Page 67 of Cruel Dominion

I bit my lip. I’d been thinking about asking my father to do something but that would be difficult considering my father didn’t even know Carter existed.

Carter’s mom had been sick for months. Cervical cancer. The hospital bills were so high, they’d be buried under them any day now. As if that wasn’t enough, his father was responsible for the reason why he didn’t want to take his shirt off the first night we went swimming.

I’d seen them now. The bruises. The scars.

He took the abuse from his father so that the bastard would spare his mother. He’d always done it, got in between them, but now more than ever he refused to let the piece of shit touch her. She was too weak. Too fragile as her illness grew inside her.

I ached for him. It hurt so much to see him hurting.

He didn’t know it yet, but I’d been working to put money away. Little bits here and there withdrawn from Daddy’s credit card, stuffed under my mattress. When I had enough to make a difference, I’d make him take it.

Then he wouldn’t have to work so much and his mom could get more of the treatment she desperately needed. As it was, I knew after this round of chemo, they wouldn’t be able to afford the next one.

“Carter?” I prodded when he didn’t reply.

“I mean, yeah. I’m glad she’s feeling all right, but I know it won’t last,” he said.

“Don’t say that.”

He sighed into the wind.

“Do you think the cops have let your dad out yet?”

They always did when he inevitably found himself being belligerent at a bar and getting himself arrested and thrown in the drunk tank. Which was exactly where he’d wound up a couple days ago.

“Don’t know. Don’t care,” he said flatly.

He left after a fight two days ago. That night, he came to the beach with a busted lip and finger marks around his neck, his eyes bloodshot.

I’d been so terrified, I couldn’t sleep when I went home.

I begged him not to go back and he listened, staying with a friend, but I knew he would have to go home eventually. For his mom who despite everything refused to leave with him.

I’d never understand that.

My arm wrapped protectively around his middle and my eyes squeezed shut. I wanted to protect him.

I came from home every night, he came from his job waiting tables. Right after school, before he started at the restaurant, he had another job at a garage.

The last time I offered him money he had looked at me like I slapped him. But that was before his mom was diagnosed. Now, he might take it. I hoped he would take it.

“Let’s hope he stays there,” I said, knowing he wouldn’t. He never did.

“I’ve thought about that.”

I raised my head and looked at him.

“Thought about what?”

It was dark tonight so I could barely see him but I knew his brows were pulled down over his eyes. His lip curled when he talked about his father.

“I’ve thought about the day when the cops will show up at the house. Sometime I imagine they’ll come with a court summons that will put him behind bars for years or even for life.

Other times I imagine they’ll say some shit to my mom like, ‘We’re so sorry, ma’am, Frank Cole was found dead from an automobile accident. Looks like he was drinking.”

His throat bobbed and his chin shook as he said the next imagined line. “‘We’re going to need you to come identify the body’.”

My mouth fell open but I didn’t say anything. Frank Cole deserved to die a slow, painful death after what he had done to his son and wife. I didn’t want to admit it to myself or to Carter, but I’d imagined something similar. Or even just him leaving, abandoning them.

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