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Sinking onto the couch cushions, I take his hand and pull him down to sit beside me.
His large body plunks down, and I curl up beside him in my usual catlike ball. Tucking my cold toes under his leg, I rest my head against the back of the couch and give him a sad smile. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“Not really.” His laughter is short and hollow.
“Okay.” I brush my teeth over my bottom lip. “But do you need to talk about it?”
Squeezing the bridge of his nose, he finally croaks, “Probably.”
“Is your sister okay?”
“Yeah, she’s fine. She, uh… When I left, she was doing okay, and Mama’s home now, so they’ll be tucked up in bed. We drove Dad back to his place, and we basically had to carry him inside. We dumped him on the couch, and I just have to hope he’ll wake up with a hangover and a bucketload of regret like he always does.”
Liam’s voice has taken on a bitter edge, his jaw clenching when he’s done.
I rub my hand down his arm, curling my fingers around his fist until it loosens. I thread our fingers together—an intimate gesture, but I want to comfort him any way I can right now.
This man beside me is good and kind. I’ve been living in the same house as him. I’ve seen what a gentle soul he is, and I hate the idea that he’s hurting.
“How long’s it been like this?”
“Since I was eleven. It was worse back then because he lived with us.” His voice goes raspy, and he’s staring at the wall like he’s in a trance. “He was a soldier and came back from his tour wounded and suffering major PTSD. We helped him as much as we could, but he wouldn’t go for therapy. I don’t even know why, he just…” Liam’s shoulder hitches. “He turned to the bottle, and it brought out the ugly in him.”
My stomach tenses as I think about what that might mean.
Liam’s gone quiet, his face a mask of pain, and I’m not sure if I should ask him to keep going. I’m trying to make him feel better, not relive what was an obvious nightmare.
But then he sighs and keeps talking. “He used to go off. You could feel it building, you know? And then he’d just explode. My mom would always stand in the way. She ended up black and blue, but she didn’t want her babies getting hurt.” He sniffs, his voice turning thick and gummy. “I tried to help her out a few times, but he was so much stronger than me, and she couldn’t handle me getting hurt. He broke a few of my ribs once, and she begged me to keep my sisters safe. I could see how much it was killing her, so I did what she told me. Whenever Dad started to lose it, I’d take my sisters upstairs, and we’d hide until it was over.”
Tears build on my lashes, and when I close my eyes, a few trickle free. I don’t bother brushing them away. All I can picture is little Liam, probably terrified, trying to keep his sisters calm while they listened to the carnage downstairs.
“She’d be bruised and hobbling around the house for a few days afterward. And Dad would cry and apologize and buy her flowers and promise to never do it again.”
“But…,” I whisper.
“Yeah.” Liam nods, then glances at me, his expression crumpling when he notices my tears. Frantically brushing them away with his thumb, he shakes his head. “I don’t have to tell you this shit. I don’t want it being some kind of trigger for you. Shit, I’m sorry.”
Before he can turn away from me, I rest my hand on his cheek and guide him back so I can look into his eyes. His beautiful, tortured eyes.
“I’m okay. I’m not crying because I’m thinking about what happened to me. I’m hurting for you. For what you and your mom… your sisters… what you had to go through. How long did you all suffer like this?”
With a soft sigh, he nestles his cheek into the palm of my hand. “Years. Mama wouldn’t let us say anything, because… she loved him. Despite the fact that he hurt her, she could see his mental suffering, and she was desperate to help him. But he’s a stubborn asshole, and one night… I just couldn’t stay in that closet anymore.” His voice began to shake, his gaze going distant like he was walking back in time and reliving it all over again.
“You don’t have to,” I whisper.
But he doesn’t seem to hear me.
“I was sixteen. Bigger. Stronger. I… He was whaling on Mama, and… I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t sit in that fucking closet anymore listening to her cries of pain. She was begging him to stop, but he wouldn’t.” Liam’s forehead bunches, his nostrils flaring as he grits out the rest of the story. “So I stormed down those stairs and I grabbed him. And I threw him across the room. He crashed into the TV, and I swear, when he stood up, I thought he was going to kill me.” His lips quiver when he squeezes his eyes shut. “This was a trained soldier, and he came at me like I was some terrorist rebel or something. His fists were like cannonballs, and I fought him as best I could. I got in a few good shots before the police showed up. Cut his chin bad enough to leave a scar. But… it was a bloodbath.” He shakes his head. “He broke my nose and busted open my cheek. Mama couldn’t even look at me. She was sobbing and Sofia was screaming while the police dragged Dad away. He was cursing, and… it was like he was possessed.”
I brush my thumb across his cheekbone, feeling his raw pain as if it were my own.
“She couldn’t look at me for days. I don’t know if it’s because she couldn’t face what he did to me or because I broke her rules and got involved. If I hadn’t, Maria—my older sister—she never would have called the police.” He tips his head back, resting it against the couch and looking like this story has aged him by a decade.
“Did your dad go to jail?”
“Yeah. Mama didn’t want to press charges and tried to explain that it wasn’t Dad’s fault. She went on about the IED and how he’d lost his entire unit and was suffering from PTSD. But it wasn’t enough. Not with Maria’s testimony. And mine. The old guy was put away for twelve months. And when he got out… he didn’t want to come back home.” Liam nodded. “It was a good thing. Mama was sad, but life was peaceful, you know? We got on with living, and it enabled me to leave and go away to college without worrying about her. Well…” He lets out a harsh laugh and shakes his head. “Mostly not worry about her. My old man is one stubborn bastard, and he still shows up every now and again. Even though I made sure there’s a restraining order out against him… he just can’t seem to stay away.”
“Is that why you went to a college relatively close to home, so you can still be there when they need you?”
