Dropping down onto my bed I grab my guitar and start mindlessly strumming, it's loud, you could barely class it as music but I need noise, I need anything possible to numb my mind.
Reaching into the bedside drawers I pull out a half bottle of whiskey and take the biggest gulp that I can stand. I haven't drank alcohol since Taylor and I became official, part of my attempt to prove my self worthy of her but it turns out I wasn't worthy after all, turns out when I thought I had been given something good to make up for all the shit I had endured I had been wrong.
I'm always wrong.
Wrong for everyone and wrong about everything
I take another gulp then set it down and begin strumming. Pushing Taylor and everything that makes me feel anything as far away from my heart as possible
'Me and you, we were made to break
I know that it's true, but it's much too late'
The last word comes out like a strangled sob.
I want to cry, fuck do I want to cry.
I want to scream and cry and rage
I want to tear the entire world to pieces with the unfairness of it all but all I can do it sit, frozen on my bed, strumming the same chord progression that's hung around my brain since the whole fucking saga with Taylor and I began
I think of her face, the way she would smile uncontrollably whenever she saw me, I never thought anyone would ever look at me that way but she did.
The tears threaten again and I try to strum them away but I can hear her voice calling for me, begging me and I let out an audible cry, the sound of my heart cracking open seeming all too real in my ears.
This is why people write so many songs about heart break, it must be the most agonising pain a soul has to endure.
My chest heaves as i cover my head with my hands and allow myself to sob quietly but then I hear hands on my door, my head snaps up and I see the lock is open, throwing my guitar on the bed I run to the door but make it there just as Mary pushes it open and stumbles towards me, her eyes rolling and then narrowing and she stares at me
"You're crying"
"Fuck You!" I reply wiping a hand over my face "Now get out of here"
"Come here Travis baby, let mommy kiss it better" She reaches for me but I slap her hand out of the way
"Get the fuck out!"
"Tomas! Tomas! Get in here, your son is up here crying In to his fuckin guitar. I thought you were raising a man not a wimp"
"Get the fuck out Mary!" I try to push her out but my dad appears at the door, his tall figure filling the narrow space, his eyes burning into me with familiar disgust
"Who are you talking to boy?" his eyes are glazed, as though he's looking at me but not seeing me. I want to tell him his dumbass wife but i lower my head, afraid for him to see my pain, knowing he will only use it against me
"He's crying Tomas, poor little Traaaaav is crying" She fakes a laugh and prods a finger into my shoulder "What's wrong Travis? A girl broke your heart?"
I whip my head up to glower at her and know immediately that I just made a mistake, I gave myself away and now i'm defenceless against them
"Is that what this is?" My father demands to know "A Kelce crying over some whore?"
I swallow down every emotion that is threatening to erupt to the surface, I know only too well how dangerous it is for me to stand up to my dad, the last time I did I ended up in hospital, ever since then I keep my head down, I take the beating and then I take my emotions out on someone else.
"No sir" I reply, keeping my eyes fixed on my feet but his hand shoots out and grips me by my chin, raising my head as his cold eyes move over my face
"See Tomas, he's crying, your son, crying, can you imagine the shame of a man crying?"
She's goading him on as she always does and she won't be happy until he explodes and my blood is on his hands, it's a familiar routine, I know what's to come so I just submit, keep my head down and my hands by my side and wait for the pain knowing no matter what my father subjects me to tonight, it won't anywhere close to what I already feel from losing Taylor.
The back of his hand strikes my face and I immediately taste blood as my flesh comes into contact with my teeth
"Are you going to cry about that now Travis?" Laughs Mary "I bet this is about that little girl that turned up here that day. Is that why you are crying? Did you get dumped?"
I feel the fury I had buried deep begin to bubble beneath the surface at the way Mary speaks about Taylor but I just grip my hands into fists and say nothing
"She asked you a question boy" My father pushes my head hard to the left but I say nothing
"I would hardly think she's worth crying over she was tiny and had nothing up top to grab hold of" Mary says whilst giving her left breast a squeeze and I want to vomit all over her
"Are you crying over a girl?"
"No sir"
"He is Tomas, that blond thing that turned up here, he's crying like a little girl over her"
"Shut up" I can't help myself, the words are out before I can think. Taylor is mine, she means everything to me, I won't just stand here and listen even if it means my beating is twice as bad
"What did you say?" My father gets right in my face, his hand comes up against my throat "You're going to speak back to me in my own home over a bitch?" I don't answer, but I don't dip my head either i just stare my father in his eyes
"You disrespectful little shit!" Mary pushes me by my shoulder as my father grabs me by my shirt and pulls me to him, his alcohol soaked breath is wet against my face and makes me feel like I'm suffocating
"What's up boy? Was your little princess too good for someone like you?"
I close my eyes, afraid of how close to the edge he's pushing me. He can say what he wants, do what he wants but not Taylor, he doesn't get to speak about Taylor
"Just like your mother, getting ideas above her station and then throwing us away like a pair of old socks, is that what the little bitch did to you?"
Say nothing Travis, just keep calm and say nothing but my brain is beginning to boil in temper
"It's a shame, you could have brought her over again, it's only right that you share with your family, what's yours is mine" he winks at me and my mind collapses in on it's self
The fist that collides with his chin seems to come out of nowhere as he crashes back against the door and Mary screams in shock
I feel like I'm no longer in control of my body as I rain punches down into my fathers head and face. In my mind it's my face that's being pummelled, my father above me laughing as I cower and cry
I punch him for 3 year old Travis that was made to sleep in a wet bed when he had an accident.
For 7 year old Travis that was subjected to the sick game in the bathroom,
For 12 year old Travis that was battered to within an inch of his life for trying to fight back and for 18 year old Travis who has just lost the first and only person that ever loved him and now has nothing left to lose.
* well those were some dramatic chapters even for me lol
