Page 20 of Damian & Jun, Episodes 9-12
Dalia slapped the table again. “Whatever you’re saying, boy, say it straight.”
Damian turned halfway back around. “Never call me boy again. Next time you address me like that, our conversation is over. You want it straight, then it’s this: Thaddeus Kramer is a pedophile.”
Dalia stood, flushed, hands shaking. “You take that back.”
“He’s a monster. You can choose to go down with him, or you can wake up and run when you’re given yet another chance. I gave you your first, years ago, but you turned evidence on me then, didn’t you? You lied. You said Armada had taken a stumble while learning to walk. Even though you saw him hit her. You lied for him and nearly put me in prison.”
“You hit him!”
“He hit me. He hit her, Dalia. He’s a violent monster.”
“He’s the man of the house.”
“That doesn’t give him any more rights than anyone else.”
“It’s God’s law: God, the husband as head of the house, the wife, then children.”
“Not good enough, Dalia! Not good enough.” When had he started shaking? “Some things you don’t stay for.”
“You were disobedient. What was he supposed to do? Let you do whatever you wanted?”
“You were supposed to stand up for your child, Dalia. Armada was your baby. You let him hurt her. You let him hurt me for years. We were children.”
“Yeah, and do you think Dad was any better after you left, huh! You left us with him. Do you know what it was like after you were gone?
“I was seventeen!”
“You were a man.”
“Make a decision, Dalia. Either I was a man or I was a child who should have obeyed him.”
“You were his son. It didn’t matter how old you were.”
“Who’s more important, Dalia? The child who can’t speak? Or the grown man who hit a baby?”
“He was your father. It was his responsibility to raise you.”
“So that’s your reason? You stayed, even after you could leave, because I was his?”
“It’s not like I could leave! I was twelve.”
Damian stared at her, the truth finally ringing out between them. “You were eleven.”
She huffed. “Almost twelve.”
“That was me. We could have left at any time between then and when Armada was born. We could have left that night. All you had to have done was speak the truth. They would have taken him away. We could have been free.”
Dalia trembled. Tears lined her lashes. “We needed him. He owed me. I was his woman. He could have made an honest woman of me.”
“A woman, when? When I was born? When Armada was? Dalia, what he did to you was wrong.”
“Are you not hearing me? He was your dad. He knocked me up. A man’s supposed to raise their sons.
“Not good enough.”
“He owed me, owed us. It’s a father’s responsibility.”
“You were eleven. You weren’t his woman; you were his victim.”
