Lovino Vargas had only been four when he first saw his father screaming at Mother. His first reaction was to run and hide before the scary man would see him in the shadows, so that's what he did. He ran to the room that he shared with his baby brother Feliciano and hid. He hid under the blankets on his bed like they would protect him from the screamed insults that could be heard throughout the whole house but they couldn't. Nothing could protect him from those cusses directed at his beautiful, kind mother. Not even the tears of his baby brother who had been awakened by the noise and was now crying almost loud enough to drown out the yelling. Not quite loud enough. Never quite loud enough.
The sound was enough to draw Mother to the boys' room, away from the threats and insults and yelling of their father. She had to run away. That's what Lovino had thought when he heard her footsteps on the wooden boards of their house. She had to run away with him and Feli and never ever come back to the house haunted by their father's threats. That's what she had to do but instead she drew him out of the blankets with soft Italian words. She took the terrified boy into her arms even though she too was shaking and sung to him in a quivering voice. Despite the terror both felt he calmed in her familiar hold and her voice so soft and sweet lulled him to sleep so he did not hear the slamming of the front door or Mother's quiet sobbing.
The next time Lovino ran to his room in fear was over a month later. During that month everything had been fine. Perfect. Their father had been his normal self. Then he snapped. Once again the yelling and screaming and threats. Empty threats, he had learnt by then. Even knowing those words were hollow did not make them any less terrifying. The threats were no longer just about Mother. Now they involved Feliciano and himself. Feliciano. The angelic baby sleeping calmly in his cradle as Lovino cried beneath his many blankets. How could anyone threaten that little baby? The older of the Vargas children wondered that amidst his terror and confusion. Feliciano was so perfect. So perfect and innocent. He would never know what their father was doing to Mother. He was too young to understand.
Crashes echoed through the house. The man was throwing things now. Plates, cups, crockery. Were they aimed at the fair skinned North Italian woman? Lovino squeezed his eyes shut tighter and held the edge of the blankets in a death grip. Footsteps drawing near, creaking on the wooden floorboards. They were too angry to be Mother's which meant….small fingers tightened even further on the sheets, so hard they went white. Nonononono. Their father was not allowed in the room. He was not allowed to find Lovino's hiding place. He could not enter the room in such a rage and wake Feliciano. It would spoil the memories the child had of their father in that very room. The soft spoken father who read to the child and the baby in Italian. Those memories could not be broken.
But they were.