12 years ago
Ásta's POV
Finally. Ari was finally asleep. I slipped out, locking the door behind me.
'Dad isn't home. The locks stayed on.'
I Wiped the foggy window with my sleeve. Rain blurred the streetlights, into smears of gold. I counted them like sheep.
'One...two...three...'
Maybe the storm would keep him away.
"Litla."
Mama's voice, thin as tissue paper she hated. I jumped, my elbow cracking against the wall.
'Stupid.'
I ran to her room before the second call could come.
"Yes mama? "
She was propped up on pillows, a angles under a sheet.
ALS hadn't taken her voice yet, not completely, but it had stolen it's music. It had taken her hands, her walks, the way she could hug. The machines hissed and the sharp, clean smell of antiseptic clung to her everything,trying and failing to cover the smell of slow decay.
"Is Ari asleep?" The words slurred, each one a little mountain her tongue had to climb.
"Yeah. Finally." I took her hand. It was warm but the weight was wrong, like a doll's hand.
'Why her? Why not him? Why not me? '
the thoughts weren't just a question, it was a prayer in reverse.
"Your book..." Her fingers curled like like the fiddlehead ferns, managing to brush a strand of hair from my forehead.
"You haven't read it to me..."
"You need to rest, Mama. So you can recover." I said it too fast, the automatic lie tasting like metal.
'Stupid. Stupid. She knows. '
I watched her face darken, the fragile smile she'd put on for me crumbling. That look. She got it everytime I mentioned recovery. It was the look of a person watching a child believe in fairy tales, knowing the monster under the bed was real.
"My pills, Litla, " she whispered.
A tiny, treacherous spark of....something..... Flickered in my chest.
'She asked me. Not the day nurse. Me'
I opened the drawer. The screech was too loud in the quiet room. The smell hit me first, that sharp, alcoholic sting of medicine that always made my stomach twist. I swallowed back the bile, forcing my hand yo be steady as I counted little white soldiers in my palm.
She took them from ne. Her hand trembled violently. She tipped her head back, working her throat in a slow agonizing gulp. My own throat tightened in sympathy.
'How? How do you swallow when your body is a prison? '
"Your father..." She paused gathering air as if it was a final resource "....does he still come home? "
Something hot and bitter rose in my throat. Father. That word was too clean for him. Too kind.
"Yes" I said the syllable brittle.
I stood up, the chair screeching.
'Gotta go. Gotta go before...'
Her hand shot out. The grip surprisingly strong.
"Ásta" Her eyes held mine, clear and desperate. "Remember. You are stronger than this house." I inhaled sharply. The air felt like needles.
'What does that even mean? '
The question bounced in my head as I tucked the keys underneath the doormat.
'Stronger how? Strong enough to stop him? Strong enough to fix you? Strong enough to not scream every night? '
She let go of my hand, her strength spent.
I tucked the keys under the doormat on my way out. Ms. Helga's shift had ended at five. The silence she left behind was different from the silence he brought. Hers was empty. His was held breath..
'Stronger than this house. '
The words followed me, a parable I couldn't understand. Strong enough for what? To survive it? Or to burn it down?
The clock read 9:41. The rain kept tapping.
'Please dont come. Please please please...'
I tried my homework. The numbers swam. My book was better. My real work. The words came easy, pouring out. I fell into them, into worlds where mothers could walk and fathers were just... words on a page.
BANG.
The whole house shuddered
BANG. BANG.
My pencil snapped. Graphite dusted the page like black snow.
"OPEN THIS DOOR, YOU WORTHLESS BRAT! "
Thick. Slurred. Him.
A cold, heavy some dropped in my stomach. I moved slowly, each step a prayer.
'Maybe he'll be gone by the time I get there. Maybe he'll habe fallen in a ditch'
The handle was cold. I turned it.
He filled the doorway, rain dripping off his nose. His eyes red, swimming in their sockets like a dying fish. The smell hit me, sour beer and something sharper, chemical. I dropped my gaze to the floor, hiding the hate that tightened my face.
'Dont look at him. Dont give him a reason'
I moved aside. The clock in the Hall read 10:57.
He stumbled past, a sleep deprived giant and went going straight to the kitchen. I let out a breath I hadn't known I was holding.
