40
Lia
“I’m trying to, okay? All I’ve done is for you, for her. I’m trying to protect you all. I’m trying my very best.”
“No,” whispers the quiet, wavering voice of my mother.
“All you’ve ever done is protect yourself.
You know, Emilio, I’ve been a coward. Letting you scare me.
What kind of a mother have I been, letting you take her from me for so many years?
Letting you hire that gang for protection, when you knew you couldn’t pay them back? ”
“We needed protection,” he hisses. “The mafia were after us, Devil too. We were in danger. Hiring the Puicin Gang was the only thing I could do.”
“And now they’re after us too! You traded one enemy for another! An enemy who took your own grandchild! How could you, Emilio?”
“Enough. I’m dealing with it.” My father mops his forehead. “What would we do with a baby anyway? Ever since I started injecting Lia, she’s been perfectly happy. Carefree. Allowing her to keep that baby would have risked everything.”
My mother chokes down on a sob. “How could I allow you to inject my daughter…”
“I said, enough.” My father’s voice grows low and threatening.
“You’ve never allowed me to do anything.
You submit, and that’s it. As you’ve always done.
I injected her to keep her happy. Satisfied.
If I hadn’t, she’d never rest until she found…
him. She’d put us all in danger. I told you, that man wants us all dead. I’ll never give up my daughter to him.”
She shakes her head. “And now, the Puicin Gang are going to come back and collect. They took our granddaughter, and now they’ll take you. You’re a liar and a coward, Emilio.”
“Silence!” he thunders, pulling out his belt. Seeing the movement, my mother falls to her knees, lifting her hands up to protect herself, in vain.
A moment later, he’s bringing the belt down again, and again, and again, until she collapses on the ground, groaning in pain.
Then he heads toward the cupboard, grabbing the syringe that’s grown far too familiar. I plaster myself on the opposite wall, shaking in fear as he opens the door, looking at me with a smile that does nothing to counter the danger in his eyes.
“Time for your weekly injection, princess.”
“No,” I whisper, as he stalks over to me. “No, I don’t want it. Please, papa, I don’t want it.”
“Shh. It’s okay, princess. Sit down on the bed. Let me give it to you. Let me make you happy.”
“No, papa.” I shake my head, tears in my eyes. “I don’t want to be happy. I want to be free.”
“Ah.” He grabs my arm, trapping it between his thighs, and I feel the tiny, cold pinprick of the needle against my skin. “That, daughter, you will never be.”