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“You thought it was too good to be true,” Ethan offered.
“Yeah. Weeks went by and I waited for him to explode, to go back to his old ways. But he didn’t. He and my mom were happier than I’d ever seen them.”
“What about you and him?”
“He seemed to make more of an effort to get to know me. I…I started to hope that maybe the worst of it was over. That we were going to be a real family.”
I fell silent as a ripple of shameful heat went through me.
“What happened, Cain?” Ethan asked, his voice gentle.
“He picked me up from school early one day to take me to a baseball game – it was just a minor-league team but I was so excited. We talked about everything on the way there and back. He told me how proud he was that I was so good at sports. It was one of the best moments in my life. By the time we got home, I was on cloud nine. When we got inside, he asked me what I wanted for dinner since my mom was working late. My brothers and sisters weren’t around so I figured they were staying with the lady across the street who used to babysit sometimes.”
I felt Ethan stiffen in my hold, but he never let up on touching me with gentle presses of his fingers.
“I was standing there in the kitchen looking through the refrigerator for something for dinner when he said my name. The look in his eyes…I’ll never forget it. He looked both happy and sad at the same time and it didn’t make sense because we’d had a great day. He…he was still wearing his jacket.”
A chill swept through me as I was once again in that kitchen, watching my father walking towards me, that melancholy look in his eyes.
“Cain, look at me.”
The sharp order had me snapping my eyes open.
When had I closed them?
“Take deep breaths,” Ethan said softly. I noticed he wasn’t touching me anymore.
“Did I hurt you?” I immediately asked since I couldn’t remember him sitting up.
“No,” he said gently. “Take a few deep breaths for me, okay?”
I nodded and did as he said. I felt some of the tension leech out of me and it wasn’t until I looked down that I saw that my hands were fisted.
“Ethan, did I hurt you?” I asked again when I felt a little more clear-headed. I sat up so I was eye level with him and I scanned his body for any injuries.
“No, you didn’t,” he said. “I swear it. You just…you got really tense and quiet.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
I was surprised when he grabbed the back of my neck. “Cain, look at me,” he ordered, though he kept his voice quiet. “You didn’t scare me. I was trying not to scare you, okay? That’s why I moved.”
I saw the truth in his eyes and nodded.
“Do you want to finish your story?” he asked.
I nodded again. But I didn’t lie back down as I said, “I was standing there and he was walking to me, his arms open. I was…I was actually excited that he wanted to hug me. He never really had when I was a kid. It took everything in me not to cry when he put his arms around me and told me everything would be better now.” I shook my head. “I didn’t even feel it at first…there was just this pressure in my stomach and then this weird tugging feeling. And then everything got really hot and then really cold all at the same time.”
I felt Ethan’s fingers on my cheek, but I couldn’t look at him. I was staring at my stomach, watching the long blade being pulled out of my body. “Twelve times,” I murmured. “He stabbed me twelve times as I was lying on the kitchen floor before I managed to turn over so I could try to crawl away. I thought he’d just let me go because there was no way I was going to make it very far.” I shook my head. “But no, he had to make it fifteen.”
“Cain,” I heard Ethan whisper brokenly.
“He kept telling me he was sorry, but that it was better this way. That he couldn’t share her anymore…he loved her too much.” I lifted my eyes to see tears streaming down Ethan’s face. “I let him too close to me…I trusted him, even though I knew deep down that something was off.”
“You couldn’t have known,” Ethan said.
I nodded because he was right. I hadn’t known that kind of evil existed, and certainly not within the man who’d given me life.
“I woke up in the hospital a month later. The blood loss led to a coma. I was partially paralyzed from the knife hitting some nerves near my spine.”