'Good. He'll pass out. '
"WHY THE HELL IS THIS DISH DIRTY? "
My blood turned ice. My head snapped up. The sink. Mama's plate. The one with the little blue flowers.
'I forgot. I was supposed to...'
My brain short circuted.
'When did I last eat? Did Ari eat? Did Mama? ' I couldn't think straight, the questions screamed over each other, too loud, too fast.
A glass shattered beside my head. I felt the wind of it on my cheek. Shards skittered across the floor like diamonds.
'Pretty' A distant part of my mind observed, like someone else was thinking it.
"COME HERE" His hand was a vice around my wrist. His breath was a toxic cloud.
"Is it school? You want me to pull you out? Make you stay all day with her? " He yelled in my, spit speckling my face.
'Straight face. Don't cry. Don't you dare cry. '
"I forgot." I whispered, the words tasted like ash. "I'm sorry"
SMACK
The pain was bright. A white hot star exploding on my cheek. The metallic taste of blood joined the ash. My lip throbbed where his ring had split it. 'Dont touch it. Dont let him see it hurts. '
"This whole damn house is falling apart! " Spit flew from his lips " Just like your useless mother! "
The words should have hurt. They always had before. But now... they hung in the air like smoke.
'Wrong, something is wrong with me. Mama wasn't useless. Mama was... Light. '
He stumbled upstairs, cursing. The locked door stopped him. The rattling of the knob. The meaty thud of his shoulder hitting wood. Then... silence. Then, Snoring.
I looked at the glittering glass on the floor. 'Seven years of bad luck'. I picked up the pieces, one by one. The biggest shard reflected my face, one eye already swelling, lip split and puffy. 'Ugly' . I threw it in the trash.
After I cleaned the plate, I went upstairs. Ari's door creaked. He stood there in his dinosaur pyjamas, pressed so hard against the wall, like he wanted to be absorbed by it.
His yellow eyes we're wide, liquid with fear. They went straight to my swollen cheek, my busted lip.
A wave of shame, hot and sickening, washed over me. I'd failed. Again. I'd let the monster in, and he'd left his mark where Ari could see.
"Ásta... Dad's back?"
His voice was so small it cracked something inside me.
'My fault. Should have been quieter. Should have been faster.' I pulled him into a hug, too tight, crushing his dinosaur pyjamas against me. He smelled like crayons and sleep and innocence I was failing to protect.
"Why are you awake?" Stupid question. I knew.
"He knocked." Ari's hands fisted in my shirt, tiny anchors. "I didn't open it. like you said. " His yellow eyes were wide in the dark, pupils huge with a fear he shouldn't have to know.
"Good boy" I whispered, my voice rough. I tucked him back in, smoothing the covers the way mama used to, a ritual I could mimic but never quiet get right.
"Ásta? " His fingers curled around mine.
"Yeah, Ari?"
"Does dad love us?" The question didn't just hang in the air, it pierced it.
'No'
The truth was a stone in my mouth. But Mama said he did. Mama, in her bed of pain,still clung to that lie like a rosary. So I swallowed the stone. Letting it settle in my gut.
"Yeah" I lied, the word soft as a bruise. "He just.... doesn't know how to show it. "
His eyelids were already fluttering. The truth was devastating. I grabbed his superhero notebook. The one with the dented cover from being dropped so many times.
The words poured out. A boy who could fly, a sister who could turn invisible, a house with no locks., where the doors opened by themselves for people who belonged.
But the words soon blurred on the page.
'Superheroes. Flying. Stupid. Who was I Kidding? We were mice in the walls, praying the cat was asleep. '
Then, clear as day, a whisper, not in the room, but in the space behind my ears;
'You locked the door. Good girl.'
My lips hadn't moved. A dry soundless snort escaped me.
'Wow, even my imaginary friend thinks I'm pathetic. '
But the laugh died. A sudden, leaden wave of exhaustion slammed into me, a wave so heavy it felt final. My body turned to lead. The notebook slid from my slack fingers, hitting the floor with a soft thud. My face met the mattress, the smell of clean linen and childish sweat the last thing I registered.
Through the thick, descending fog, I felt his little fingers still curled around mine.
At least I wasn't totally alone.
"The thing that whispered to you in the night, it will be the only thing left to hold you when the world falls away."
-Cassandra Khaw