Monk by Ivy Black
Chapter Twelve
Monk
“When are you gonna get a job and start pitchin’ in around here?”
Hunched over the table, I look at the diploma sitting there. I know I’m an idiot for even expecting so much as a word of congratulations, but the confirmation is like a kick in the nuts. My parents didn’t even bother coming to my graduation. Not that I really expected them to. But seeing everybody at the ceremony with their families… that kind of pain hurts worse than his fists ever have.
Pushing through my anger and hurt, I eat my cereal as I try to ignore my dad. It’s not even noon yet, and already he smells like he’s had a few. He doesn’t usually get belligerently shitfaced until after noon, so I can only assume he and my mom got into some drunken, drug-fueled fight last night either about money—specifically the lack of it—or he wanted to get laid and she wouldn’t play ball.
When they fight, which is often, it’s usually one or the other of those things. I’ll assume since he’s getting on me about contributing to the household, their fight was about money. I don’t blame her for not wanting to screw him though. He’s fat, sweaty, smells like he hasn’t showered in a week, and his breath stinks worse than a sewer. Not that she’s a prize in that regard, either.
“You listenin’ to me, boy?”
“Trying not to.”
He grabs my bowl out from under me and hurls it against the wall. It shatters, spraying milk, glass, and Fruit Loops all over the kitchen. At least I got most of the bowl down before he did that.
“All you do is take. You take, take, take. It’s about time you start givin’ back, goddammit.”
“Take? That would imply you had something to give. Near as I can tell, since mom is the only one who works, you take just as much as I do. I’m your kid, what’s your excuse?”
My father cuffs me upside the head. “Watch your mouth, boy.”
The anger, my constant companion in life, is now bubbling, filling my veins with that dark poison. Growing up in this house, with parents who are junkies, drunks, and abusive as hell, hasn’t exactly taught me to feel anything but anger. They’ve taught me to hate and little else.
This isn’t the life I want to live, and I’ve tried to do something to put me on a different path. I’ve played sports, throwing myself into them and outworking everybody else. My hope is to be good enough to earn a scholarship, thinking that will be my ticket out of this place. And although I’m good—one of the best on my football and baseball teams—I still haven’t been recruited. Nobody’s offered me anything.
I’m sure it has everything to do with my parents. With my life. I’m sure my coaches haven’t done much to talk me up, probably told them all about my home life, which has scared the recruiters off. In this day and age, apparently nobody wants to roll the dice on a kid with a sketchy background. It doesn’t matter than I haven’t done anything wrong, that I’ve never been in trouble.
But my family name is so notorious and so synonymous to trouble, drugs, and abuse, nobody wants to give me a chance. It’s probably the biggest reason I haven’t been offered a scholarship. It’s probably the biggest reason I’m destined to go through life like them. A loser.
“You still ain’t answered my question. When are you gonna start contributin’ to this goddamn family?”
“Tell you what, I’ll start when you do.”
“You disrespectful little shit.”
For such a big, slovenly man, he moves quickly. Not expecting it, his fist connects with the side of my head, which snaps to the side as I topple out of the chair and hit the ground with a grunt. I see stars and feel dizzy for a moment, but I don’t have time to sort myself out because in the next moment, he’s hauling me to my feet.
The breath is forced from my lungs when he slams me into the wall. My head rebounds off of it hard, adding to my disorientation, but then his face is only inches from mine, his foul breath washing over me.
“You fuckin’ freeloader. All you do is take and it’s never enough for you, is it? You always want more. I need this, or I need that. You always want more,” he hisses, his spittle dotting my face.
My head clearing, I look at him and think about all of the things I’ve wanted to say for so long. All of the speeches I’ve practiced—the things I vowed I’d say to him one day—all crowd together in my mind. And then, they seem to hit some sort of bottleneck in my brain and nothing comes out. I gape at him, my fury and frustration at not being able to express myself building.
“And what about you, huh? All you do is sit around the house getting drunk and high. You’re a piece of shit and I hate your fucking guts.”
It’s all I manage to get out before he drives his fist into my face, and I feel my nose break. The blood, thick and warm, flows down my face, my mouth filling with the coppery taste of it. The rage flowing through me is so thick, I barely even feel it. A snarl on my face, I piston my arms out, slamming him in the chest. He lets out a grunt and staggers backward, nearly tripping over the chair.
Not giving him time to recover, I close the distance between us and drive my fist into his gut. He doubles over with a loud “oomph,” and I deliver another shot to the side of his head. My dad crumples to the floor, landing hard on his side, and all I’m seeing is red. It’s like I’m not even in control of my body but standing outside of it watching all this happen. I scream like a madman as I drive my foot into his gut. Into his kidney, even kicking him in the ass for good measure.
The anger fuels me… anger for a life that’s been stolen. A future that’s been wiped out because of them. Everything I’ve worked for, everything I might have wanted, is gone because of them. The hatred that flows through me is so thick and visceral, I feel like I’m choking on it.
My rage has blinded me so thoroughly, I don’t even know how I end up on top of him, straddling his chest, driving my fist into his face over and over again. When I come back to myself, I look down and see the bloody ruin of his face. Both of his eyes are already swollen shut, his face is a nightmare visage of blood and gore, and the few teeth that haven’t rotted away already are gone.
Stunned by my savagery, I slowly climb off him, unable to tear my eyes away from the bloody pulp of his face.
