"No, please, please," The useless begging. It wouldn't make a difference. Craig cowered under the blows. Glimpsed his father's face. And started his begging again.
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Ashley sat at the kitchen table, her cool exterior giving no clue to the turmoil. Her father was looking at her mother with an expression of such helpless sorrow that Ashley couldn't stand it. He was telling her he was leaving.
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Craig swallowed hard, tasted blood. Blood from inside his mouth, from his split lip. Felt the ache, generalized and dull, in his arms and legs and torso. The ache he always felt.
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Upstairs in her room, the door closed. The calm angelic expression still on her face. He was leaving. Her father, her hero. How could she ever deal with this?
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"Craig," his father standing in his doorway, and Craig looked up fast, flinched. Saw the expression of hurt and shame cross his father's face when he did that but he couldn't help it. He let out his breath in short shuddery gasps and waited for the apology or the promises that would come. Not that he would believe them. Not anymore.
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He was leaving. She couldn't make him stay. Couldn't make him love her mother. Couldn't do anything. She was helpless.
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He'd said he was sorry and that it would never ever happen again and Craig had listened like he always listened. Watched T.V. in his room and hoped his dad wouldn't make him go downstairs and eat supper. He couldn't eat. He could hardly move. If he stayed real still it hardly hurt at all.
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She saw him bringing suitcases out to the car, watched out her window as he filled the trunk. Packing everything and going. The tears threatened to spill but she held on. She held on.
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The morning, the sun shining in through his window. He stood in front of the mirror and stared at the black and blues, at his lip puffed to twice its size. What excuse would he give for the lip? Fell off his skateboard again?
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Ashley stood at the window in the morning, her hands on the sill. Her father's car was gone. She felt the emptiness.
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He hated him. Hated him. His side hurt and his lip hurt and everything hurt and he fucking hated him. He'd remember that this time. He wouldn't forgive him.