Grace Rage
"So, dad, how about those Bulls?" Zach says, as he, Grace, and Peter sit around the table, pizza in hand. "Oh those was a great game! The shot at 4th quart-"
"Stop it! Shut up! I can't take it anymore!" Grace cried, slamming the plate on the floor. All of the sudden her emotions came over her in an overwhelming flood. She could not hold back what she had held in for a long time-too long. The whispering, the mocking from other students behind her back, or even not that closely behind her back, the loss of her school, her neigborhood, some friends, and the general ability to walk down the street without people pointing was just too much to bear. Her very roots had been rocked to the core, a foundation ripped asunder, not unlike her parents marriage. Was it not supposed to be the bedrock upon which a family stood? How could he have been so casual? So reckless? All for some strange? They would be shocked to know that she thought that, let alone knew she said it. They still thought of her like a little girl, in her uniform and innocence. But she was not-her father had stolen that from her as if he had stolen her virginity himself, if not her body, certainly her mind.
"Grace! You're out of line!"
"Well you being a man whore didn't help!"
"I hate you Daddy! You've destroyed what was left of our family! If you weren't such a souless maggot with the morals of a sewer rat I'd have a lot more respect for you."
"Ha! I'm out of line with all the destruction you've done!"
"What are you saying, Grace? Dad's past is in the past. He's changed!" shouts Zach.
Oh of course you're going to side with him! One day you'll be just like him!
"Hey!"
"Of course you will! All men are alike!"
Grace ran to her room and slammed the door.
"Grace! Come out! Come out!"
"No! Leave me alone!"
"Open the door!"
"Go away!"
"No!"
"I want to talk to you!"
"You've said more than enough!" She layed down on a heap on her bed, spent. He laid his head on her door, fighting back tears.
He did the only thing he knew how to do: call Alicia: ." He pivoted toward his room, struggling to not hold his head in shame-he had done that long enough-but now his shame returned, it was different when it came to his own children.
My children are ok, he thought. No they're not! That 's just something you tell yourself to get through the day. That he could never live down. How did one innocent family night of pizza turn into so much angst? He was rebuilding, or at least trying to. Or was he more rebranding? His conscience would struggle with that one. How sincere was he? Other women would always be a temptation. Who was he kidding? To them he would always be the scourge, the black mark, the Darth Vader. He sat at his desk and wept hard. Near gut crying.
At the kitchen table Zach waxed not as deeply. What was wrong with her? Couldn't she see Dad had changed? There was no going back, regardless. They had their school, maybe even their home again. Above all he was still Dad, Daddy. Wasn't that enough, in the end?
The next day.
Alicia and Grace share a special mother-daughter ride to school. "Grace no matter what Daddy loves you."
"That isn't enough, now is it!"
"All we can do is move forward."
"I can't! I can't move forward!"
"How can you talk to your father that way?"
"That's how you should be talking to him Mom, if you had a backbone!"
"Grace!"
"Well banging your boss didn't help, now did it?"
There it was. On the table.
"Grace I_"
"Don't say a word."
She slammed the car door shut. And started an earthquake.