34. Preston
PRESTON
To Marcus,
I’m not sure why I’m writing you this letter after you clearly let me go.
Fine, I do. My therapist suggested I tell you “things,” and since I can never say this to you out loud, a letter could be a compromise.
You get to enjoy my beautiful writing. Not many people have had the pleasure to see it. You’re welcome, I guess.
I’ve started this for the fifth time, by the way. I might have had a mini panic attack while scribbling the others before I ripped them up.
It’s because my brain is fighting me. He does that all the time, you know—fighting, sabotaging, and driving me insane. I just pretend to be in control because I have to. If I don’t, I’ll need to admit I’ve lost.
And if I lose, I’ll do what my brain has always wanted—follow my mom over the cliff.
But, eh, I guess you’d want me to start from the beginning.
Fuck.
I’m kind of hyperventilating, and the words are blurry, and I want to quit and rip this piece of paper to shreds.
But that would mean leaving you alone, and I’m just too much of a selfish son of a bitch to do that. So here goes.
If I bore you to tears, you can burn this.
When I was a kid, I was whimsical. I liked walking in gardens, climbing trees, and eating lots of sweets. I used to talk to birds and squirrels, pretending they were my friends.
I wanted many of those. Friends, I mean. Being an only child in a house full of adults and the son of parents who never really got along, I was a bit lonely.
But it was okay. Even if Mom and Dad fought, they still loved me. They put me to bed and read me stories about monsters and faraway kingdoms that I’d repeat the following day to my squirrel friends. Hey, you better not judge. I was a literal kid.
Anyway, things changed when my parents divorced. Mom hated being alone with a passion and told me repeatedly that Dad abandoned us because we didn’t fit his image anymore.
I later learned that she tried to take me to France without Dad’s knowledge out of spite.
Now that I’ve grown up, I realize that neither of them was at fault.
Thing is, Mom was emotional while Dad is, you know, a ROBOT. It wouldn’t have worked between them anyway. As much as I loathe Satan’s lover, aka his current wife, Lilith, she’s more compatible with him because she doesn’t care about his lack of emotions.
Mom did.
She cared a lot and loved too much, and maybe she lost her temper too easily, which I think irked Dad to no end, hence the divorce. After which, he gave her a mansion for the two of us to live in that was close to the Armstrong residence.
It was too big for us, and Mom, like me, was whimsical and had a tendency to get lonely and overconsume wine. She was an alcoholic, now that I think about it. People have coffee first thing in the morning, but she had her glass of wine.
And because Mom got lonely easily, she always had all sorts of friends over—artists, directors, French socialites. She loved hogging all the attention and being a social butterfly, even if no one cared about her.
I guess we’re similar that way. So sad, truly.
My memories of Mom fluctuate between fun shopping days, sitting by the lake as she smoked and we ate and fed the ducks, and learning to put my fingers in the back of her throat so she’d throw up.
I really, really hated the feel of her throat against my fingers. I knew that the slimy, wet gagging sensation would only be followed by the smell of vomit and the deplorable sight of her tear-streaked face.
But at least I had my mom, right?
She said, “Your dad no longer lives with us because we’re different than him. He can’t handle beautiful people like us, but don’t worry, mon petit trésor (my little treasure), I’ll never abandon you.”
And I believed her. I believed that we only had each other.
But we didn’t.
Mom had a couple of boyfriends after Dad, in a petty attempt to get back at him, maybe, but they were never handsome enough, rich enough, or just…enough. Never having enough was Mom’s problem.
For the most part, the boyfriends barely stuck around, and I don’t remember their names or faces.
But one of them did.
His name was Claude Lavoie.
He was Mom’s kind of long-term boyfriend. He worked with money as a partner in a wealth management firm and talked about other people’s money a lot.
And Mom loved that. But what she loved more was the access to the plush lifestyle and the privileges she’d lost after the divorce. Claude used to tell her she deserved a lot more than what Dad gave her.
He was tall, presentable, and had a trainer’s body. He talked in a suave voice, wore the right clothes, said the right words, and ate the right food.
But I never liked him.
The first time I met him, when Mom brought him to our house, he had a strange look in his dim brown eyes. It was different from how her other boyfriends looked at me. They were either disinterested or faked interest; one of them even pretended to be fatherly, like Dad.
Not Claude.
The first time he met me, he didn’t even attempt to put on a show. He just assessed me.
After that, I felt…scared around him, and I didn’t know why.
