He cocked his head and took a step toward me as he raised the book higher and brought it down, hitting me squarely in the shoulder. I buckled under the abrupt strike, but straightened almost immediately.
"I will talk about whoever or whatever I want. Do I make myself clear?!"
He struck again with a backhanded swing, clocking my ear. Blinding pain pulsed through the side of my head as a loud, echoing ring filled the room. I brought my hand up to cover the radiating heat with my palm and felt something warm and wet.
I'm bleeding.
"Dad—"
"You donothave any control over me, you worthless, ungrateful piece of shit!" he bellowed, bringing the book down again and again, and all I could do was lift my hands to block the blows as the sharp, throbbing, agonizing pain in my ear continued endlessly.
"Stop!" I begged, burrowing my head beneath my bent arms.
And to my surprise … he did.
He took a step back, his breath coming out in short bursts, the book hanging limp in his hand. "Look at you, cowering before me. What a sorry, pathetic excuse for a man. Youareweak. All these years, all thatworkI put into making you strong, thickening your skin … and you're as pathetic and weak as the woman who raised you. Is that what you want?!"
I lowered my arms and straightened my spine, standing tall as I steadied my lungs and my quivering bottom lip. Keeping my face straight through the pain and blood streaming down my neck.
Dad's face was red, his eyes wild with madness and fury as he lifted the book again and shook it in my face, and this time, I didn't flinch.
"It's because you read this trash, isn't it?! Where did this come from anyway?!" It was a rhetorical question. Hedidn't care for me to answer, and he continued, "You want to live your life on your back, on yourknees, like a woman?! Like apussy?!Areyou a pussy, Maxwell? Is that how I raised you?! To read trash like this"—he frantically opened the book and shook out the pages—"and fuck other pussies like you?!"
I knew better than to reply. I knew better than to protest or deny when he was in the throes of one of his manic tirades. But then he clenched the book in one hand, gripped a chunk of pages in the other, and tore them out. And suddenly, that pain in my ear no longer mattered. Because that book—that beautiful,wonderfulbook—was the one thing I had that was truly mine. It was the one thing he hadn't known about, the one piece of physical evidence that someone had at some point cared about me, and he was proving yet again thathedidn't.
Blinding rage washed over me as the ripped pages fluttered to the ground, and he tore out another handful. I hunched over and rushed at him, ramming my head into his gut as hard as I could and ignoring the burst of pain that sliced down the side of my face from my injured ear. I tackled him to the ground with a twin set of grunts and groans as we rolled and tussled over the carpet, until I was on top.
I raised my fist and brought it down, punching him in the face once, twice, as tears streamed down my face and spittle flew from my mouth with an incoherent string of curses and insults. "Fucking piece of shit. Worthless asshole. Intolerant, sorry fucking bastard!"
I punched him again, blind to his arm slowly rising, the book still in hand. And I didn't see it coming when he struck me again over my oozing, bleeding ear.
I cried out and held my hand up, and he shoved me off. I fell to the floor, clutching the side of my head and crying out from the pain and overwhelming weight of sadness that came from my book—my fucking beautiful book—being destroyed.
Dad stood, wiped a hand below his bloody nose, and spit a wad of blood and phlegm onto my chest.
"Like I said," he grunted, then spit again, "weak."
***
I didn't want to go to school on Monday.
I didn't want to face Ricky, knowing that the book he had given me was still shredded on the floor of my room. I didn't want to see Laura, whose lips were still soft and perfect, but the memory of them was now tainted by my father's brutal belligerence.
He ruined everything.
Healwaysruined everything.
But Ihadto go to school because they would've called my father at work if I hadn't. And facing his wrath again so soon was about as appealing as sticking my hand in the garbage disposal.
So, I walked into school with my head hung low. I avoided the eye of everyone who passed, afraid they’d sense the beating I’d endured just two days ago or how the hearing in my right ear had been muffled ever since. I walked to my locker, miserable and bruised, and as Iunlocked it to stuff my backpack inside, Ricky leaned against the closed locker beside mine.
“Hey, man,” he said, nudging his knuckles against my shoulder, right on one of my hidden bruises.
“Hey,” I muttered, keeping my eyes trained on the contents of my locker.
“So, Molly told me you kissed Laura.”
I swallowed, wondering what else Molly knew. “Yeah.”
