Care For Me Not, I'll Hurt You Too Much

Your stomach grumbled for the millionth time today. It wouldn’t let up as the vibrations rippled through your abdomen and sent an involuntary shudder through your body. You hated this. The hunger ripped through you and made you feel as if you could just reach a hand down and dig right into the empty pit that was your stomach. You hated it, and it was barely your third day into the break. Damn holidays.

For other students the holidays would mean to them that they actually get to go home and eat good food. But for you, the school’s food was the only kind you had. You stopped eating at home, and your dad stopped buying things for you to eat. He always seemed to eat out, because there was never any food in the house anymore. He wasn’t starving. But you were. And you were three days into break, three days into not eating anything.

You needed food, but for that you needed money.

That was the reason why you were now standing at the foot of the stairs, staring down the hallway at the part of the house that you hardly ever ventured into. It seemed to be colder down here, even with your socks on and the carpet underneath your feet, it was just cold. You shuddered at the thought of being down here on your own. He always seemed to be down here.

But you had been waiting for him to leave, just waiting for the only chance you may ever get. He left a while ago, you heard the car rumble to life and slowly pull out of the drive just twenty minutes earlier. You were now alone. There was no fear of him coming back. You just knew he was gone, because he never pulls a fake-out. Why would he pretend to leave? He already knew you wanted to stay as far away from him as possible.

It was definitely colder here than the rest of the house as it became unworldly darker down the hallway. You could barely see anything except for the faint light coming from the very end of the hallway. You weren’t familiar with anything down this hallway, so you couldn’t go about it blindly. You reached out a shaky hand and flipped the light switch. The yellow incandescent sent a cream colored light through the filter and bounced off the pale walls. The hallway seemed longer than you ever remembered it. There was only one thing down this hallway, a single picture frame hung lamely on the wall. It was a wedding picture.

The end of the hall was still dark where the light from the hall wasn’t able to reach. A small square of light reached only a small ways in and left the rest of the room in shadow. That light was where you felt your safety end. You walk slowly, measuring your footsteps carefully and taking in slow and silent breaths. You didn’t want to make a sound and you wanted to be able to hear any others as you stepped lightly down the hallway.

You stand at the lightened doorway, not wanting to step any further into the darkness that encompassed the master bedroom. You get even colder as a shiver steals its way up and down your spine. Nothing felt safe here. You don’t dare turn on the light as you look quickly through the shadows. You take a shuddering deep breath and are immediately met with the musk of the room. The stench of liquor is so strong it stings your nostrils and immediately causes and bile to rise in your throat.

This is where he drinks the most.

You bend over and hold your hand over your mouth. You couldn’t throw up in here. You taste the acid in the back of your throat, and that makes holding it in even worse. The smell clings to the moisture in the air, and the damp heightens the scent of it. You don’t want to smell it, so you just decide not to breathe.

You keep your mouth shut and take small spaced breaths in through your nose. It was the only way to keep you from throwing up all over his carpet as you bit down hard on your tongue, trying to numb it from the taste of your own sickly fluids in your mouth.

You can still smell it all. The alcohol. The stench of it hangs in the air and clings to every thing possible. You look at the faded blue curtains still hanging limp and closed against the window. You look at the neatly made bed. You look at the untouched closet. This place changed so much. It all became tainted with the smell, the violence, the man.

You look over to the single dresser standing alone against the wall, opposite a vanity mirror on the side of the room. The mirror stares back at you as you spot yourself in its image. You’re silhouetted against the backdrop of the light in the hallway, and can see your outline standing unmoving, one hand on the door frame, the other cupped over your mouth.

You stare. In your mind, you see his figure coming down the hallway. The shadows cover his eyes because of the light cast from overhead. His overly aged and ragged face comes out of nowhere and grabs you from behind just because you stood where you did. You see the graying hairs in the whiskers on his beard and hear the gruff of his voice as he shouts and kicks. You see the spit flying from his lips in recurrent profanities and you see yourself huddled on the floor, twelve years old, crying. You shake the image from your head and tear your gaze away from the mirror. You look back at the dresser, getting back to business.

