Chapter 12
The world went silent. Not the kind of silence that comes with a hushed library or a peaceful snowfall in the cold December, but a silence that heavily pressed down on the thirteen years old Gabriel Di Luca, it was suffocating, heavy, and utterly unnatural. It was the silence of a life abruptly extinguished, the silence of the teenage boy's soul screaming in the aftermath of a deed he never thought he'd be capable of.
It started with a stupid argument, a clash of egos fueled by teenage bravado and a simmering resentment that had been building for months. Words escalated into threats, threats into a shoving match, and then, in a blur of adrenaline and fear, a punch followed by another and another, until he could no longer count how many punches he delivered. When Gabriel finally snapped out of his dark trance, the boy was finally dead, his face was bloody and unrecognizable.
The world spun. His heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drumbeat against the sudden, horrifying stillness. He saw the blood welling up on the tiled flooring, a crimson stain spreading like a macabre flower. The air tasted metallic, the smell of fear and blood choking him.
Gabriel knelt beside him, a wave of nausea washing over him. His hands trembled, the weight of what he'd done crushing him. The guilt was a physical entity, a vise squeezing his chest, making it impossible to breathe. It was a constant, gnawing ache that spread through his body, a reminder of the life he'd taken. It was a monstrous, insidious thing, twisting his insides, making him question every single fiber of his being.
He wasn't a monster. He wasn't a killer. He wasn't his father. He doesn't want to be anything like that. He was just a boy, a scared, confused boy who had made a terrible, irreversible mistake. But the label stuck, branding him with a darkness that he couldn't escape.
"Gabriel. I'm sorry." Alessandro Di Luca, his father, appeared, patting his son's back offering some sort of comfort, but the man was foreign for that kind of word. He doesn't know how to help. His son just killed for the first time
Gabriel was such a sweet little boy, but as he started to grow up his temper, much like his father, started to show and like his father he can become dangerously violent when provoked. His family tried their best to help him with his temper, but sadly everyone knows it's just a matter of time.
"I...I didn't mean for this to happen... I was just so angry, it was such a blur and before I knew it he was dead!" Gabriel cried out, his heart breaking in two.
Turning into a killer, a monster, like his father is his greatest nightmare. Alessandro knows this and he shared the same nightmare as his son as well. Gabriel is so much better than him, he wants him to be better.
"I don't want to be a monster, Papa! I can't be a monster!" The teenage boy was shaking.
Alessandro couldn't take seeing his son in so much pain anymore as he knelt down beside his son and pulled him in a tight embrace.
"You are no monster, do you hear me? You're my same sweet and brave tiger. What happened here is a regrettable mistake, an accident which will serve as your lesson, but it will not happen again. We will not let it happen again because you'll learn how to control your anger more. You are a good person, Gabriel, always remember that."
***
-Gabriel Di Luca-
The days that followed after that day were a blur of fear, shame, and a desperate need to erase what I had done. I tried to convince myself exactly what my Papa told me, that it was an accident, a tragic misunderstanding. But the truth was a cold, hard stone in my stomach, a constant reminder of the life I had stolen.
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