Page 35

THIRTY-FIVE

SAINT

GOLDEN GIRL: I blame you for my pizza burrito addiction.

GOLDEN GIRL: I can’t stop thinking about it.

SAINT: And here I thought you were going to say you couldn’t stop thinking about the locker room. Guess I need to step my game up.

GOLDEN GIRL: That was… memorable. Just not as much as that delicious burrito.

SAINT: We’ll see about that, Golden Girl.

GOLDEN GIRL: See you later, Satan.

Grabbing my hoodie off my desk chair, I pull it over my head and shove my phone in the front pocket, then grab my hockey bag before walking out of my bedroom.

It’s rare that I get to come home between class and the rink, but there wasn’t an option today. I had to drop off the rent check to our landlord before tomorrow’s deadline, which means heading all the way back to campus.

At least it’s paid, and it’s one less thing for me to fucking worry about.

Now that it’s done, I can take the next few nights off and catch up on homework and sleep.

Dread, heavy like weighted lead in my stomach, sinks when I step into the hallway and hear my father yelling, the words slurred and thick with drunken rage.

Motherfucker.

It’s fucking four o’clock on a Tuesday, but the last thing I am is surprised.

Just a normal midday afternoon in this fucking household.

Usually, he’s throwing shit at the TV because of whatever hockey or baseball game he’s losing his ass on after betting money he didn’t have to begin with.

That or he’s misplaced the remote or run out of beer.

I can read his moods most of the time from the moment I walk into a room.

Some days, he gets in a few shitty digs when I walk by but leaves it at that, taking out his anger on whatever else is in his path.

And then there are days like today, where Ma and I are the only thing he’s willing to use as a punching bag.

When I walk into the kitchen, I find him cornering her against the cabinets as he yells in her face, spittle flying everywhere, hand raised like he’s going to slap her.

I see red. I don’t even think; I just move.

In a single breath, my hockey bag hits the floor, and I’m barreling over to him, my fingers curling around the T-shirt at his nape, yanking him backward, and throwing him onto the linoleum floor. “Don’t fucking touch her.”

Ma’s broken sob reverberates around the small, shitty kitchen around us, and I swallow, pushing down the rage that’s bubbling inside of me. For her sake and nothing else.

I fucking hate this. That this is our reality, that she has to live like this, and that I have to feel like I’m becoming him just to protect her.

And myself.

“Don’t you tell me what the fuck to do in my house,” he mutters, pushing himself off the floor.

Looking at him now, I hardly even recognize the man he’s become. There aren’t many good memories I have of him, even before the “accident.” He was always cold and never affectionate when I was a child, but now, he’s a shell of a man.

His long, salt-and-pepper hair is greasy and unkempt, eyes dull and glassy, black bags beneath them making him look sickly.

He’s going to drink himself to death.

And the fucked-up part of me, the part I bury deep down because even as much of an asshole as I am, I’m ashamed that sometimes, I wish he would.

I can smell the stench of whiskey permeating off him as if it’s escaping through his pores when he steps closer, narrowing his lifeless eyes.

“How about you get the fuck out of here, Saint.”

Ma whimpers behind me, and he looks past me, nostrils flaring, “Shut the fuck up, boy. All you do is baby him. The boy’s a grown man, and he’s got to learn how to start acting like it.”

I snort. “Yeah, you’re right about that. Just so you know, I paid the fucking rent so you’ll still have a place to sit on your ass and take up space.”

His hands hit my chest, and he shoves me hard. Only I barely even feel his sloppy, drunken attempt because I’m not the thirteen-year-old kid he can beat around anymore.

I’ve got three inches, forty pounds of muscle, and a sober fucking head on him.

“Saint, please, just… just go to practice. Everything’s going to be okay,” Ma whispers as her small hand curves around my bicep.

My jaw feels like it might pop from how hard I’m grinding my teeth together.

I hate this, and I fucking hate him.

“Listen to your mother,” he sneers, eyes glinting with pure hatred. “Go play your little game. Leave. I don’t want you here.”

He’s baiting me, trying to get me to react, just like always.

And I’m not doing it.

Stepping closer, I lean in. “Don’t fucking touch her. Leave her the fuck alone, do you hear me?”

I don’t bother listening to his slurred response. Instead, I turn to her, “If he touches you, call the cops, Ma. Promise me.”

She hesitates, eyes darting to him, then back, but she nods. “Go. He’ll calm down once I make dinner, get food in his stomach. It was just a little disagreement.”

It’s the same thing she always says.

He’ll change, he’ll get sober, he’s not going to hurt me. He doesn’t mean to. He loves both of us.

The same excuses, the same lies. Over and over. So many times that I think she truly believes it.

She’s a victim of his physical and mental abuse, just as much as, if not more than, I am.

And it breaks my fucking heart.

“I love you, Saint,” she whispers.

“I love you too, Ma. Always.”

We can’t keep living like this. Something has to change, not only for my sake but for hers.