The Refugees

Chapter 22: Ash

Edited

I feel restless in my bed as I shoot up, more fully awake then I've been in ages. My heart is hammering against my ribcage and tears are once again spilling out of my eye sockets to join at the bottom on my chin. I look at my palm to see it moving just so slightly, I'm shaking although it isn't that cold underneath my bed sheets. I grab my blanket and wrap it around me tighter in an attempt to comfort myself.

"Mom..."

The day I returned home from school a little later than usual, because of a detention I had received, is the day I regret the most. I was a bad kid. I never listened to my father, I argued with him all the time and didn't look after my Mom as much as I should have. I loved her but I never truly showed her in the way I wanted, before it was too late.

I was 13 and naturally I thought that meant I was entitled to everything and anything. My opinion was all of a sudden more valuable because before then I was afraid to express it. Callie was always locked in her room to avoid the monstrosity that was my father and, like me, couldn't find the time to care about a dysfunctional family that never showed her the love she desperately needed and sadly I wasn't a great role-model either and isolated myself in bad habits. Instead, the only one she really trusted was Mom and her favorite teddy-bear Lucy. I was third on that list and father wasn't there at all.

I open the front door, walking in without a care in the world. That is until I hear the gentle sobbing of my mother coming from the living room.

"Mom?" I ask as I make my way towards her, then I stop dead when I see the most traumatizing thing yet.

My eyes can't stay off the horror in front of me as I stare at my father on top of her, forcing himself onto her against her will. In that moment I don't even know what goes through my mind. All of a sudden, everything is red, the rage growing within me now shoots up and every last scene of my father's actions replays in my mind. I feel my whole body tense up in anger. It's normally rather brisk in here but tonight the air feels freezing. My muscles start to feel unsteady, gripping harshly to whatever's close to me. A lamp.

Mom sees me, her eyes widening with distraught and gives me a pleading look to go away but I can't, not this time, not ever again. He would finally pay for his crimes.

"GET OFF HER!" I shout in fury. I race towards my father with my new weapon, but it's pointless.

He gets up and blocks my hit before pushing me, making me fall pitifully on my back. I can feel the pain coming from that one spot where I fell down the hardest but I ignore it and push through to get up again.

"GET YOUR FILTHY HANDS OFF OF HER!" I yell once again with all my might but I know it's pointless, he's strong, he's in the army.

I'm not.

"SHUT THE FUCK UP! EITHER YOU GO UPSTAIRS TO YOUR ROOM NOW AND LET ME FINISH OR I'LL BEAT YOU UP MYSELF." A man I can no longer recognize yells at me.

"Ash, honey... I'm fine, just go upstairs." Mom tries harder, but her frail body and tired eyes make refuse any such offer. It's been like this for too long.

I am left in shock. There he is, taking away what little dignity she has left and yet she's still willing to sacrifice that for me, her child.

No, I'm strong, I'll protect her.

"You better listen to your mother, I bite hard." He scoffs.

I keep my feet grounded, scared to move forward yet convinced to never go back.

"I'll protect you Mom..."

"STUBBORN BOY! Who raised you like that?! Must have been your bitch of a mother because I sure as hell didn't!"

"DON'T CALL HER A BITCH!" That was it for me, I just once again raced one last time towards him as he threw his fist up in the air. It all happened so quickly that I didn't even see it. One second I was there, in front of him, and the next it was Mom who was in front of me and took the hit for me. It's when I heard the collision of the two bones meeting, cheek and fist, that I knew I wasn't the one that was hit.

She falls to the ground in front of me and I can do nothing but just stare in pure disbelief, at loss for words, my mind going blank.

"Stupid whore." My father spits at her as he gives her a kick to the stomach but she just lays there, motionless and my mind goes completely blank.

She's not moving.

Silence.

Is she dead?

I see blood pooling around her and I don't understand until I see the bloody swiss knife in my father's left hand. I look at him in confusion, or rather I knew what happened I simply remain in denial, refusing to acknowledge what had just happened. I turn her over so she's on her back and then I see the big cut in her waist and the bruises all over her arms and legs. She was weak and he killed her. He stabbed her. And that was meant for me...

I couldn't save her.

I no longer feel anything as the only thing I can stare at is my dead mother's body. Lifeless and still. She's still beautiful even in death. She fought until the end, she protected me, when I was the one who wanted to protect her.

I'm going to kill him.

I'M GOING TO KILL HIM.

I hurry to open the drawer from the desk in my father's office and when I race back I realize that the tears are already spilling from my eyes and streaming down my face.

"I never knew I could hate anyone as much I hate you. Sorry!" I wail because I'm scared but I know I mean my actions.

And with that, I shoot 10 times at my father's back as he lifts his arms, ready to take a puff out of his cigarette when his wife's dead body is on the ground beside him. And here I am, alone, parentless, wishing for her to come back, pleading because from now on, I was going to be a good boy and never disobey her.

But it was all too late.

~~~

Hey guys! I know this chapter is rather morbid and dark but this is a little insight as to why he doesn't trust anybody and this is a big reveal about his past.

And to clarify if it wasn't really clear, his father was raping his mother.

Song: Message to Bears - You Are A Memory