"Why are you late coming home?" Rex sighed. Great, his dad was home from work. The old man was used to him being home by two, but the school had changed the time to get out of school.
"They changed the times!" He called out. His father stood up, reaching a height of over six feet. Rex wanted to shrink into nothing. He smelled the booze on his father's breath. Drunk already?
"Bullshit! Where you been boy?" He grabbed his belt and lashed it out, striking Rex's face. He stumbled, and hit his head on the coffee table. He winced and bit his lip, trying not to cry out in pain. The old man loomed over him. "You think that's pain?" He stomped over to the table and picked up a glass.
Something had happened. Something bad. His father wasn't usually this drunk by now. But what?
The old man had smashed the glass against the wall. Only the end of the glass was still together. He ran over to Rex. "I'll show you pain if you really want it." He circled around Rex, like a panther stalking his prey. It was scarier than a darkling. Finally he brought down the glass on Rex's head, making it break. Rex cried out in pain. His father only laughed louder. "I'll make a man out of you yet!" He grabbed Rex's hair and picked him up, making Rex stumble along with him. They went out the back door and he threw Rex to the ground. He coughed up a little blood, and tried to stay conscious. His head was sticky with blood.
His father pushed him towards the bottom of the house. "Go on Rex, go with the spiders!" He leaned close. "They'll smell your fear, so you better get over it." He kicked him in the side and sat down in the chair in the backyard. Rex crawled under the house, feeling fear in his throat. What had happened? His father usually didn't send him under the house. "Find anything boy?" Rex opened his mouth to respond, but his dad had already grabbed his foot and was pulling him out. "No? Then let's go inside." Rex limped to the house, a shard of glass stuck in his leg, dirty from crawling under the house. He sat down in the chair.
"Stand up! You're not a wuss, you can stand." Rex painfully stood up. His father smiled, and walked over to the aquarium. Rex shivered. The spiders. He grabbed two of the hairy spiders, and put them on his skin. "Feel that Rex? That'll make you into a man." Rex had to stay still as the spiders crawled over him, and during the rest of the night while his father kicked, beat, and whipped him more. Finally his dad got tired and went to bed. Rex crawled to bed, taking time to wash his face and take the glass out of his leg and face. Right before he fell asleep he felt a calm in his head. It was Melissa, checking on him.
When Midnight arrived that night Rex opened his eyes, wondering why he was so sore. Then he remembered. He got out of bed, and saw that his leg was still bleeding. He grabbed a towel and wrapped it around his leg. He washed his face one more time and took a look.
It wasn't so bad, his head was swollen, but it would be down by morning. The scrapes on his face looked like his new cat had scratched him. According to him, his cat scratched him all the time. He lay down and waited for Melissa to arrive. For a minute he thought he heard a darkling, but it was silent. He was just being paranoid.
But then he heard it again. He sat up in bed, looking around. He quietly got up and walked around the house. Nothing.
He went over to the back door, grabbing a clean, steel spatula on the way out. "Assassination" He whispered to it. Slowly he walked around the yard, looking for the hiding darkling. He didn't want it around when Melissa showed up. But he couldn't find or hear anything.
Just when he was about to go inside something swiped his back. He turned and saw a darkling, younger one, with blood on his claws. No doubt his back would be bleeding. "Assassination!" He screamed and threw it at the darkling. It missed.
He had no more metal. He was about to turn and run when a stainless steel handle hit the darkling in the back. It exploded in a shower of blue sparks, and the cat turned and ran. He stood up shakily from where the darkling had knocked him down. Picking up the handle, he saw it was a car door handle. He closed his eyes in relief.
"You okay?" He jumped at Melissa's voice. Of course that's where the handle came from. "Hello? Rex?"
"I'm okay!" He called. She appeared over the fence, dropping down gracefully. She walked over and turned him around.
"Damn, he got your back good." He sighed. She walked over to him and examined the wound. "It'll be fine." She said. "But you might want to put something on it." She touched his shredded hoodie. He'd taken to hoodies ever since his dad had started hitting him hard enough to leave marks. "Your jacket, on the other hand, is gone." She smiled, then frowned, touching his head with a gloved hand. He winced as it ran over the cut on his face from the glass. "What happened here?"
He shrugged. "Must've scratched me there too." She watched him, eyes narrowed, for a minute. Then shook her head and started towards Rex's house. "Where you going Cowgirl?"
She turned around and smiled. "Let's chill on your house for a while."
He frowned, confused. "On my house?" She laughed.
"Yup." She took a hold of the wood on Rex's patio and pulled herself on top of the railing. "Coming?" She held out a hand and he took it, helping to get on he wooden railing. Melissa looked at the roof and thought for a second then jumped, grabbed the edge of the gutter. She eased her way up, then helped Rex up. "What's this skylight?" She asked, carefully making her way over to the glass in the roof. Rex went over too, and thought.
"It's in our attic." He said. She looked thoughtful and then nodded. "We can use that from now on." He nodded. Then sighed.
Melissa looked over. "What's wrong?" She asked. Rex only shrugged.
"Nothing." He murmured, and lay down. She crawled over.
"No, something's wrong." She closed her eyes, and Rex forced himself not to think about his dad, the spiders, and the glass. She opened her eyes, looking at him suspiciously. "Strange, it's hard for me to get into your mind tonight." He shrugged and closed his eyes.
"I'm just tired." Melissa studied him, then sighed in defeat.
"Fine." For a while they stayed quiet, just looking at the passing moon. When the moon was close to setting Melissa silently stood up and jumped off the roof, landing on her feet. Rex sat up.
"How'd you do that?" He asked.
Melissa smiled up at him. "It's the easiest way to sneak out of a two story room." She said, then ran over to her bike. Rex smiled. She was…interesting. She was his best friend, his only friend, and he wanted more than anything to be able to tell her his problems. But there wasn't anything she could do, so why burden her?
With one more sigh, Rex slowly made his way off the roof and into the house, falling asleep just as Midnight ended.
((Poor Rex. L)