“I’m sorry, darlin’ but this means a lot to me and I’m unaccustomed to offloading emotion and shit like that, but you deserve the whole of me before I ask you to be my old lady.”
I stare at him in astonishment. “Old lady?”
I was not expecting that, and he nods, the yearning in his expression difficult to ignore.
I reach for his hand and smile reassuringly.
“Say what you need to, Razor, but I am not demanding it. I’m with you because I want to be, more than anything, and what happened in the past can remain there for all I care. It’s our future that matters.”
“You say that now, but things may change, and you would have appreciated the warning.”
“Then tell me, and my answer will be the same. Nothing you can say will change my mind on that.”
He nods, his gaze troubled, and as I squeeze his hand, he speaks in an emotionless tone.
CHAPTER 51
RAZOR
This is harder than I thought, and I always knew it would be difficult, but I owe it to Sunday to reveal the man she is with.
My voice comes out huskier than usual, and yet I can’t help it as I head to that place in my mind I turned my back on years ago.
“My father was an alcoholic.”
I get that one right out there, and yet she says nothing, merely squeezing my hand, encouraging me to continue.
“Mom bore the brunt of his addiction; we all did when he staggered home after one of his nights out.”
The memories swirl around me like fractured ghosts bleeding venom and pain.
It takes a lot for me to carry on.
“He loved mom hard. Too hard. When he was sober, he treated her like a queen. He was obsessed with her. It grew like a cancer that destroyed all our lives. His devotion was twisted, and she paid a heavy price.”
The water gurgles before me, and I note our reflections distorted by the ripples of the water, yet somehow distancing my mind from the reality of the situation.
“She couldn’t move without him wanting to know why. Even at home, if she moved from one room to another, he kept his eyes on her. Always watching her, expecting the worst to happen. She became trapped, physically and emotionally. She had no friends, no job, and no life outside of him. It dragged her into depression, and she gave up caring. Blade and I were distractions, and he began to resent us too. We took some of her attention away from him. He hated that, and the beatings started when we were young boys. Mom tried to help but suffered the same, and we began to dance on a knife edge not to trigger his mood.”
Sunday lays her head on my shoulder, enough to comfort and reassure, and my heart twists in agony at the thought of ever laying a hand on her in anger.
It’s killing me inside at the mere thought of that, and it’s difficult to speak as I attempt to distance my mind from it.
“It was normal for Mom to face us with a black eye, bruises on her body and a split lip. He was always sorry, cried and begged for forgiveness. But when the alcohol was speaking, he spoke with his fists, sometimes worse.”
I squeeze my eyes tight against the memories, but they edge past anyway.
“I shared a room with Blade beside theirs. We didn’t have much, and it was all they could afford. A small house means noise doesn’t have far to travel, and the sound of Mom sobbing through the walls will live with me till my dying day. He abused her in every way, and she took it – for us. To keep his attention on her, to keep us safe from him. When we grew older, taller and more able, we joined a gym and worked out hard, mainly to refocus our rage and to give us the strength to fight back one day.”
I blow out a breath, the agony of the past haunting my present.
“One night, Blade and I came home and heard Mom screaming. That wasn’t unusual, but we knew. It was time. We found them in the kitchen, and when we burst through the door, Mom was face down on the countertop while he plowed into her from behind. Blade got to him first, and yet our dad was a huge man with surprisingly fast reflexes. He saw his reflection in the cupboard door and turned, a knife in his hand we missed. He slashed at Blade, who took the knife across his face, and yet he held on and grabbed his wrist and brought it down hard on the edge of the counter. I pulled Mom away and told her to run. To get out of there and call the cops from the neighbor’s house. She was terrified but did as I said, and as my father attempted to beat the hell out of Blade, I added my fist to the party. Two against one didn’t end well for our father, and by the time the cops arrived, he was unconscious and badly hurt. Fractured pelvis, concussion, collapsed lung and broken jaw — that was the list the doctor read off the chart when the cops paid him a visit in the emergency room.”
Sunday is crying, her tears splash on our fingers as I grip her firmly.
“It turns out his hold on Mom was too strong, and she refused to press charges or back up our story. She put it down to a family squabble, and all was good. I have never felt so betrayed.”
My voice is strong, but inside I am that boy again, on the verge of manhood, realizing that adults can make a shitload of a mess of their lives.