open truck door, barely catching myself on the handle and the back of the seat. My stomach leaping into my throat at the sudden feeling of falling, provoking a wave of nausea to roll through me. Righting myself, I finally manage to jump out of the truck and rush to the front door. Just as I start to push through it, the girl from earlier in the day steps out with a disgusted look on her face, like she is playing the role of an unimpressed parent.

Who the hell does this bitch think she is? She won’t be here past morning-time if I know my dad like I think I do.

Glaring at her in return, I make my way into the house and down the darkened hallway to my room. I could not scurry into the safe space fast enough, locking the flimsy door behind me. Like it could ever prevent my bull of a father from barreling through it if he wished. He hasn’t in the past, but if I’ve learned anything from tonight, it was that shit is changing, so he likely would break my door down if I’m not careful.

Shedding my clothes, I look at my reflection in the mirror over my desk for a moment, seeing dad’s hand print appearing on my face along with my bicep. I know my arm will bruise, but I sure as fuck hope my face don’t; the longer I stare, the more I realize I don’t belong here. Half the time I don’t want to continue breathing, but I’m not going to puss my way out of this life, I am going to suck it up and deal with it.

‘Pull myself up by the boot straps,’ says the boomers.

If I was supposed to make it out of Hazelwood, then it will happen.

There is no wishing upon a star here.

Dragging on my night clothes, I snatch up the water bottle I keep close to my bed before digging through the single drawer in my rickety desk, where I hid my ibuprofen. I know I’m going to be in pain tomorrow if I didn’t get a head start on it. Pouring a few pills out of the container onto my palm, I toss them back and chase them with a drink of water, swallowing quickly in hopes to avoid the chemical taste they tend to leave behind.

Climbing into my small twin-sized bed, I pull my thin blankets over my head and sigh. Waiting quietly, I listen for any noise outside of my room, hoping for sleep to take hold. When it didn’t, sorrow set in to the point that I cried myself to sleep.

I hate this place.

The next morning, I opt to keep my head down and find something to clean in the house. It was dirty enough I could always find some sort of filth that needed to be scrubbed out. Just as I had predicted, dad threw the girl out on her ass this morning, which I couldn’t help but grin over. Serves her right, stupid cunt… looking down her nose at me last night, as if I am beneath her.

Nice try, enjoy your walk of shame.

On my hands and knees in the kitchen, I use a Brillo pad to scrub the grime from the linoleum floor. Hoping to get most of the dirt up, enough where dear-o-dad won’t have something new to complain about. I scrub the floors, and he’d bitch about the dust on the fans. I clean the fan blades, and he’d comment on the filthy windows. Wash the windows, and the bathroom would be dirty. Focus on deep cleaning the bathroom, and all of a sudden, the yard was torn up. A never-ending cycle of chores and labor.

What’d the little mice in that cartoon say?

‘Cinderelly, Cinderelly, night and day it’s Cinderelly.’

With a smirk, I whistled the tune.

After a few days, I feel as if I have cleaned the house from top to bottom and was restarting the cycle. The garage needs to be tidied up today, which is where my dad has his model train collection—though he hasn’t touched it in years. The plan is to dust, and ensure things were straight and exactly where he likes them placed, in the event he does decide to randomly dabble with the junk.

Plugging my ear buds in, I grab a Swiffer and get to work. My music playing through the headphones loud enough to block out the rest of the world. That was until life came screaming through in the form of a text message. Making my way over to my phone, I pick it up and scroll through the notifications. My heart sinking as the words lit up the screen.

Kaleb: Hey Nadia, this is Kaleb’s mother, I want you to be the first one to know. Last night, Kaleb was in a car accident and unfortunately lost his life. I know you two were close, we would love to have you at the funeral in a couple days.

I may have lived a shitty life thus far, but nothing had prepared me for the heartbreak I feel reading these words.

My God, Kaleb… he’s gone.

Following a much-needed shower, I pull on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt; hopefully they match. I don’t have the wardrobe it takes to get a good job, but I am going to try either way—whatever keeps my dad off my back and helps me find a way out of here.

Sliding into a pair of clean white sneakers, I tuck the front of my gray shirt behind the fly of my jeans, finishing off my look by tying back my long dark hair and shrugging on a dark blue blazer. I look as put together as I can be. My face is still puffy from all the crying yesterday, but at least the redness had gone away. The funeral was rough, to say the least. Seeing someone you went to school with, someone you had come to care about tremendously, laying cold in a box, isn’t something I expected to experience this early in life, but here we were.

Fucking Kaleb.

What in the hell was he thinking? The roads around here are never clear enough for him to do the crazy shit he liked to do. He didn’t drive a god damn rally car, for fuck’s sake.

My chest ached at the thought of him being in a furnace today. His body reduced to ash and bone fragments, only to be placed in a baggy and then a plastic box. His life is over. He is but memories, memories that are so painful to recount. The warmth of his eyes now gone, the timber of his voice, along with the humor and liveliness he brought to our outings. The way he challenged me and made me feel content with the little lives we had—all gone. Leaving a chunk of my young heart utterly empty.

