"Lacrimae rerum" -Virgil; "Tears for things"
My earliest memory is of soft, weak arms wrapped around me. I am sitting on a girl's lap on the floor, and her dark hair falls in front of my face. Every so often I feel a drop of water on my hands, which are resting on the hands of the person embracing me. I know she must be crying, and I want to make her feel better because the fact that this girl is sad makes me feel sad, and I am afraid that I too will start to cry. I know that crying is bad. To distract myself from the sadness, I reach for an action figure lying near the girl's bare foot. I can't reach the toy, so I squirm out of her grasp and grab the toy. She quickly grabs me back and holds me closer, her soft crying becoming a little louder. She says something to me. I pat her foot and continue to play with the toy.
x.X.x
The man slammed the door as he came into the house. He smelled of alcohol, but then again, the entirety of the small apartment did. Melissa called him "Father", but I never, save one incident, spoke to him, so I did not call him anything. Melissa was my older sister. She was eight years old, my senior by three years. She would often play with me, and was doing so when the man came in. Melissa always stopped playing when he came home.
"Good evening, Father," Melissa said to him when his heavy boots grew close to us. She stood up. She hadn't taken off her nightgown at all that day, nor had I my pajamas, and the sun had once again disappeared past the buildings of the city, leaving the world a darker, scarier place.
The man came closer to us, and Melissa pretended to be smoothing out invisible wrinkles in her nightgown. The man strode up next to her and violently ruffled her hair. She closed her eyes, recoiling at his touch.
"Wha-?" the man slurred. "You 'on't like me?" Melissa stood there with her eyes closed and her head down. "You talk me when I talk to you, girl!" The man followed his command with a slap across Melissa's face, sending Melissa sailing to the ground. Her dark hair fell in front of her face, but it was clear she was fighting back pain-filled tears.
"Aah! 'Elissa!" I cried and hurried over to her. The man was faster, though, and he kicked me away from her. "Melissa! 'Lissa!" I wailed.
Melissa lifted her head and looked at me. Her hair slid off her face, and I could see that the left side of her face was red. "Ignore it, Nate," she said to me, "and keep playing. Just don't pay any attention and keep playing with yo-"
"Shut up, girl!" the man cut her off. He kicked her in the side, and she let out an "oof". "Stand up, girl!" the drunk demanded. She began to lift herself up when he kicked her again. "Stand up!" Melissa stood, and the man grabbed a fistful of hair at the front of her head. He yanked hard so that her face was pointing up towards his. "You, girl, you come with me."
"Yes, sir," she said quietly.
"I said shut the fuck up, girl!" He yanked her hair again and she let out a yelp. He then released her hair in exchange for her wrist. He pulled her harshly, and she stumbled along behind him as he himself stumbled out of the room.
"Melissa!" I shouted. I didn't want her to leave the room. She made me feel safe when the man was there. I got up and ran to her. I grabbed the wrist the man wasn't holding and tried to tug her back towards me. The man noticed me struggling to set her free, and used his free hand to push me down. I felt like crying, but I wanted to be strong like Melissa, who hardly ever cried despite all she endured.
When Melissa saw me fall, she whimpered, "No." I am still unsure whom this was directed at. Her next words were for me, though: "Nate, just go back and play. Just go back and play with your toys and ignore everything, okay? Go play!"
This rather angered the man. He threw her in front of him and kicked her so that she went flying about a foot. Her face was full of pain; I'm amazed she didn't burst into tears right then. Melissa said nothing, but she looked at me and nodded. I knew she was telling me again to go play with my toys and ignore anything that happened. I reluctantly obeyed her, and sat back down on the floor, quietly using my toys to re-enact the scene that had just played out.
A/N: I have decided to re-post this. I looked back on the original and it hurt my eyes, it was so poorly written. Ha, yeah, that may be an exaggeration. Anyway, I have edited it, and hopefully it's now better.