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A doctor presses on my arm, and I scream. “Don’t let them touch me. It makes it worse.”
Tears rush down Aunt Karen’s face. “I know, honey. I’m so sorry this happened to you. I’m so sorry I let this happen.”
“Make it stop! Make it stop. It hurts!”
A cuss word falls off her lips. She’s forced back, and a nurse takes her place. “Makayla, we’re going to give you something for the pain, then we’re going to bring you up to surgery and make your arm all better, okay?”
“No, please don’t! It’s gonna hurt.”
“You won’t even feel it. I promise.”
“Where’s my girl at?”
Fear skitters down my spine at the sound of his voice. I try to climb off the bed and hide, but it hurts too bad. I cry out.
“Get him out of here!” Aunt Karen screams. Between my own sobs, I watch her storm up to Daddy and shove him back into the wall. “How could you do this?”
“I didn’t do shit. She fell. She’s lying.”
“She’s thirteen years old! You’re disgusting. If my sister were still alive—”
“She is none of your business.”
“It is my damn business when my niece calls me hysterical because she misplaced her keys, so you beat her and twisted her arm so hard, you broke it! You are done. She’s coming home with me. I’m going to make sure you never see her again.”
“You can’t do that. You have no right.”
“But your daughter does. Every bruise, broken bone, and "accident" she's had will prove it.”
“Mr. Jacobs?”
Daddy turns around as a police officer grabs his wrist. “You’re under arrest—”
“You bitch! You can’t do this!” He twists his head to grab my attention, an angry vein protruding from his neck. “You lying little brat. You’ll be sorry. Don’t think you’re gonna come back home after this! You just stay gone!”
Through my tears, I barely see him as he's pulled away. Aunt Karen is back beside me, shielding me. “I promise you. Never again. I should have done this the second your mom died. You’re coming home with me. You’re going to be safe. I give you my word.”
* * *
I roll out of bed, the lingering smell of my childhood home creating a pit in my stomach. I can’t believe I’m back here. After sixteen years. I swore I’d never step foot in this place again. It was never a home, not after my mom died. It was a prison. A dark place where bad things happened.
Nothing has really changed since I left. Years of dust cover my dresser and trinkets. A small part of me is surprised my father didn’t throw everything out. Well, anything that wasn’t already broken from one of his drunken episodes. He hated the clutter my things created.
This house has nothing but bad memories. Any good ones are covered in the filth and decay he left behind. I grab my robe and slippers and walk across the hallway to the small bathroom. My stomach roils at the grime, but I have to pee. If I had known the state he left the house in, I would’ve hired cleaners to come through before I arrived.
Then again, the last month of my own life has been such an epic shitshow. Trying to navigate up, down, left, or right has been a challenge. Figuring out how to move on after a divorce, quitting my job, and now my father dying has left me on a rollercoaster destined to crash. Every way I turn, something is waiting to slap me in the face.
I groan at my latest slap. My little incident at the wedding last night. “All deserved,” I grumble as I spread toilet paper along the stained seat and do my business. My to-do list today is a mile long, starting with figuring out my father’s finances and getting this house decent enough to sell—which is going to be an impossible task.
The last time we spoke was the night Aunt Karen picked me up from the hospital and promised I’d never have to see him again. He wasn’t allowed near me, but his voice had already done its damage. My thirteen-year-old heart was beaten bloody. From the love he never showed me, the scars his fists left. . . I never thought I’d have to deal with him or his hatred again. He was a drunk who chose to abuse me because he couldn’t love me. Then, a few weeks ago, I got the call he had died.
Even after all these years, I was his only emergency contact. Feeling numb, I listened to the officer explain he’d been drunk at work and had fallen off a rig, snapping his neck and breaking almost every bone in his body.
Pain spread through my chest, but not from his death. It was because he never changed. Some small part of me always hoped my leaving would force him to turn his life around. Do better. If only for himself. The only thing he did was make sure to drag me down one last time and write me in as the executor of his finances and estate.
The joke of it all was he was broke. The house was far from paid off. He’d taken out so many loans against it. It was only a matter of time before this dump was gone too. Seemed easier to show up in the middle of the night and light the whole place on fire.
But here I am, still stuck in my father’s web of control, doing the right thing.