A knot formed in my throat the longer I think about him, I can’t dwell too hard or I will end up crying more. So, it’s time to go, time to get out of this room and move on. Dad made it abundantly clear that my ‘free ride’ here is over and it is time for me to ‘get off my ass’ and contribute to the household. He hasn’t made anything easy lately; on my back daily about doing what needs to be done. For the most part I ignore him, but when I received the text about Kaleb about a week ago, I lost what little starch I had left.

I’d do anything if it means that dad leaves me alone and doesn’t make me feel worse than I already do. Now I need to focus and find something to occupy my time instead of feeling sorry for myself, instead of hurting.

As quietly as I can, slip out of my room and head to the door. I’m not going to take the truck today, not after the bonfire incident, I rather walk into town if dad was going to freak out on me anytime I take the truck. After about thirty minutes, I saunter into Rigg’s Diner on the edge of town. It is the only place that I know of who would hire on the spot and hire young. The younger you are, the better, meaning you came with no skills and would settle for minimum wage.

Yeah, the owner has a few more issues regarding inappropriate conduct between customers and the staff, but he will ensure the cops remain silent with ongoing free meals. One day that won’t fly anymore, and I hope it happens sooner rather than later.

The bell hanging just above the door jingles as I step inside where the scent of pancakes and bacon assaulted my nose; no complaints, honestly. I can’t remember the last time I actually ate breakfast, let alone breakfast food. Sometimes I will eat a frozen TV dinner for breakfast or a slice of cheese on a toasted piece of bread.

Despite a sticky film on the floor, I walk over to the cash register where a middle-aged woman stands, going over what appeared to be a ticket, likely for one of the tables along the glass walls now behind me. I remain there for what felt like too long until I’m forced to clear my throat. She finally snapped her head up, looking in my direction, giving me her attention.

“Excuse me, ma’am.”

Now ignoring the yellow paper of her ticket book, she scowls at me. Her gray streaked hair pulled back into a bun, a few crow’s feet wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, smile lines circling her mouth from either sucking on straws or smoking because it was obvious this woman did not smile.

“What do you want?”

“Uhm, I was wanting to know if you were hiring by chance?”

She looks me over from head to toe, with what appears an awful like judgment; rubbing me the wrong way. Her glare stops on my white shoes that won’t survive the day if I end up taking a job here.

“You have any skills?” she asked, her upper lip curling into a look of disapproval.

“No, I just graduated. Other than knowing how to hold my own, I learn quickly.”

Don’t ask me why I felt like that needed to be said, perhaps it was the way dad has been treating me lately and I have an instinctual need to establish dominance. Stand up for myself to this woman and her assessing eye.

“Hmph, you’ll need it. The assholes here don’t know how to take no for an answer, and looking at you? They’re going to eat you alive.”

“I’d like to see them fucking try.”

“Atta girl. Come on back behind the counter. I’ll get you set up.”

Well shit, I didn’t know getting a job was going to be that easy.

I spent the next day or two training with the woman, aptly named Joy. She keeps me on my feet, and before I know it, I am slinging plates of eggs and sausage like I am pro. Sometimes I truly enjoy what I do, keeping me busy while my life crept by, especially as the months pass, and eventually a year or so.

Fridays and Saturdays are my favorite. Once the bar closes, the drunks come into the diner where I am able to flirt my way into more tips, but it doesn’t always end the best for me. Occasionally, a couple men get too hands-on, pushing boundaries, and end up getting kicked out. Those nights, usually, I get home late and my dad will be pissed off at me. At first, I didn’t know why until I learned the men I flirted with were his co-workers. I’m sure it is shocking getting to work on Monday, and finding out your daughter was flirting with men almost three times her age for a few extra dollars.

The day he called me a prostitute for simply working at the diner, I knew our relationship was over. In a moment of anger, I followed up with that assumption and fucked his boss, Walter, which was only a week ago.

So, here I am today, walking to work with yet another busted lip from dear old dad. With a shaking hand, I place a cigarette between my lips and light up; drawing in a deep drag, having developed the habit after long nights at the diner with Joy. My knuckles were bloodied, bruised, and sore—the ache in them influencing the shake. A shake that, if I didn’t get it under control, would have me dropping plates and making others mad too.

Seeing me standing outside of the door, Joy approaches and looks me up and down, like always, her hands lifting to rest on her hips in an unimpressed sort of way.

“You look like shit.”

“Thanks, you bitter old bitch.”

“What happened to you?”

“Take a guess.”

“Your old man put his hands on you again?”

Sucking in another pull of smoke, I can’t help but stare down at my filthy shoes and nod. Thinking about how clean they use to be, but now, like my life, they are dark and dirty. I exhaled the smoke after holding it in until it started burning my lungs.

“Hopefully he looks worse than you.”

“He does… this time at least.”

I’ll be damned if he ever lays his hands on me again; last night was the last time. He slapped me across the face, causing my bottom lip to split wide open, and I just couldn’t take it anymore. I snapped. I was on him in the blink of an eye, swinging my fist, letting it collide with his face over and over again until the flesh ripped apart, and I could no longer tell whose blood was whose.

“Come on, baby girl. Let’s get you cleaned up. You have regulars to see.”

And just like that, my life moved from one blurred day into the next. I will never let anyone ever make me feel as low as I do at this very moment. Men, women, it was me against every single person on this fucking planet, and I’ll destroy anyone who treats me the way my own flesh and blood had.

I wish he would fucking die.