When Dad rounds the corner, face flushed and sweatingthrough his shirt, he looks happier to see me than I can ever remember. “Do you have the money?” he asks immediately, rushing over quicker than I would’ve expected him to be able to. He wraps his hands around my upper arms tightly, making my shoulders bunch up in defense.
“Dad, what the hell is all of this? What have you done?” My words barely make it out but he acts as though they’ve slapped him.
“What have I done?” he repeats incredulously, his grip becoming even tighter as he shakes me slightly. “What have I done? I’m making up for the money you’re not bringing home anymore! I’m paying for the goddamn roof over your head and the fucking internet and shit!”
He’s not. I’ve already paid those bills for the month and they’re not due again for weeks, but I know better than to bring that up. “Ungrateful little bitch!” he growls as he stomps away from me. “After everything I’ve done for you the past eighteen years, this is how you treat me?”
I flinch as his voice booms around the room out of nowhere. I’m used to yelling. I’m not used to this immediate back and forth—mumbling and then screaming, excited to see me and then blaming me for all of his problems.
“Dad, we can’t do this,” I try to reason with him, eyes flicking over the mess again. One of the bricks is cut open and a pretty decent amount is missing, it looks like. His suspended driver’s license is on the table next to more residue than he’d typically leave behind. “We have to—” I stop myself. I have no fucking clue what to do.
“I know, sweetheart, I know we can’t,” he says, back in front of me like he teleported there. His bloodshot eyes are glassy now, and not just from the alcohol. He reaches out for me, ignoring the way I flinch again as he pets down my hair the way Mom used to. “I know we can’t, but he’s going to kill me. He’s going to kill me if he finds out I used some of his inventory. Ineed you to pay for it, sweetheart, please. I’ll pay you back, I swear.”
Rationally, I know he’s not in his right mind. I know he’s drunk and he’s high and he’ll never pay me back even one percent of the money I’ve fueled into fixing his mistakes the past several years, but my heart breaks for him. Even though he’s hurt me before, even though he’ll definitely hurt me again, all I am in this moment is a little girl who’s been desperate for affection from her father for far too long.
“How much do you need, Daddy?” I whisper reluctantly, crying with him. “I only made a little over two hundred in tips tonight, but I have…” Something stops me from giving him the exact dollar amount. “I have a bit saved.”
The whiplash as he goes from crying to elated kills me, makes it even more obvious that he’s playing me. It doesn’t change anything for that little girl inside me though. “Thank you, sweetheart. I knew– See, I knew you’d take care of me!” He smacks a kiss on my forehead and my stomach twists as the smell of him finally hits me.
“How much, Dad?”
“Just three thousand.”
Justthree thousand. Once again, he was taking a pretty decent chunk out of the money I’d saved to leave this hell hole. I sigh, stepping around him. He babbles in the living room, mumbling and then shouting and then back to mumbling again. I close my bedroom door and lock it behind me. I don’t want him finding out where I’m keeping my money again.
But when I reach under my mattress for the hole I’d cut there and slip my fingers inside, all I feel are springs.
Of course. He would’ve needed money to give the supplier to be trusted with this load in the first place, at least half of the cost, but probably more.
As though on autopilot, I storm back into the living room. “You already took all of my fucking money! What money do you expect me to use to bail your ass out this time?”
He whips around, the maniacal smile that had been on his face as he babbled to himself melting into rage. I turn my back away from the wall as he rushes me, grabbing my face in his hand, pinching my cheeks and forcing my lips to pucker. “You don’t get to blame me for this shit! If you were a better daughter and took care of me like you’re supposed to, I wouldn’t have to go looking for money!”
His fingernails dig into my cheeks and my jaw is forced open at the force of his grip. He uses it to shove me to the ground, whirling back around and grabbing his sweaty hair in his hands. “He’s going to kill me. Oh my god, I’m going to die,” he starts whimpering.
I stand gingerly, shaking out my hand to alleviate the ache in my wrist. One day, my body will learn to stop trying to catch itself. “Dad?—”
“Shut up! Shut up, shut up, shut up!” he screams, and the television crashes to the floor a second later. He’ll regret that tomorrow when he can’t watch the Dodgers game, but I guess he’s more worried about even being here tomorrow.
He paces around the room, mumbling under his breath. I start to creep toward the front door, thinking my pickup is probably the safest place for me to sleep tonight, but the movement catches his eye and he turns on me again.
“You’re not fucking leaving me!” he shouts, knocking into the end table and making the lamp fall over in his haste to get to me. I try to outrun him, used to his clumsiness when he’s drunk, but he’s much quicker than he usually is because of the coke.
My fingers curl around the front door handle and tug, but he slams into my back, pinning me against it. He grabs me by the hair, pulling me away from the only shot at safety I had. I go limp, trying to reduce the tension against my scalp, trying to placate him into thinking I won’t fight him.
Mama’s lessons come to me like they always do.
Don’t show any sign that you’re hurting.
Don’t cry.
Don’t fight.
Just say and do whatever you have to, to get him to go away.
I open my mouth to croak out an apology, but he spins me around instead, slamming me back against the wall, cutting me off when his hand closes around my throat.
My eyes bulge, fingers scrambling at his hand, nails digging in but he doesn’t seem to be able to feel them. “You’re so desperate to leave me, maybe I should get rid of you like I got rid of your cheating mother,” he growls.
