Page 63 of Obsession
His lips travel back down the edge of my jaw and below my chin. He places a kiss on my mouth, his lips fitting perfectly with mine. “Don’t be, baby. There’s nothing to fear. I’ll look after you. Just hold on a little longer for me.”
“Fuck, so tight,” Miller grunts, jerking through his orgasm.
“Is this what death feels like?” I ask Robbie, who silences me with another kiss.
“I’ll bring you back from the dead again, I promise.”
A sharp smack to my bare ass, then cum slithers down my thighs, growing colder by the second.
Miller tucks his dick back inside his pants. “I’ll wait outside the room while you make yourself presentable.”
He leaves me there, bent over the desk with my heart bleeding out on the floor in a river of red.
He’s a killer in his own right.
I’m breathing but I’m dead inside.
Outside the window, the trees continue their dance peacefully, their roots stretching far and wide beneath this hell on earth.
I phonein sick for work and spend three days as vegetative as my father downstairs. I don’t move. I don’t think. I just stare at the gap in the curtain, where a sliver of sunshine threatens to allow light into my darkened bedroom. What I need is to be sheltered by the shadows that shroud me in blackness while I mend my broken heart.
I don’t have a teddy to hug anymore. It’s on the table in Robbie’s old trailer, unless some kid with a spray can has tossed it to the dirty floor. Maybe it’s destined to rot away amongst the debris and broken glass like Robbie’s past?
On day four, I drag myself out of bed and walk with heavy steps down the creaky stairs to the bottom floor where my dad watches reruns of some soap opera. I haven’t got a fucking clue. I haven’t set foot downstairs in days. My peach dressing gown is untied, hazardously thrown on top of my cotton shorts and a gray T-shirt, and the belt drags behind me on the floor as I turn the corner into the living room. I tied my hair up in a bun the other day, but now it sags, hanging halfway down my head.
I stop in the doorway and stare at my father. I’m so sick of the sight of him. Every day he gets to breathe is a reminder of the hell he put me through only for another monster to replace him.
As I shuffle deeper into the room, the floorboards creak beneath my sock-clad feet. Dad makes a gurgling sound in his throat, the only sign he’s aware of my presence.
I’m two steps away from the bed when I pause.
I always felt some kind of way toward my father. Anger. Sadness. Regret. Now I feel nothing.
“Dad…” I walk up to the bed and stare at his wrinkly hand for the longest moment before I carefully reach out and stroke my fingers over the back, tracing the roadmap of veins. “I know you know what I did.” Taking his hand in mine, I sweep my gaze over his face. He’ll never look at me again. His eyes will always be locked in one position. “I’m not sorry, and I don’t regret it. What I do regret is that I didn’t finish it.”
For once, his gurgling has stopped. He’s listening silently. It took years, but I finally have his attention. Maybe he’ll hear what I have to say for once.
“You hurt me, Dad. You and your friends broke me, and I thought I’d healed. But Dad…” Tears burn and prick my eyes. “I’m not healed. I’m not even close to healed. I hurt, Dad. I hurt so fucking much.” I point at my chest, knowing he can’t see because he can’t turn his head, but it doesn’t matter. This speech is for me more than him. I need to voice my pain instead of pretending it’s not there, festering inside me. “I tried so hard to move past it. To live a normal life. But my past haunts me, Dad. Everywhere I turn, there’s another you, lying in wait to hurt me all over again.”
I wipe my cheeks with my sleeve, but more tears fall. “I can’t do it anymore. I’m not endlessly strong. There’s a limit to how much I can take. Do you hear me? I am so close to falling over the edge, and it scares me.” Inhaling a deep breath, I sniffle as I trace my thumb over the back of his hand. “It’s time to let go, Dad.Ineed to let go.”
With those words hovering in the air, I cushion his head with my palm while removing the pillow behind him. He’s gurgling again, protesting loudly.
Isn’t it funny that even now, a shell of his former self, he still wants to live? To exist.
But he didn’t think twice about stealingmylife back then. To killmeon the inside.
“Ssshh now. You’re okay. It’ll all be over soon.” I climb onto the bed, straddling his lap, and press the pillow over his face. It doesn’t take long. While his life slips away, I let my mind drift, thinking back on all the times he snuck into my bedroom at night and the countless nights he paraded me in front of his friends and let them take turns with me.
Freedom tastes sweet when it finally sweeps through my soul like an avenging angel.
I sit back with the pillow gripped in my hands and stare at his face. His empty eyes gaze at nothing.
The gurgling has finally stopped, and silence has fallen for the last time.
It’s all over.
And in the silence that ensues, I allow myself to break down with my head buried in my father’s neck and his pillow clutched tightly to my aching chest, crying for the love and safety I was never offered.
