Family Photos

*This is a short story (for now). I plan on adding on with chapters and such things later on when I actually write them...So, this story starts off a little slow, but all stories do, so please read and familiarize yourself with my writing style. Enjoy!* 

​A photograph of old feeble hands, the book, the pipe-the man. It's easy to spot the tobacco stain on his white shirt, the folds in his pants, the thought caught in his wrinkled brow. I'm flipping backwards through the coffee-stained album, the rough uneven pages brushing my fingertips, thinking how, with each gentle flip, time falls through my empty hands. The background is almost real. Frames of aunts, uncles, cousins-frozen in smiles. There is my mother with a full stomach, her son is still focused and my slanted smile is looking at the wrong camera. Here, my father is sober; his strong hands strum the cello. 

The old wallpaper is still in the kitchen. The window hasn't been replaced yet. No dent in the wall the shape of a fist. The lock on the door isn't broken. My footsteps haven't been heard yet. Now we're in the living room, it's Christmas and my mom is half turned towards my dad, erasing all those silent years. My grandmother leans a smooth cheek to her husband's arm, his other holding that pipe; the one he used before he quit. Flip back farther. Look at my mother, age six, wearing her tap shoes and that plastered smile. Only, her arms have no scars, her eyes are not tired, her father is standing beside her and she does not know that he won't have any more pictures in here, while her mother shifts slowly through the album. I'm half way through and my mother looks terse, her belly swollen with Joshua and me. She does not know we will turn out bad.  

I used to have a cat, straight from the ally, who would jump through the cracked window by my bed in the middle of the night and land on my pillow. I used to think he liked it out there, wandering around, catching mice and whatnot, but then I realized it was just that he couldn't stand it in here. One night, he didn't come back. That was the night our front door broke. Dad, or Derek as I called him behind his back, was livid-Mom had failed to clean the house before he got home. I had slowly crept down the hall from my room to the top of the stairs and peered down at them below. Derek's face was covered with prickly stubble and his shirt was splattered with oil-slick black and menacing. Mom's long bony fingers reached out to calm him down, but he grabbed them and thrust her into the door, while he used his free hand to slap her, leaving a clear and distinctive red hand print across her fragile face. She tried to push him away, insisting he would wake the children, but this only seemed to enrage him further. She protested while his punches shoved her into cream colored walls. With the coaxing promise of vodka and dinner, the conflict was over. Only when I saw him walk into the kitchen did I see my mother silently sob into her bony hands, while I slithered, unnoticed, back into my waiting room. 

It wasn't too bad tonight though. Joshua was asleep and snoring steadily; a calm white noise and we were alone. Mom was cooking dinner for Derek while our stomachs were left unfed. We couldn't afford a meal for all four of us when his plate took up the entire kitchen table. The white of the ceiling of our room still had small stars on it from when we were little, sometimes I would pretend we were in space surrounded by all the stars I've wished upon, but my thoughts were interrupted by the unruly clattering of objects down stairs-Dad was home. And with that the whole night sky turned black, and I couldn't find any more stars to wish on. 

We lived in a small yellow house, painted with thick obnoxious robin egg blue shutters and an unmistakable red front door. When dark storms brewed above our house the TV turned to static as the lights flickered about The outside, much like a photograph, can be analyzed, looked at, scrutinized with the most diligent of eyes, and still no one will never know what goes on inside. 

​My eyes were quicker than most-they had to be, unlike my brother's slow hard eyes, heavy as marble and dark like a panther; as unforgiving as the night. I could dodge the smacks and hits, but Joshua would just take them as they came. He developed the art of silence as I developed the skill of avoidance. It's Saturday and Mom has 'Book Club', but we all know it's so she can have some time outside the house. This is good for her, but it also means four hours home alone with Derek. 

He walked slowly into my line of sight, unbuckling the strap on his leather belt and cinching it tighter around his waist. He struts to his chair and shifts slightly so that he is angled towards the television. A sudden electric shock of fear shoots through me; the TV won't turn on and it's my fault. Derek's features are indistinct from this far away, but his silhouette gives off an ominous body language and I cringe. I want to run, but I'm frozen-like a deer in headlights, except the car would stop for the deer while Derek locks my eyes with his. It's silly, but I close my eyes and cover my face with my hands to feel safe, but this is a mistake because the next thing I know is that I'm being carried, jerked around until we are in the bathroom; the sound of water running in the porcelain claw foot bathtub. With a swift flick of his wrist, I'm submerged under the water. I clasped the edges of the tub, thrashing and wrenching myself free of his grasp only to be plunged under again. I spit and whip the rusty taste out of my mouth and try to gasp, catching his arm in mine, but I had no strength. The weight of the water was crushing my chest and I went limp-willing myself not to breathe it in. Maybe if I could outwit him he would let go. I couldn't continue to fight back or I would use up all my air. So I waited. His grip remained firm, clenching my hair, holding me down. I needed to breathe the water. Just a little of it. I needed to wait him out. The cold water rushed and whirred in my ears, stinging them to numbness. I opened my mouth cautiously and water seized my throat, choking me, burning my lungs, exploding me inside. The cool water filtered beneath my ribs, filling the spaces hungry for air, and I was slipping away, but I could wait like this forever. I would wait. Wait him out.