He doesn’t respond immediately. When I look up, he’s smiling. His fingers move slowly over his phone again.
GIO:
-They don’t hurt
-You do
I stare at the screen, wide-eyed. I can’t breathe for a second. Then my mother nudges my elbow gently. "You’re not listening," she whispers, still smiling politely.
"Sorry." I put the phone down, shove it into my jacket pocket.
Now I get to sit here for the next two hours listening to people drone on about hotel logistics while my curiosity eats me alive from the inside out.
I hate when they do this, show me you’re upset, show me something’s wrong, throw the vibe completely fucking off, and then go, "We’ll talk later."
Later? Ma’am, I might not live until later.
I will literally combust from anxiety.
…
The ride home literally feels like walking blindfolded toward something waiting to hurt me.
No one speaks. The tension is so thick I could slice it with a butter knife.
Every time my dad sighs, my heart drops into my stomach. Every time he taps the wheel, I wonder if it’s about me.
"Dad—"
"Silence," he says.
Perfect. I die now.
I’m twenty-two and this is how I go out, not from a car crash, not from illness, but from stress because my dad has attitude. I’m actually so scared right now.
God, please. Let it be something else. Let it be anything else.
Yell about my paperwork, my hotel schedules, my stupid signature on the contracts.
Yell about my shirt being wrinkled, my hair being weird, my breathing being too loud.
I’ll take it. I’ll survive it.
Just please don’t let it be the thing I’m afraid it is.
When we get home, we walk in quietly. My mother’s heels on the floor are the only sound.
My father closes the door behind us, calm, collected, and then… he slaps me.
Hard.
One sharp slap across the face, so sudden that for a second I’m not sure it really happens.
It burns. God, it burns.
Not a dream then. This is real. This actually happened.
I just got slapped by my dad at twenty-two years old.
