Dreams can be deadly...

Prologue

I awoke to the sound of my dear brother, Ray, and the sound of a drunken man with a rusty voice. The two voices seemed as though they were shouting at each other. I moaned and tugged my blanket over my head.

My dad and Ray were fighting again. I assumed that my dad was extremely drunk (as always), and Ray was starting an argument with him. The argument could be endless. The argument yesterday morning lasted three and a half hours, to be precise. The disagreement the argument was based on wasn't worth fighting for, in my opinion. Today they were fighting on whether or not Dean and Asher (my two younger brothers) should be allowed inside of the barn. If the argument got out of hand and my gruesome dad started to take action and start abusing us, Ray would pull my wrecked dad back, and throw him into his tiny crowded room. He then would lock the door from the outside. My dad would then pass out on his floor and land on top of his own vile. The regular morning routine.

The crashing of a glass bottle interrupts my thoughts.

I hear Ray curse.

There are a few crashes afterwards, and after a few minutes it becomes dead silent. I rush down the wooden stairs that lead to the large kitchen of the farm house. Ray was sitting on the cream, tiled floor. He was picking glass out of his blood covered foot. His stormy grey eyes looked up at mine. If you looked into them long enough, you could be put into a trance because of their uniqueness.

"Morning sunshine." Ray said with a playful grin.

Ray was eighteen, two years older than me. He had a personality that was charming and extremely like able. He was very strong, anyone could tell that he was strong just by looking at his muscular arms, and he was the bravest person I knew. As a family, we looked out for each other. We have experienced the same things and we have grown up with each other. We have watched each other grow older and older each and every day. Together we work on the farm and take care of our two younger brothers Dean, who was twelve, and Asher, who was four. Ray will work every day and not break a sweat. He feeds the horses in the barn yard, cleans the big ole' farm house that we have constantly been living in for all our lives. He deals with our insane alcoholic father. He will listen to you and care about what you are saying. I am proud to call him my brother.

"Lea?" Ray looked at me concerned. I noticed that I had just been standing there staring at him, deep in thought. I snapped back to reality.

"Hi...where's dad?" I asked hesitantly.

Ray nodded towards the door across from the kitchen. Inside of the room, was my father's room that we usually locked him in when he became too drunk. There's only a lock on the outside of the door. If we were to put one on the inside of the room we would be foolish.

My eyes wandered across the kitchen floor and I saw broken pieces of deep brown glass scattered everywhere. Ray looked up at me and noticed my disgusted facial expression.

"The alcohol took over his body-" Ray started.

"You can't keep blaming it on the alcohol! It's not the alcohol that's making him do things. It's him that makes him do things." I interrupted.

Ray looked surprised.

"I guess so...but the alcohol does affect him in many ways." Ray said trying to reason with me.

I decided to ignore it and let it go. It wasn't worth starting an argument over.

I walked over to the kitchen pantry and swung the door open.

"There's bacon on the counter top if you and the boys want it," Ray said as he swept the broken pieces of glass into the garbage can.

"Did you eat?" I asked him.

"I wasn't hungry. You can go ahead and help yourself." Ray said with his usual friendly, warm voice.

I grabbed two pieces of bacon and chowed down on them. My brothers and I didn't eat much. So when we did eat, we stuffed it down our throats, thanking the lord we even got food. We lived in the fields of Havre, Montana and we were far out from anything. The closest store to our house was a Reams, and that was an hour away. We didn't have much transportation other than a tractor and horses. Ray rode his Tractor every Saturday to get food. He was very hesitant about leaving me and the boys alone with our frightening and wasted dad. Occasionaly our dad will break the door down and start attacking us. It hasn't happened yet when I was alone with the boys, though, and I've had to watch the boys every Saturday for the past three years.

I finished my last piece of bacon and washed the grease off of my hands and face with a wet cloth.

I sigh and prepare myself for the day that lies ahead of me. I can check off "let/help Ray deal with dad" and "eat breakfast" off of my mental planner. What's next of the normal day for me is "home school Dean and Asher." Right as I say there names in my head footsteps come rushing down the stairs and I can hear Asher's playful laugh. Dean and Asher come rushing wildly into the kitchen and Asher's head crashes into my stomach knocking the wind out of me.

"Oof!" I say collapsing to the ground. Luckily my bottom was able to catch the hard fall.

Asher's face went pale and his eyes had a guilty expression in them. Dean threw his head back in laughter and mocked us. Ray came into the room and studied the scene for a moment.

"Asher, apologize to your sister." Ray scolded. Asher mumbled an apology. My frown turned into a smile and I laughed realizing how dumb I probably looked. Asher relaxed a little knowing I wasn't furious at him for pushing me down.

Ray offered his hand and helped me up. He had the smallest of smile on his face and I could tell he was holding in a laugh. "Are you okay?" He asked, a laugh escaping from his mouth.

"I'm fine," I said smiling.

"I'm starving!" Dean said snatching more bacon that he could finish eating. Asher grabbed some as well and we all sat at the table laughing and talking ecstatically like normal happy families do.

Little did we know that our family routine would be soon to change...