Mom loved him, though. She was happy with him, and all her friends fawned over him. He was charming and good-looking and had everyone’s attention and trust.
Not mine.
I just hated it whenever he touched me. His hand would press on my shoulder for too long, or he would try to sit me on his lap when Mom wasn’t there, which gave me a weird feeling.
When he kind of moved in with us, I threw a tantrum and told Mom I wanted to go back to Dad’s. She got drunk and started crying.
“You’re just like your papa, Preston! You’ve become as unfeeling as he is. You have the heart to leave Mommy all alone?”
I didn’t.
Also, Dad had an annoying girlfriend at the time, and I thought he wouldn’t want me there.
He never really asked me to move back in, so I thought he’d truly abandoned us like Mom said.
All these years, I’ve been thinking that maybe I should’ve insisted back then. When Claude moved in, I should’ve moved out.
Because that’s when it all started.
The lingering touches lingered more, and he often came into my room while I was doing homework.
He’d steady my shoulders and lean in from behind. He’d push my hair from my eyes and say I looked so pretty. Like a cute, little girl.
It made me feel sick.
But I didn’t say anything to Mom, because I was so scared she’d start crying again or say it was my fault she was sad and miserable all the time.
I was just scared she’d abandon me like Dad did.
So when Claude snuck into my room at night, when I heard the low creak of the door and the floor under his weight, I bit my lip. When he touched my face and made these ugly noises, I pretended to be asleep.
When he whispered, “You’re so fucking pretty, Preston,” as my face was smeared with hot jelly water, my lips trembled, but I kept them shut.
“You’ll stay quiet for me, yes?” He cleaned my face with fingers that burned me everywhere they touched me. “With a face like that, it’s your fault I can’t control myself.”
After that, Claude came to my room every night for more than a month.
He’d jerk off over me, make me suck his dick sometimes, then he’d come all over my face.
Always my face.
I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t move. All I could do was pretend it wasn’t happening to me. I floated to the stars on the ceiling of my room and stayed there watching the broken version of me being molested and unable to breathe.
“Shh, Preston.”
“Stay quiet, Preston.”
“Don’t tell, Mommy, okay? She’ll hate you if you ruin her happiness, and she’ll leave you just like your daddy did.”
“Your parents don’t love you, Preston. You were just born because they needed someone to inherit their money.”
“I love you, Preston. I’m the only one who’s ever loved you. You know that?”
“It’s your fault I’m like this.”
“I’m not hurting you, see? I could fuck you, but I won’t ruin you like that. I’m just training you so you can please me better. Until you’re a bit bigger, I’ll continue to picture your pretty face as I fuck your mom’s ass.”
“She really hates it when you’re withdrawn during meals. If you keep flinching and acting dramatic, she’ll get rid of you.”
I believed him.
After my parents’ marriage ended, I couldn’t risk Mom abandoning me, too.
The idea of being all alone terrified me.
To this day, it still does.
In my mind, it was simple—to keep my mom, I needed to stay quiet.
Once, I was with Dad for a few days, and I was so happy I didn’t have to see Claude. For once, I wouldn’t be crushed by his heavy body, nor would I be gagged by peppery musk mixed with that overpowering smell of cigarettes.
But I still couldn’t sleep well. I spent most of the nights watching the door, imagining it creaking as his silhouette peeked through. On the last night at my dad’s, before I had to go home, my stomach churned, and bile rose in my throat.
I threw up a couple of times and held on to Dad with all my might, crying like a little bitch when he dropped me off at Mom’s.
When he asked me what was wrong, I wanted to scream, “Help me, Daddy. There’s a man who keeps hurting me, and I don’t like it.”
But Mom appeared at the door and yanked me from his arms, and I just kept my mouth shut.
And I had to tell myself things such as…
“Stay quiet.”
“Put up with it.”
“That way, your mom won’t hate you.”
“That way, you’ll always have someone and you won’t be all alone.”
“It’s okay, Preston. If you look at the stars, stay calm, and don’t fight, you’ll eventually be able to breathe.”
It was the worst when I fought. Claude would be more brutal and vicious. He’d slam a pillow on my face and hold it there as I thrashed and kicked and my muffled screams echoed in the air.
My whole world would be black, soulless, and cold. I’d scream Mom’s and Dad’s names, but they wouldn’t hear me.
I felt so alone.
My only friends were the stars on the ceiling, and I couldn’t even see them when he had the pillow on my face.
I thought I’d die.
He said he’d kill me if I kept being a naughty boy.