“Do not act a fool!” she snapped, hauling me toward the door as Auden stirred in his sleep. “You have no place here! No place!”
She threw me out into the hallway and slammed the door shut in my face, her footsteps shuffling toward the bed where she scolded Auden for waking.
I stood there, outside the door, massaging my wrist as I tried to process the words my mother spat in my face. What had I done wrong? How did she know about the Devil inside my head?
Knowing I would not get an answer until this strange mood passed, I sulked toward my own bedroom, peeling off my uniform in preparation for a shower. It was only as I reached for a comfortable pair of grey sweatpants and a long-sleeved t-shirt that my gaze fell upon the crucifix above my bed. It had been turned upside down.
***
Silence was the punishment for my unknown crime. My mother refused to speak to me, and although I scoured my brain, replaying every word that rolled off my tongue, I could not determine what I had done to deserve the label ‘demon’.
Guilt hung over me like a storm cloud, shadowing me in darkness with the threat of lashing rain. I was desperate to end the days of silence, to make my mother smile again. But that meant I had to apologise, even if I did not know what for. And I had the perfect idea.
Crayons lined my bedroom floor, a piece of white paper gradually transforming with colour as I prepared the ‘apology gift’ for my mother. I drew often—sometimes animals, sometimes a knight on his noble steed, sometimes my favourite superheroes. But, more often than not, I drew my family.
Evidence of these drawings were scattered on my desk, special ones selected to hang on the refrigerator for a week before they were thrown away.
Satisfied with the drawing of my mother and I holding hands, I slipped it under my parents’ bedroom door, hoping that once she laid eyes on the two of us smiling, she would open the door and welcome me back into her arms. She never did.
I waited, and waited, and waited. But the door never opened. Instead, I heard the sound of paper tearing in two, my heart tearing along with it.
The following day, as I stood in my bedroom, bottom lip between my teeth, I decided that in order to return to my mother’s good graces, I needed something morepowerfulto express my love and remorse.
My gaze darted from wall to wall, searching for inspiration. Those said walls captured my attention, birthing an idea that would show my mother how much I loved her, how much she meant to me. And maybe, just maybe, she would look upon me with fondness once more.
The idea was disastrous. Naturally, I did not realise this until it was too late. As I reached for my crayons and approached the blank wall, I thought of my mother and everything she loved—everything that would make her lovemeagain.
An hour of drawing resulted in a wall decorated with St Augustine’s church, my parents hand-in-hand as they stood in their finest Sunday clothes. A row of red roses—my mother's favourite flower—led to Auden and I swinging on the old tire that hung from the tree beside the statue of Mary. We all wore identical smiles. A picture-perfect family.
I studied my artwork, proud of what I had been able to create with nothing but an eight-pack of crayons. It was not my best work, but it was from the heart.
Crayons abandoned, I emerged from my bedroom, eager to announce the surprise I had for my mother. She was seated at the dining table, wrapped in a brown cardigan with a cup of tea in her hands, eyes glued on her computer screen.
“...and it is important you emphasise that everything,everything, in your home is yours, not theirs,” a voice said from the computer. A man in a black suit spoke to my mother through the screen, a wooden cross swinging from his neck as he paced back and forth. “Your child is living inyourhome, underyourroof, and they must obeyyourcommands. Just like we are living in God’s creation and must obey His commands.”
“Mumma?”
She paused the video and turned to appraise me with suspicion. “What?”
“I have something to show you!”
She waved me away dismissively, attention returning to the video on her screen.
“It’s a drawing!” I added, “a present!”
With a long, drawn-out sigh, she shut down her computer and followed me toward my bedroom.
I pushed open the door with a wide smile, confident I would be praised with a ‘Wow! This beautiful’ or an ‘Augustus, you have made Mummy very happy.’
You could probably guess what I was met with instead when my mother’s eyes landed on the drawing. What you probably did not anticipate, however, was that the drawing I had left the room with was not the drawing I now walked into.
The church was engulfed in flames. My mother, my father, Auden—all gone as though scrubbed clean. In their place, I dominated the scene, eyes as black as night, a crimson river pouring from my eyes.
There was a gasp, a lingering silence, and then…chaos.
“AUGUSTUS SAINT!” Knuckles met the back of my head with a loud crack, two crayons snapping beneath my bare feet as I stumbled forward. “WHAT IS THIS?”
My bottom lip trembled as I scratched the back of my head, vision blurring with unshed tears. “I… I don’t… I don’t know. I didn’t draw this!”
