Page 40 of Secret Revenge

“Wow, thank you so much for your observation,” I replied sarcastically.

“Why, you’re welcome.” His eyes filled with mirth as I narrowed mine at him.

Leo returned to eating his toast as though none of it mattered to him. Alexi glanced at him for a second and sighed before returning his gaze to me.

“Talk to us. What’s the matter?” he prodded some more.

I sighed and pushed my breakfast aside, dropping the fork in my grasp before focusing on him. I debated telling him and shrugged as I made up my mind to do so. My brothers being gone made it easier. Perhaps my cousins with their famous romantic exploits could provide more insight into my situation than I could figure out on my own.

“ I think I might have fucked up,” I said finally, knowing for a fact that I had indeed fucked up.

Leo looked up from his breakfast as though my statement had shocked him.

“Oh that’s new, you fucking up is unprecedented,” Alexi murmured. “What did you do? Did you make a mistake with the business?”

“No, of course not,” I said, rolling my eyes at such an outlandish idea.

“Of course not, I should have known that was not the reason. What then did you make a mistake in?” Alexi asked.

“I made a mistake with a girl. I think… I think I’m in love with her.” I sighed in defeat as I said it out loud for the first time.

“Ah feelings. Yeah, that makes a lot more sense,” Leo said suddenly, still focused on his breakfast as he poured a drizzle of syrup on what was left on his plate.

Alexi smacked his brother’s arm before I could react. “Talk to us.”

I sighed knowing that now that I had his attention, he would not rest until I told him what had happened.

“I haven’t really let myself fall in love since college. I have only felt that once before and that was for Barbara. She was perfect, everything was perfect.” I winced, wishing that I did not have to talk about this. “The day I proposed to Barbara, I came back home to surprise my parents with the news but then I walked into another fiasco… as was usual for us. Dad was um… hitting mom again.”

I looked at Leo when I could no longer hear his fork constantly scraping on the plate. He was staring at me in shock with a half-chewed piece of toast sticking out of the corner of his mouth.

“I was older and much stronger now, so I got between them and stopped him. I yelled at my father, calling him a monster.” I shook my head as the memory played like it had only just happened. “I wasn’t the least bit surprised when he slapped me. He always did. He laughed at me and asked what I thought I knew of the world and if I thought I was any different from him.”

I chuckled as I repeated his words. “What does a monster give birth to, if not another monster? That was what he asked me. He said one day, I would look myself in the mirror, and see that I had become him.”

I was quite young when this happened… just twenty years old. And the thought of being a monster like my father had been enough to make me reconsider the thought of marriage.

I did not want to ever have to hit the woman I claimed to love. The thought filled me with so much pain and knowing that my mother had endured it for so long in silence was even more painful than the image that had been burned into my mind. I didn’t want that to happen to Barbara. The thought of what I could become ate away at me for months, until…until I broke up with her.

“It probably wouldn’t have worked anyway. We were so young. Still, I was in love with her back then, and I knew that she loved me too. She cared nothing for my background or money. She simply was glad to be with me as I was to be with her. She was the one person I could always go to, but after hearing my father tell me that I was a monster like him, I feared to go near her… feared that I might hurt her if I did.”

“What’s the name of that girl you keep hanging on your arm all the time?” My father asked me. “You feel you’re so righteous,right? Just you wait until the day comes when you see her pretty little face turning red with your hands around her neck and tears in her eyes. Only then will you realize that you are just like me. You will become me because you are my son.’

“Hearing those words shook me so terribly that I ran away from home, ran from the reach of his words but it was too late. Just like the image of his hands on my mother, those words had been burned into my mind and had left a deep scar that served as a reminder.

I picked up my cold cup of coffee and took a sip, frowning when it hit my tongue. I got up and poured the cold brew down the drain before filling my cup with fresh coffee. My father’s actions had had deeper consequences than they would ever know.

Alexi and Leo sat behind me in silence.

I remembered the day I broke up with Barbara, unable to get the image my father had planted in my head out of it.

“Oh, hi Travis,” she said and I pictured her with her full pink lips turned upward into a smile and her eyes twinkling as they crinkled around the edges.

“Barbara… I’m sorry, it’s over.” My grip tightened around the phone as I waited for her to respond, knowing nothing good could come out of this conversation.

“What?!” her voice had lost that cheeriness she answered quietly… brokenly… completely caught off guard by what I just said.

“I am sorry, I can’t do this to you. I can’t be with you, I’m so sorry,” I apologized again knowing that no amount of apology would heal her broken heart. But it was better she had a broken heart than for her to be a victim of the monster I was to become.