It wasn't me.

Part 12

POV Gabriel (13 years old)

13 years ago

"Please I'm sorry! I didn't mean it, it was an accident." I plead to my dad. I had dropped his beer when I was getting it for him, and he's really mad.

"I don't care if you're sorry! You're going to clean this shit up, you got it!?" He yells loudly and slaps me in the face. I stumble and hit my head on the fridge.

"Yes I got it! I'll clean it now." I stutter as tears blur my vision.

"And when you're done with that make me food." I nod my head and grab some paper towels to clean up the mess. I stumble and cry when I feel a sharp pain in my arm. He stabbed me. He fucking stabbed me with a shard from the bottle. "Answer me when I talk to you next time."

"Yes, I'm sorry." I try to stop the tears but they just keep coming. I look at my arm and see a large gash. I grab a towel and tie it around my arm so I don't get blood everyone. Dad slaps me hard in the face again before storming out of the kitchen with a new bottle in his hand. I stumble backwards and fall against the fridge. I've dealt with this ever since my mom died 6 years ago. All I remember are the times when he was actually a good father. When he cared about me. Now it's like.. he's a different person. I remember when he used to make me chicken noodle soup when I was sick, and we would have flour fights when we baked cakes with my mom. I also remember amazing times with my mom, but now that she's gone everything's different. Sure we're still in the same house but nothings the same anymore. All he does is drink and get high all day..when he's not? He's beating the shit out of me. I hate it. I hate that I can't fight back or defend myself. Even if I could.. I don't think I would. He's my father, and I love him even after everything he's done.

————————At School————————

"Hello, Gabriel! Welcome to Eastwood Middle School, we're so excited to have you here!" My new teacher, Mrs. Braily, tells me.

"Uh thank you." I go sit in a seat near the back next to a girl.

"Hi Gabriel! I'm Madeline, but you can call me Maddie if you'd like." She smiles at me.

"It's nice to meet you." I smile back and take out my notebook.

"This class is really boring, Mrs. Brailey just talks and talks. I swear she doesn't know how to be quiet!" Maddie whispers to me. I laugh with her about that. It seems true, from the time I got here to now she hasn't stopped talking. Whenever anyone asks a question she goes on a ten minute rant about the subject, it's really great actually. We don't have to do as much work if she is too busy talking about random things.

After that day me and Maddie became really good friends. I noticed she hung around with two other guys a lot too, but I've only talked to them once or twice. I don't think they really like me very much, but that was okay. Me and Maddie hung out a lot, whenever she wasn't with her two other friends she was always with me.

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I scream. And I scream. And I scream. He just keeps going. He doesn't stop, he just continues hitting me. I don't understand what did I do wrong? All I did was ask how his day was. I was being nice, I thought. I thought it was nice to ask how your day is. Is it not? I don't understand. It's a lot worse this time than usual. He hits me in the face, he kicks me, whatever it is that he does it's just to cause me pain and I don't understand why. Why me? What did I do to deserve this? Why couldn't I get a loving parent? Maddie talks about how amazing her mom and are all the time, why couldn't I have that? Why couldn't I have two parents? Why do I have an abusive father? It feels like it's going on for forever. Why won't he stop? I plead and I plead for it to end but he just keeps going. All I can do is scream and cry at this point. Soon though, he stops. He stomps out of the room and falls onto the couch. I'm bruised all over. I have blood running down my face, and I'm almost 100% sure he broke my arm. I try to stand but end up falling back over. Fuck him. Why do I have to deal with this! I remember then that I have my phone in my pocket. If I can call Maddie maybe she'll come over and help me. I pull my phone out and call her. She answers right away.