Meet Me By The Dock

Chapter 8

"What is wrong with you?"

"I don't know." I cry back, tears streaming down my face.

"You thought you could flunk chemistry and not tell me?" He yells, his face turning red, "Hide it from me?"

"I wasn't hiding it from you," I say with as much courage as I can muster, "And a B is not flunking." The tears continued to fall. But I didn't break down, I didn't lower my eyes from his, and I never flinched when he screamed.

"Who do you think you're talking to?" He got closer to my face, "Who?" He yelled.

There was no use fighting. I gave up fighting him long ago, when I was still young. When I still had the fire to try. "I don't know." I say quietly. I lower my eyes and surrender, like I always do.

"Why are you crying?" He demanded.

"Because you're yelling at me." I say forcefully. Why does he think I'm crying?

"You have no idea what it's like to be yelled at." He muttered as he sat back down in his chair at the dining room table. Fury rose inside of me. It devoured my insides. My heart, my lungs, my brain. Until all I saw was red.

I didn't know what it was like to be yelled at? Then what was that? A stern talking to? A suggestion?

He dragged his hands across his face. But I didn't leave because I wasn't dismissed. "Now, I'm the bad guy," He looked up from his hands and raised his eyebrows, "Right?"

I didn't say anything because sometimes he asks questions he doesn't want answers to. So I took a gamble.

"Answer when I talk to you!" He yelled suddenly. I took a gamble and lost.

"No." I said quietly. My eyes never waver from his.

"I don't ask that much of you," He says lowering his voice, but it's still not quiet, "And you cant even do that."

That was a punch to the gut. Because he was right. He didn't ask for much, he asked for straight A's. He asked for me to be respectful, but lively. He asked me to be funny, until I said something that offended him. Then it was on me.

"I'm sorry." I whisper.

"Get away from me," He says waving me off, "I can't even look at you right now."

So I ran, up the stairs, down the hall, to my bed, into my pillow. I closed the door but didn't slam it, I don't have a death wish.

And I cried. And I cried, and I cried, and I cried.

Until the tears dried up and my throat was sore.

My heart beat rapidly in my chest.

And you can't even do that.

—-------

I gasped and sat up suddenly.

I looked frantically around the room.

I took in my dark bedroom. My window was cracked and a breeze blew in, I had a beach towel strewn across my chair and my tote bag thrown at the foot of my bed.

Just a dream.

A nightmare.

I sat there, staring out my window into the dark, quiet night. Until my heart beat slowed and my body unclenched and I loosened my grip on my sheets. The occasional hoot from an owl sounded outside and every time a car drove by I wondered what they could possibly be doing out this late at night.

Maybe they 're like me. Haunted by nightmares of their past.

But they have the luxury of driving away. I can only sit here.

So that's what I do.

—-------

I stare at my ceiling with my earbuds in, but play no music.

I lay there trying to form a coherent thought inside the mess that is my brain.

I woke up this morning after staring out my window for two hours and I've been laying here ever since.

My heart isn't even heavy, it just feels empty.

Like if I reached into my chest and cut it open, I'd find absolutely nothing inside.

My body felt like it was floating but also sinking deep into the mattress. It was like my brain couldn't pick a sensation so it had chosen them all.

I couldn't move and I didn't want to.

So I just laid there, breathing.

In, out.

In, out.

In, out.

Hoping if I stay still enough I'd just disintegrate, evaporate, rot away.

I get like this sometimes. Mom said she'd allow me to have my "bad days" because she had them too. So we clung to each other like ivy clung to brick, and we took care of each other the best we knew how.

Our glue was gone and we were still learning to survive without it.

I sweep my gaze across my room.

Chair.

Dresser.

Window.

I didn't know what time it was, and I didn't care much to know.

My mom uses the term "bad days" for a lot of different things. She uses it for when she refuses to cook— or even come out of her room— for days at a time. She uses it to describe when I can't move from one spot for hours and I just stare at anything in my general vicinity.

And she uses it to describe my dad.

How he'd get into these moods. Where he wouldn't talk to anyone and anything would set him off, even small things. Like if I'd gotten a B on an History test— but then spilled my cup of water. That would propel him to his breaking point.

He wasn't always like this though. Normally he was kind and sweet and funny and intelligent.But sometimes he'd get into these moods. And I just— I wasn't scared of him. He never hurt me, not physically at least. I was more scared of what he thought of me.

Because everything he said was contradictory. "See, I knew you were smart," was also "Are you stupid, Lilah? An idiot could pass this."

"I love you, Lilah." Turned into, "I can't even look at you."

So I didn't know what was real.

I didn't know if I should ache for him, all of him.

Or just the part I liked.

—-----

I walked into the kitchen at around 6:30. I dozed off after staring out the window for too long and woke up groggily with a dry mouth and the will to drag myself downstairs.

I found my mom sitting at the kitchen island, scrolling through her phone.

"Hi sweetie." She said absentmindedly, never even looking up.

"Hi." I grumbled and went straight for the fridge. Just as I wrapped my fingers around the handle she said, "I ordered pizza, it should be here any minute."

We normally ate around 5:30, so I had thought she already ate. But it was Friday so the pizza parlor was probably busy and late with delivery.

Just as I thought it, the bell rang.

Both of our heads turned to the door, "Would you go get that, Hun?" She asks with a smile, "I'll set the table while you're gone."

"Fine." I rolled my eyes, she hated talking to people as much as I did, hypocrite.

I grabbed the money off the counter and strolled through the foyer and quickly checked my hair in the mirror next to the door before unlocking it.

When I pulled it open, I was met with a now familiar pair of light brown eyes.