“Dad,” I say and nudge him with my foot.
He’s not moving, and I can’t tell if he’s even breathing. My stomach clenches hard and I feel like I might be sick. But at the same time, as I stand over him, I feel more powerful than I’ve ever felt before. After so many years of being his punching bag, of taking the brunt of his fury, to give it back to him in kind has me feeling strong. And for the first time in my life, my fear of him has evaporated completely.
Nudging him with my foot again, he lets out a gurgling wheeze. At least he’s not dead. Although I will probably be doing the world a favor if I end this prick. As if he’s reading my thoughts, he groans, his body twitching as if he’s trying to get back to his feet somehow.
Staring down at him, the urge to finish what I’ve started, to put an end to this piece of garbage I’ve hated with everything in me for so long, pulls at me. And the longer I stare at him, the stronger that pull gets. All of the fury that has built up over my lifetime, short as it’s been, is coalescing in my heart.
“I’ll fuckin’ kill you, boy,” the old man gasps, his voice little more than a choked whisper.
Balling up my fists, I step closer to him, the voice in the back of my mind whispering, telling me to finish this. To end him. To kill the source of my own pain and misery. My entire body is trembling and my heartbeat his thundering in my ears. Everything in me is telling me to do it. To exact my pound of flesh once and for all.
It’s only through a Herculean effort that I’m able to push back the red haze that’s creeping in at the edges of my vision. Forcing myself to take a step back, I reluctantly unclench my fists. The voice in my mind is still whispering urgently, telling me to finish this. To finish him.
It’s only through a sheer force of will I don’t even know I possess that I’m able to turn away. I walk down to my room, throw some clothes and things into a bag, then walk out of the house forever.
***
The last vestiges of the memory fade and blow away on the soft breeze that blows through the backyard. I take a long swallow of my beer, which is lukewarm by this point. Bo sits at my feet, looking up at me hopefully, a line of slobber dripping from his mouth. I oblige my pup and grab one of the treats that’s sitting on the table. He takes it gently from my hand and crunches on it happily.
I haven’t thought about that day at my parent’s house in a long time. It was like once I walked out that door, I closed off that part of my mind and my parents ceased to exist.
“Go get it, Bo,” I say and throw the tennis ball across the yard.
I watch as Bo sprints off and snatches the ball out of the air on a bounce. As he’s coming back, he gets distracted and starts to sniff something. I shake my head and laugh when he becomes totally engrossed in whatever it is.
Seeing Kasey yesterday rattled me more than I had thought, let alone acknowledged it to her. But it definitely stirred up a lot of memories in me. A lot of things I tried to stuff down and pretend didn’t exist. But I know now that by disassociating myself from all the bad memories, I did the same to the good ones, too. And Kasey was the best thing I ever had in my life.
To say that I loved her would be an understatement. Kasey is one of those rare women who come around and turn your entire life upside down. She was the only one who ever helped me temper that constant burning anger in me. When I was with her, all I felt was peace. Happiness.
Kasey never made me feel inferior or somehow wrong because of my upbringing. She never judged me by the actions of my parents. She didn’t mock me for being poor, or for not having the money to take her anywhere fancy—or for anything really. Kasey saw me for me, not for what I had or didn’t have.
She was one of the only people in my life who accepted me for who I was, background baggage and all. Not even my teammates, my so-called brothers in arms, did that for me. They always made sure to keep me in my place and let them know that, even though I was better than them at football or baseball, that I would never amount to anything because of my family. They never failed to tell me the world was made for—and run by—the wealthy, just like them.
It had always been a point driven home every time college recruiters came around back then and the coaches bent over backwards to push guys who were nowhere near as good as me but came from better families. Every time my teammates had elaborate parties after big games and never invited me. Every time they all looked down on me, making shitty comments for having second-hand jeans, clothes that weren’t of the latest trends or fashionable brand names, or for not having an expensive car. Or a car at all.
Kasey wasn’t like that at all. She saw me for who I was and loved me in spite of everything going on in my home. She stripped away all of the garbage and made me feel that I was worthy of being loved. That was something that not even my parents—the people who are supposed to love me unconditionally—were able to do. Not that they ever really tried.
It killed me to leave the way I did, leaving Kasey behind without so much as a goodbye. I almost couldn’t do it and gave in. Her number was already punched into my phone with my finger hovering over the send button. But I knew then if I made the call and talked to her, she would have found some way to talk me out of it. And I couldn’t do that. I needed to go. Needed to get out and get away from my parents, all of the people who’d made my life a living hell. I needed to get away from Blue Rock Bay, and unfortunately, that meant getting away from Kasey, too.
That day in the kitchen, when I’d beaten my father to a pulp, I really wanted to kill somebody. And once I let it out, it was like a dark genie I couldn’t put back inside. If I’d stayed, it would have only been a matter of time before it happened. Knowing that made the decision for me. Not that I would have hurt Kasey, though, but I knew I would have hurt somebody. And I had no desire to put her through that. Better she thought me an asshole for ghosting her, than realize I was a monster when I ended up killing somebody.
So, I lay low at a friend’s place for a few days, then when I was ready, I went straight to the recruiter’s offices and enlisted. I figured that at least, by joining the military, they’d be able to channel that rage in me and would put my desire to kill somebody to good use.
