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I lie awake for hours, battling my mind and reaching for sleep. When it finally comes, my dreams take me to a dark, unforgotten place.
I’m eight. It’s August andthe pavement is hot enough to fry bacon. My T-shirt sticks to my skin and sweat stings my eyeballs. I dribble the ball up the long driveway and stop in front of the net. My throat feels like I’ve been eating sawdust. Gotta focus and make this shot. He’d already warned me.
I line the width of my feet with my shoulders, slightly bend my knees, and position the ball. I squint against the sun. Scared that my stance might be off, I shift over and set up again.
“What the fuck’s wrong with you? Shoot the goddamn ball!”
His bark is meaner than the two Rottweilers’ down at Mr. Hadley’s repo lot. Better do it. I push the ball upward with my shooting hand. Jump and release. Hold my breath.
The ball hits the backboard, wobbles around the rim, teetering like a drunk. Then it spins inward, actually touching the net. I watch, my hearthammering against my ribs. Droplets of sweat trickle into the corners of my mouth. I taste the briny liquid mixed with my fear. I pray. But no one’s listening.
The ball spins outward and hits the ground with an echoing thump. It bounces several times before rolling along the pavement toward my father. He stops it with the toe of his shoe. His obsidian eyes cut into me. His nostrils flare and his top lip curls up bearing his teeth. It’s the evil face I give to the monsters and demons in my stories.
Like the ball, I wobble. There are no second chances after a warning. He kicks the ball away and lunges at me, grabbing my arm, calling me a useless pussy. His blasts of dragon breath reek of whiskey. He accuses me of daydreaming about my stupid writing. I wasn’t at that time, but I don’t talk back.
He’s a big man; tall with wide shoulders, his hands are three of mine. He hauls me into the house so fast I fly through the air. My feet don’t touch the ground until we reach the living room.
He yanks off my sweaty shirt. My back is still a crisscross of welts from the last time. He never hits me in the face or anywhere that would leave noticeable marks. He knows how to hide this stuff. And no one can touch him anyway, ’cause he’s the sheriff.
That isn’t the only reason I don’t tell anyone. He said he’d kill me. He could too. He has a gun. But even though I don’t think death would be much worse than this, I still would never tell. Not even my best friend Victor, or Papa or Mama T. He might hurt them if they knew.
He shoves me forward over the arm of the couch. I squeeze my eyes tight and hear the familiar sounds. The scrape of metal from undoing his buckle, the swoosh of the belt pulling through his pant loops, the thud of leather tapping across his big palm.
I flinch. Nothing. He likes to do that. Make me wait. I never cry, though. Not a single tear. No matter how bad it gets. That’s the one thing he can’t make me do.
When it comes, the crack of thick leather against my skin feels like a sharp whip of fire. I bite through my lip to keep from crying out. He counts them off for every missed shot, “one…two…three…four…”
“Malcolm!”
Mom. No. Please.
“Stay out of this, Luiza.”
He holds me down hard at the back of my neck. He’s yelling at her how I’m a fuck-up, that when he was eight he could make a hundred shots just like that and I can’t make a lousy fifty.
“It’s ninety-three degrees out there today, meu amor.” She’s being real nice, talking to him in her soft voice the way she does to try to make him stop. But she’s scared. Her Portuguese accent gets thicker when she’s scared. “He probably just needed a break and some water.”
“You baby him too much. You’re turning him into a weak-ass pussy with all that fairy-tale bullshit you let him write.”
The belt cracks across my back again. My body jerks.
“Malcolm. Please…eu imploro…no more.” I hear her tears. They’re my fault.
“Get your ass in the kitchen,” he says in a low, chilling voice. “I’m warning you, Luiza, for the last time.”
He means it. But she won’t leave me. She never does.
“I’ll do anything, Malcolm.”
He’s on her in seconds with a punch to the stomach. Her face mangles in pain and she drops to her knees, the groceries spilling out of their bags. I watch in horror, wanting to fight back, wanting to kill him. But fear paralyzes me.
“Mom! Mommy!”
She’s balled up on the floor, taking blow after blow for me.
“Stop!” I scream, begging, pleading, until nothing squeezes past my raw throat but useless, powerless whimpers.
Dee
