Lana

The bass in my father's voice verberates throughout the walls of my mind. His anger took on new facades each time: from a slow haunting anger, as if mobilized by a demon to levels of rage brought on by his sporadic delirium tremens. I remember one night in particular that the two of them had come home from a night of dancing.

With eyes shaded in anger he spewed, "whore!"
My mother retorted, "Jonathan, let's not start this shit tonight"
"I start whatever the hell I want, whenever the hell I want... Whore."
"What did I do now? I just want to go to bed."
"I saw the way that woman was looking at you tonight."
"Wh-what woman?", my mother responded in genuine bewilderment.
"Bitch, don't play dumb. That woman was looking at you. And you liked it. You liked it didn't you? Didn't you?! Answer me when I talk to you", he bellowed.

At this point my mother had taken off the red, suede stilettos she had been wearing. They haphazardly lay strewn on the floor, not knowing the weapon they would soon become. My father stumbled over to her and in one simultaneous swoop; he grabbed the hair of my mother’s head and the right shoe, rigidly holding its heel to her neck. As she grappled with him, he swiftly controlled the movements of her body via the clenched grasp he had on her hair. She fought, but it was futile. She cried out in pain and attempted to cower from the shear pain from an item she regarded as her favorite. The heel of her shoe was now pressed at her left temple.

My father spit on her in disgust. "I could tear your pretty little face up. You thought these shoes could only make you look good, huh. I'll show you how bad these shoes can really make you look."

My father took the heel of her shoe and attacked my mother's ribcage as if he were responding to her as a result of defense. My mother cried out, as her blood melded with the crimson shoe my father continued to pummel her with. I stood there shaking, yet frozen in stance. I understood my father most in that moment. I've never told anyone, because I know I'm supposed to relate to my mother. I understood that he loved her. I understood she was weak. I understood that he didn't want to lose her. I understood that my father was drunk and my mother stood for it. I understood that she dressed too sexy for a woman who had a husband.

I understood my father.

© CafeUzuri