Total pages in book: 159
Estimated words: 149301 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 747(@200wpm)___ 597(@250wpm)___ 498(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 149301 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 747(@200wpm)___ 597(@250wpm)___ 498(@300wpm)
“Me and my brothers and sisters was too ’fraid to do anything about Daddy’s temper. We was too young to lift a finger, offer a helping hand. I was only ’bout six or seven at the time. I knew it was wrong what he done to her, regardless. I never saw him show love to Mama, only contempt and occasionally, indifference. The only signs of affection were fuckin’. The bed would squeak at night, and then out pop another baby. A baby he probably didn’t want.”
Grandpa slowly rose from his resting position. He watched what looked like him standing in front of that mirror for the longest. He wondered if he should pour himself a drink, or take some of those pills the doctor had given him years ago, that he never took. Instead, he wiped the sweat from his brow and listened to himself vomit his past. The pain of it all.
“I vowed to myself that one day, I’d get big and strong, and never let Daddy put his hands on Mama again. I’m ashamed to admit this next part, though.” He blinked several times, rubbing his eyes. When he looked back over at the mirror, the mirage of himself was finally gone. He huffed in relief. The panic attack was subsiding. But his heart was heavy. He snatched a sock off the side of the bed and slid it onto his foot.
“Well, no need to stop now. Seein’ things or not,” he chuckled dismally, “I still wanted my daddy to love me. After all the times he beat me, degraded me, destroyed my mama, and harmed my sisters ’nd brothers, I still wanted him to tell me that he loved me. That I was worth somethin’. I saw that man murder babies… and I still wanted his love. I still loved him. Showed him respect. Saw him make my brother a cripple when they’d gotten into a fight… and I wanted his love…” He took a deep breath.
“I think he knew that, too. He used it. Dangled it like a carrot. He was the leader of our family, and he showed his love by workin’. Sometimes love hurts. That’s what he said, alright. That’s what Mama said, too. He made sure us eight children knew where we stood. Angry deep inside my soul ’bout what he done my mama. When I got a bit older, I asked my mama, ‘Why didn’t you leave him?’ She looked at me and said, ‘Cyrus, ’cause sometimes, love hurts.’ There were those damn words again.”
He reached for his other sock, and slipped it on. “I say, ‘Mama, love sounds like hate then.’ She’d look at me and say, ‘Sometimes love and hate feel the same. Some days, I was confused. Some days, your daddy was confused, too. Sometimes, our love was a painful thing.’
“Daddy went to church every Sunday. He worked like a dog Monday through Saturday, and turned into the perfect gentleman come Sunday mornin’. We was poor, so he always wore the same suit. It was nice, nonetheless. Then one day, Mama got into the wine, and started crying and tellin’ the business. They had an argument. I found out, according to her drunken rant, that my daddy had plenty of other women strewn around town. She said a little lady, of maybe sixteen—bein’ a young mistress was fairly common back then—come to the door barefoot, with her big belly all poked out, sayin’ my daddy was the papa. Daddy wasn’t home when the girl made her debut. When Daddy come home from work, Mama was drunk by then.
“Mama called that man a son of a bitch, and wished him dead. She’d never said that when he was beatin’ on her. Only when that there girl showed up. Daddy didn’t hit Mama for talkin’ slick that day. He just looked at her, then walked away. He left the house. We never saw that girl again. We ain’t hear no more about no baby, either. Things returned to normal a few days later. I ’magine I have plenty of siblings that I’ve never laid eyes on. Wilde blood pouring all over Houston. So, you see, I never saw love to even know what it was. In fact,” he reached for his dress shoe, “I didn’t believe I’d ever find love, because so much hate lived inside of me.
“I hated my daddy after ’while. I just didn’t know it until it was too late…”
It began as a tiny seed, blood dripping down a cross, and grew into a big, half dead tree in the forest that hid children in innocent games of Hide and Seek. It flowed in between strips of land, bloody like a red river in a jungle, quenching the thirst of a hungry wolf. It growled like the big dogs, and howled like wolves. It fooled so many, like a wolf in sheep’s clothing. It roared like an angry lion, in pursuit of its prey. My pain has killed men and dragged their dead bodies off somewhere to rot, all for disrespectin’ a woman I loved. It rolled dice in casinos, cheated the joint, and made the stock market bells toll.