Chapter 5 #2
She chuckles faintly, but it dissolves into a cough.
I reach forward, steady her until it passes.
Her skin is papery thin, cool against my hand.
It’s not the hand that used to tug me through grocery aisles, to swat me when I mouthed off, to cradle me when I was too small to understand why dad was angry.
I sit with her. Talk about nothing—the weather, the music charts, a ridiculous story about Sam at the gym last week. Sometimes she laughs, sometimes her gaze drifts, lost in the fog.
Every time her eyes slide past me, I feel like I’m disappearing with her.
The soap opera rises in the background, characters arguing about affairs that make zero sense. I watch her eyelids grow heavy, her head tilt. She’s drifting.
I press a kiss to her temple, whisper against her skin. “I love you, mom. Always.”
She doesn’t answer. Just breathes steady, clutching the tin of tea.
I sit there until her breathing evens out, until I’m sure she’s asleep. My chest is caving in by the time I stand, dragging my chair back with a soft scrape.
My keys slip from my pocket, clattering against the floor. I crouch to grab them, spotting an envelope wedged under the cabinet leg. The logo in the corner makes my blood run cold.
It’s from the Correctional Service of Canada.
My chest tightens. I tear it open, hands shaking.
“This letter is to inform you that inmate Jonathan Baker was released from custody on June 12th, following completion of his sentence.”
The words blur. My mouth goes dry.
Released.
Free.
Three months ago.
The letter trembles in my hand. My vision swims.
I stagger back into the chair, lungs burning. My palms drag down my face until they cover everything, sealing me in darkness.
And in that darkness—
I’m thirteen again.
The house reeks of lamb fat burned onto the pan, baked potatoes gone cold, and the stale cocktail of cigarettes and cheap liquor that never leaves the walls. The floorboards warn me with every groan as he stomps down the hall—each angry step a countdown.
I’m already curled in the corner of my room, knees to my chest, small arms wrapped over my head. My back still burns from the first round, every welt pulsing.
He kicks the door so hard the hinges scream. The knob punches straight through the drywall with a crack, like bone.
“You hiding from me, boy?” His voice drips venom, slurring around the edges. “Think you’re clever? Think you’re BETTER than me?”
The belt hangs from his fist, the buckle catching the light like a blade.
“You damaged my wall. Stand. Up.”
I can’t. My legs won’t obey.
He doesn’t wait. He never waits.
The first strike doesn’t just land—it detonates. A line of fire tears across my shoulder, ripping a scream straight out of me.
He snarls at the sound. “Shut your mouth. Only weak boys make noise.”
The buckle finds my ribs. Once. Twice. Again. My breath shatters in my chest. I curl tighter, but that only exposes something else to break.
Leather snaps across my forearm when I raise it too slow. Skin splits. Heat floods out. My knuckles burst when I shield my face. My lip tears open against my teeth. Blood fills my mouth, metallic and warm.
“Look at you,” he spits. “Crying like a little shit. No son of mine cries.”
But I can’t stop. Hot tears spill before I can blink them away.
He hates tears most.
He grabs a fistful of my hair at the root and yanks my head back so violently I see white. Then he slams my skull against the wall—a sickening thud followed by a shockwave ripping through my vision.
The room swims. Plaster dust drifts around us like snow.
Somewhere through the ringing, I hear her voice. My mother. Thin. Terrified. “Jonathan—please—please stop—”
A heavy impact. A crash. Her breath leaving her in one broken sound.
Then nothing.
Her silence is louder than his shouting.
He crouches in front of me, breath sour, eyes wild, spit flying. “You’re NOTHING,” he growls. “Soft. Ruined. Just like her. You’ll never amount to a goddamn thing.”
His fist hits my jaw. The world tilts. My ears roar.
“You think you’re getting out? I wasn’t granted that luxury. Why should you be?”
The leather swings again. And again. I stop counting. My body stops feeling like mine. It’s all heat, noise, pressure, darkness.
His voice keeps going long after the blows blur into one long streak of pain—words carving deeper than the belt ever could.
“You’re mine to break. Mine to fix. Mine to beat.”
The last thing I remember is the taste of blood—and the certainty that if I make a sound, if I breathe wrong, if I exist too loudly… he’ll finish what he started.
The smell of whiskey clings to me even now. The ache in my ribs, phantom but sharp, makes me double over in the care home chair. My chest heaves, too fast, like the air itself is choking me.
I press my palms harder against my face until I see white sparks behind my eyelids. My body curls forward the same way it did then, a grown man collapsing into the shape of a terrified boy.
My breath comes shallow, ragged. Panic swallows me whole.
He’s out. He’s free. If he finds me— If he finds my mom— No.
Fuck him. We’re not scared of him, not anymore.
My stomach lurches. I slam my fists into my knees just to feel something real, something present.
But the past bleeds anyway. I stumble to the window, gripping the sill.
My reflection wavers in the glass, pale.
I buried him under ink. Under scars. Under songs I screamed until my throat bled.
But he’s not buried. He’s walking. Breathing.
Watching. I keep my hood low, shoulders hunched, fighting the crack in my chest as I make my way outside.
Stoneface is waiting by the car, leaning against the door, scanning the perimeter out of habit.
He looks up when he sees my face, but doesn’t say a word.
Just opens the door. I need to tell the guys and Mac…
if he’s out looking for a handout, booze money, or hush money.
No. Fuck him. Fuck that guy. Fuck everything about that toxic piece of shit.
And fuck me for feeling anything at all—even fear. Fuck him.