genesis.

2. Octavious

     Octavious Alvarado didn't ask to be the son of a Catholic Priest. His father, Pastor Davis Alvarado, was the head of the largest Catholic church in their county, and he made it very known to Octavious. He'd been an altar boy for a large part of his life, starting the day he'd turned ten. He had, of course, already taken his Holy Communion at age seven, and knew how to make the sign of the cross. He was expected to help his father in the church before he'd turned ten, though. When he was younger, he'd run through the pews of the church and fix all of the Bibles up nicely.

     The only thing Octavious Alvarado could ask of his father was to maybe be a little nicer. Octavious had learned to not complain about much – he thought he was a pretty decent son, for a while. He did what he was told, and he did it in a timely manner. He was good at helping out around the church. He attended Mass daily, and the old ladies loved him. His mom would agree that he was good too, but she wasn't doing much agreeing from wherever his father had placed her when she fell ill.

     "Fallen ill". That was the term Davis Alvarado used when his wife began struggling with her mental health. Of course, it was his own fault that she wasn't doing well, but Octavious would pretend like he hadn't overheard that from the ladies who gossiped in the nursery that was lying in the basement of the church. The young women who ran the nursery got bored, and what else are you to do when you get bored during Sunday Mass? Gossip, of course. Octavious would always remember standing outside of the nursery the day after his mom went away, listening in on their conversation as they proclaimed about how sick his mom had allegedly been.

     When he was younger, Octavious never thought of his father as a mean person. Sure, when Octavious got in trouble he might get spanked a few times, but that was all. His father was a Pastor, and if God said that he was a good person, then surely he was. Surely, his father wouldn't do anything to purposely harm wife and only son. Except, that once his mom left, he saw a new side of his father that he hadn't before.

     Davis sent away his wife the day after Octavious turned ten. The day after he had become an altar boy. Of course, it had just happened to land on a Sunday, – "A miracle!" Davis would proclaim to the church, "My son, his most notable birthday the day before a Sunday. A miracle." – and Octavious quickly realized how fast his father would shift. After everyone had left after the service, and it was Octavious and Davis wrapping up, it seemed like Octavious couldn't do anything right.

     He wasn't fixing up the Bibles quick enough, his robe wasn't hung neat enough, or his belt wasn't folded in the right way. Davis was always displeased, unhappy, and disappointed with his son. Octavious went from doing no wrong, to only doing wrong. The other Altar Boys never saw this side of Davis; it was reserved only for Octavious. Octavious learned just how fast his father could remove his belt once they stepped inside their home. But without his mom, their house wasn't a home. It was a cold, empty place that stored no love. A year after his mother was sent away, Octavious and his father moved into a house closer to the church, a nasty, drafty 2-story home that Octavious hated with every fiber of his being.

     He might have hated the house, but he was growing to hate his father more. Davis had grown into nothing short of a monster. Octavious was beginning to get used to the feeling of his father's hand hitting him across the face, or his belt digging into the soft skin between his shoulder blades. He'd spent more time with a roll of paper towels than he did in Mass, and that was saying something. He frequently found himself on the shower floor, wondering where he'd gone wrong, where he'd made a mistake large enough to earn such treatment from his father.

     But he hadn't. He hadn't made a mistake, or gone wrong, not in any way. His father was the one who was mistaken, who had taken a liking to seeing his son cry out in startled pain. He'd broken his wife first, and now he'd make it his job to break his son as well. Davis would build the boy up and then destroy him with his own knowledge, Octavious's memorization of prayers and Bible verses slowly becoming his downfall. He could beg for God to grant him any form of serenity, but he would never be on the receiving end. He would never find any courage to accept anything he could change. He could have wisdom, and he'd know right away that this was one of the things he could never change.