You shudder, but not from the cold. You step quickly across the room to the lonely oak-wood dresser. The bottom drawer is where you were headed. You quickly drop to your knees and pull it out gracefully. A grimace steals through your body as the sound of the wood sliding against its frame meets your ears. Two old moth eaten sweaters sit there greeting you and adding to the stench of the room. You shut your eyes and remove your hand from your mouth, still trying to keep it shut. You dig underneath the rotted brown jumper on the right and quickly find what you were looking for. The small papery stack near the bottom was thicker than the last time you were here, but none of that mattered. You only came for what you needed. You felt blindly for all the bills just so that you could put everything back properly. You were rushing, but still trying to be careful that nothing goes noticed.

The money was thick with the stench and damp with the humidity of the room. It was cluttered among various items that you never cared to take notice to, and didn’t want to look at. You simply take out enough for you to buy some food to last you the week…and maybe longer. You only take from the middle though, you don’t know if he keeps track of what was on the top, or what was on the bottom. So just to be safe you take the bills from the middle. You quickly place everything back where you found it, shoving the stack back up against the side of the drawer just like he did. You arrange it so that nothing looks out of place and even make sure the top dollar was faced the same way it was before. You fix the sweater and fold it neatly, placing it back into its previous resting spot before you close the drawer.

You clutch the money in your hand, crumpling it up before quickly jumping up and running out of the room. You run up the stairs faster than you thought possible and go straight to the bathroom, where you finally release the build up of vomit in your mouth. You puke two more times, feeling as if you were retching out your intestines. You wanted to get the smell off. It hung so thick that you could practically taste it, causing you to retch until you began to dry-heave. Your throat is raw and you stay on the bathroom floor for a while, just trying to calm your breathing. The heaving reminded you of the emptiness of your stomach. You pull up the wadded bills still clutched desperately in your hand and stare at them through bleary eyes.

Now I just have to get the food.

-
You walk down the sidewalk, trying to be as silent and quick as possible in the dimming light. The closest market was over twenty blocks away, so you left later that afternoon. It was nearly dark as you were coming back, the twilight showing its dark blue colors across the sky and deafening the sounds of the city slightly in its haze. The large paper bags you clutched to your chest creaked with every move you made with your arms, and the items inside threatened to spill out of the bottom. This was one of the times when you wished that you had been smarter to bring a bag along.

You see your house coming into view, and spot Gerard’s right next to it, the light from the TV once again shining through the thin curtains of the living room. You see two heads sitting on the couch facing away from the window. Your feet automatically move faster, causing the items in your arms to bounce around in their thin wrappings as you move up the walk to your house. The last thing you needed now was for one of them to look back and see you, or worse recognize you.

You finally reach your door and realize the obvious…no keys.

Fuck.

You quickly put one bag down, glancing over your shoulder just to make sure that Gerard wasn’t standing there staring at you from his porch. You still see the flickering light of the television as you dig into your pocket and yank out the three lonely keys wedged in there. You notice the shakiness in your hands and the fast paced beating of your heart. You decide to blame it on the lack of nourishment.

Attempting to find the right key single-handedly became extremely difficult and you began to wonder what the other two keys were even to.

One was to your room.

Yes it was. The first didn’t work, and you skipped the second and tried again.

That one was hers.

You clear your throat loudly and force the ghostly faces out of your mind as the last key slides into the lock. You turn it and glance back over your shoulder as you swing the door open. The light in the living room goes off as if someone switched off the television so you quickly kick the other bag into the house and slam the door shut as quietly as possible, not caring about the items that now spread across the hallway floor.

You press your back against the door and wait for a good ten minutes, just expecting a knock.

Please don’t knock. Please don’t see. You don’t move and barely breath, anticipating the sudden tap of knuckles against wood. You shook so much you pressed your palms against the door and closed your eyes, trying to be as quiet as possible.

Nothing comes.

After a few more minutes you look out the thick curtains of your living room to the house next door. The wavering light of the television shines through the curtains before another light switches on and blocks it out. You release a breath you didn’t know you were holding.

You look back down at your feet and see the bags strewn across it. What the hell is wrong with you?