Expulsion gave Liam Barrett a dangerous choice. Needing to transfer for his final year, he'd known immediately where to go. It was a distantly familiar place that'd taken everything from him; had once ruined him so absolutely and twisted his persona...
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Young Charlie's hand tightened around his rucksack's straps as his feet hurriedly tapped down the dark street. The familiar scent of weed and rotting trash stung his nose; it wrinkled up.
ㅤIt was too dark. Charlie's eyes couldn't adjust. Dark shapes appeared and vanished, figures quickly moved like bats, and black objects distorted and tricked him.
ㅤHis heart beat heavily, thumping against his ribcage and trying to force its way out, loud enough he feared the delusion someone else might hear it. Queazy, he held his breath.
ㅤThere wasn't a real need to worry; he walked this way daily. This was a routine he'd repeated hundreds of times. Yet, no matter this truth, it still scared him. Because the dark was easy to hide in—as he intimately knew—it only made him all the more frightened of it.
ㅤEven if this route was longer and scarier, it was still the safest.
ㅤReaching the end of the road, a familiar black window eased his heart. His body slightly relaxed in small relief, his hands remaining ready by his sides regardless.
ㅤA dark flat was a safe flat. It meant his father wasn't there. Their dad always kept the lights on, refusing to extinguish them despite his own complaints about the electricity bill, not even as he slept. A fleeting thought crossed Charlie's mind.
ㅤMaybe he doesn't like the dark too.
ㅤThe chill that pricked him was sickening.
ㅤThose repulsive realisations arrived at him sometimes. Similarities between him and his dad built upward the older he grew—as if slowly becoming him, regardless of his futile resistance and toil.
ㅤAs disgusting as it was, his resentment gritting his teeth, it was difficult to conjure anger. No, he felt disappointed because he already knew he would, one day, end up exactly like that man. This fact of life was something he'd long resigned himself to accept. Whatever he did, Charlie's destiny was carved in stone. Blood was simply too thick to stir.
ㅤCharlie's only hope, what kept him fighting the inevitable, was ensuring the time he finally became that man would come late—late enough that his sisters would already be far away from him. As it was, and as it was going to be, there was no future for them all to be together. For now, he was content in protecting what he could.
ㅤWith a quick glance around, Charlie pushed open the front door and silently slipped inside.
ㅤThey'd used to have a lock. But their dad broke that thing many years ago. When Charlie had once made the mistake of replacing it, his dad only broke that one as well but not before he'd broken Charlie's arm. After that, he didn't replace it again.
ㅤSo there was nothing suspicious about the door opening with only a slight push. There was nothing suspicious about the lights being off. And there was nothing suspicious about the putrid scent of fags; that was, until, he realised the smell was inside his flat.
