Page 2 of Kane

I’m small and my voice is soft, and I don’t know if I’ll ever get big like him…

Cyd… please…” Mama pleads, her voice wigglin’ an awful lot.

“You think some young buck fresh from the academy is gonna ride in here and rescue you?” He grabs her, his hand around her throat. He does that a lot, especially when he’s mad. Mama says it doesn’t hurt, but she always cries after, so I think it must hurt a little. “From me?” He leers towards her, causing her to stumble backward, and my heart starts to race. She’s so close I could touch her, and I want to. I want to be next to her, but she hasn’t told me the game’s over yet.

“No, of course not. You’re talking crazy, I—”

“Think just because you open your legs for him he’s going to be your knight in shining armor?” His voice echoes in the space, rattling the slats. My breath catches in my throat.

“No, I—”

“Think just because he put a baby in you, he loves you and is gonna take care of you?” he snaps as Mama backs up against the closet. She’s so close, all I have to do is move over a smidge, but I can’t.

I’m frozen with fear.

“What b-baby?” she asks.

“Do you even know who he is? Or did you fuck every one in that dirty ass precinct like a little whore?”

“I didn’t… it’s not… like that, Cyd, I swear, I—”

“Cause’ we both know you aint fucking me anymore.”

He grabs her by the back of her hair and pulls her away from the closet, away from me. Mama whimpers, and my entire body feels like a block of ice.

“You think you are so smart, don’t you?” he growls. “Thought you could hide that baby in your belly, maybe even pretend it’s mine. Think I wouldn’t notice?”

She cries and he yells for her to answer him, but she doesn’t. She just keeps crying, and he just keeps yelling.

“All you had to do was keep your mouth shut, your legs closed, and your nose out of my fucking business!”

She gasps, choking out a garbled sound. I don’t understand what she’s saying. Daddy picks her up, but a moment later she’s back on the ground, choking; coughing.

Bleeding…

There is blood on her fingers, seeping into the carpet.

She answers him, her voice solid, not shaking at all.

“You took those women,” she says. “You killed them!”

Her voice pitches to a shrill as he picks her up, growling like a wolf. His hand wraps around her throat again, and he lifts her off the ground so high, her feet dangle. I watch them like shadow puppets, their darkness stretching beneath the bottom of the closet door, like they’re coming for me. Mama cries, her voice so loud I think the neighbors can hear her. Daddy brings her face to his, their lips so close I think they’re going to kiss and make up. They do that sometimes—fight, throw things. Call each other bad words and nasty names. But they always kiss and make up. Mama says that’s what love is—a lotta kissing and making up.

But Daddy doesn’t kiss Mama.

Not tonight.

Instead, he spits in her face.

Mama looks up at him, and then he whispers something to her. I can’t hear him, but whatever it is, makes her eyes widen, and then I hear a sharp slap echo in the air. There’s a heavy thud a moment later. Mama tries to crawl away, towards the closet, towards me, but Daddy grabs her. Her wild eyes find mine as he wrestles with her dress, shoving it up to show her behind. She yelps as she tries to get away, but Daddy’s on top of her, and she can’t move so easily. Another sharp smack sounds, followed by her relentless cries as Daddy wrestles with his pants.

“Close your eyes, Kathan, baby,” she whispers, her voice barely a sound. I close my eyes, wanting to do as she says because I always do what she says when she calls me by my full name because I’m her best boy, she says. Though, technically I’m her only boy, because I don’t have any sisters or brothers, but she says I’ll always be her best boy no matter what. The darkness overcomes me as Daddy grunts out dirty words, as Mama cries and cries like the sadness inside her is eating her alive. Maybe it is.

Maybe she’s too honest and the lies taste too bitter, too sour.

The sound of the door opens and then there’s shouting. Footsteps. Daddy growls as a familiar voice rings out, “Put the gun down, Cydney. Step away from the woman, and we can talk about this…”

I want to open my eyes; if only to see where the familiar voice is coming from, who it belongs to. There’s a strange realization inside me, like I know I have heard it lots of times, but the way it sounds right now—commanding, sharp…