Page 43 of Vile Emotion
After my smoke dwindles down to nothing as I continue to stare at the house that I’m going to break down brick by brick even if I have to do it by hand, I know I have to leave. I can’t stay here or else it’s going to be a problem. I’m going to destroy things without thinking about the repercussions.
Destroying a town takes time, it doesn’t mean I won’t… It just means one life at a time, to make this into a ghost town, I have to make sure everyone here becomes a ghost somehow. I won’t kill them, not everyone deserves to die but the majority of them will rot in the filth of what their family has done to mine.
I puff out the last of my smoke and discard the butt of it. Turning to face Juliana makes me almost laugh at how distressed she appears as she watches me. Everything around me is in shambles yet she’s the only thing that seems to be standing and stable because I protected her against my own rage, what does that say?
Once I get in the car, I shake off the thoughts that are circling my head when it comes to her. She’s a bigger fool than Carmen was to see this side of me and not run. She should have taken that opportunity to do so when I was down but she didn’t. Would I have searched for her? Yes, but it doesn’t change that everything I would’ve done would’ve been for me and not her.
“Are you okay?” She asks.
Without moving my body or responding to her, I start the car and speed out of the sheriff’s home. He doesn’t matter and neither does his daughter who must’ve known about what happened yet helped her father cover it up some more. I’m in my forties and for this to be covered this long, is insane.
My phone goes off and I answer it without bothering to look at the panel in the car. My father’s boisterous voice comes through the speakers in the car.
“What the hell is this I hear about you going to dig up things no one asked you to do!” He raises his voice like he used to do when we were younger.
“No one asked Dane to report to you like I owe you anything, Lakota.”
“Alaric, there was no need for you to be there and you know that. You’re digging up things that have no solution, you don’t think I tried?”
“You didn’t.” I answer my father point blank.
“Was he your son that you’re doing this for?”
“Did he need to be? Maybe if you treated him like a son then you would have searched harder. Dug deeper but you didn’t. You took the town’s word for it and moved on. Acting like he didn’t exist but that’s your mistake not mine. It’ll never be mine.”
“You had your son and you decided to replace him with another while your wife hadn’t even been in the ground long enough. On top of that, you let it be by the woman who killedher. So son, tell me exactly how you’re better than me and how it is that you should be calling me like this?”
My father stays silent for a moment knowing he’s gutted me with talking about Carmen and my sons. They are touchy subjects. I can admit at first it was about taking Juliana’s son from her because she didn’t deserve him but I learned to love Ricky. He is my son, he isn’t some child that I took in my care, he’s my son.
“You don’t deserve to see him if this is how you’re behaving.”
That's the only thing I say to my father because I know that he and my mother, well, my entire family, even that idiot Dane loves Ricky, so him speaking like this, is because he’s upset about me calling him out on his shitty ways of parenting. Dad was strict as we grew up and sometimes, even abusive but it wasn’t anything I couldn't handle or move on from. Healing isn’t the right word for it, there’s no such thing as healing from being raised by Lakota Crowne.
“Son.” That’s all I hear from my father before I hang up.
I don’t have to listen to his bullshit excuse that he’s about to spew out.
“Are you okay?” Juliana asks me again.
“It’s just who he is. He’s never going to change.”
“Doesn’t mean it’s okay.”
We reach a red light and my eyes dart her way.
“If it makes you feel any better, we have the same temper. Let that be my answer to your question.”
“Actually, it tells me more than anything else.”
“What is that supposed to mean, juliana?”
“I think we’re both adults here and we know what I mean.” She rolls her eyes and looks out the window with arms folded over her chest.
I chuckle again, “you’re really letting that Crowne power get to your head already. Be careful, it’ll make you delusional and power hungry.”
“Something delusional like marry my enemy and take her child as mine?” she hits back.
“Right below the belt like my father but don’t fucking mistake yourself with me, I go to sleep just fine. Will you be able to sleep when you know that we will bury these families and make this a ghost town together? Will you become an insomniac knowing you’ll be washing yourself in the shower but still be drenched in their blood? Huh, Mrs Crowne? Can you handle that?”
