Chapter 7: Chapter Seven

Sarah waited quietly in the passenger's seat of the coup and for a good five minutes it was all quiet in the house. Then there was a slap sound, followed by the muffled voice of the old woman screaming.

He did not just hit the old lady, Sarah thought to herself. Unable to sit idly by while he abused his grandmother Sarah got out of the car and crept into the house.

Another smacking sound, but as she drew closer to the confrontation, she could distinctly tell it wasn't Biff who was the abuser. She peeked around a corner to see the old woman standing over a prone Biff, hitting him with a rug beater. Sarah covered her mouth, but was unable to look away.

"Did I raise you like that, you miserable little boy?" she shouted, hitting him across his back. "To sleep around with unclean girls. To get with loose women? What would God say?"

"I'm sorry Grandma," he said, a whimpering, simpering boy, not the dominant bully Sarah was used to at home. It certainly explained where all of his anger towards women came from...

"I don't care if you're sorry. You have to learn," the old crow hissed, beating him again with the cleaning apparatus. It whistled through the air before cracking across his back. To his credit, he didn't scream, but the anguish in his face made Sarah want to. "God doesn't care if you're sorry," she wacked him again and again.

The beating went on until the old woman was out of breath, with Biff taking it all without scream or fighting back, though he was fully able to overpower the old bat.

"Get cleaned up," she said with a disparaging tone. "You're a disgrace to the Tannen name, and so are your bastard and that whore of a mother. Your father would be so disappointed in you. It's no wonder your mother abandoned you to my care. I wouldn't want you either. No one wants you. Not even that tart you knocked up. She went half way across the country to get away from you." The old woman spat on his face and walked away.

Cold words and they struck Biff harder than Sarah would have thought they could. He looked hurt, and truly ashamed. When the old woman was gone he took out a handkerchief and wiped the spit off his face.

Sarah couldn't move, she was full of fear and shared hurt for the man in front of her. She understood him better than ever right now; it didn't make what he did right, not by a long shot, but it did help her understand why he was the way he was. Why he treated her mother the way he did.

She lingered too long in the hallway; when she turned to leave it was already too late, Biff had seen her.

The old woman had gone up stairs already, and Sarah decided to risk trying to run back to the garage, but Biff was faster than her. He caught her by the upper arm and spun her around as he had done at home, in a future he was unaware of, many times.

He spun her around and pushed her into the wall, pinning her painfully against the fake wood panelling. Her eyes looked up at him, full of fear; his stared back at her, full of shame.

"I..." he started to speak but she cut him off with an unplanned, ill advised move.

Sarah leaned in and kissed him.