Generally birthdays for me went unacknowledged. But my 12th birthday was a rare one where I got a gift. Dad had come home drunker than usual, he sat in his armchair smoking a cigarette, and he just looked at me, moving only to lift his glass and poor the poison into his body, or take the fowl smelling cigarette away from his mouth to make way for the whiskey he was putting in. Tonight he was drinking the strong stuff and I could smell it even from across the room. I held out hope that he would pass out before he got a chance to hit me; but I knew it wasn't to be when he spoke "where is the rest of the single malt, you little shit?" I was surprised because he didn't usually speak to me in such calm tones, but I answered quickly before he lost his temper
"um... I-I think you d-drank it," he stood up and walked towards me, as I edged away. "d-did you check in the cabinet?" I asked to try and draw his attention away from me, I started to walk over to check in the cabinet, but I didn't make it.
I got about 3 steps away from where I was seated, before he grabbed my hair and pulled me up so that I was facing him. I didn't even get to speak and try to get out of this punishment before he was drawing back. He punched me square in the face causing my head to snap back and tears to spring to my eyes,
"did you just fucking blame me for drinking all the whiskey?" he didn't stop there, he drew back and punched me again "this is my fucking house kid, and I can drink whatever the fuck I want!" he screamed at me before he began to rain punches down on my face stomach, and arms. I was dizzy, and the room was spinning by the time he had finished. Through the haze and the pain, I felt something land on me, it was light, but I knew it was there. "be there after school you ungrateful brat, wear your trainers" his low gravelly voice drifted to me, I didn't hear him leave, but he wasn't home when I finally got up.
I didn't move for a time, just lay curled up, sobbing into myself, wondering what I had done to deserve the life that I lived, quickly dismissing my line of questioning when more tears sprang to my eyes. I went to the bathroom and cleaned my bloody nose, before heading to bed. I didn't know what to do with the bruises on my face at the time, so left them as they were.
That night I sang happy birthday to myself, wishing my gran was there, and wondering where in the world my mother was, she was never there when I needed her, and she was never there at the important dates anymore not even at Christmas, she only came home showered put on makeup and a pretty dress and left again, she never even spoke to me anymore.
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Memoirs Of a survivor
Action"You're an animal, you're a dog, you will always be a dog, and there's nothing you can do to change that" "You will do as you're told" "Come here and clean this up" All comments that had been shouted at Scarlett Fletcher. Her school life is bad, a...
