Dark & Light

~Chapter Fifteen~

(FYI: This chapter deals with some VERY heavy content-I tried my best to approach some necessarily-serious topics as un-graphically as possible here, however the mature content still is present. Please continue reading at your own discretion.)

Paige's POV

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I held my breath. Literally. For a few moments, I simply could not breathe. Something about the way Chris had just said "God saved my life" and how he reacted when he I asked him if he was being metaphorical, I knew...I knew....he wasn't speaking in a figurative sense at all.

He meant it all literally, and it scared the life out of me.

"I don't know how to start explaining any of this," he begin with a tremor in his voice.

I gently touched his shoulder. "Just take it slow. And make sure this is the right decision for you. If you want to share about your past, I'm here to listen. But only if you feel comfortable and ready to do that."

"Thank you, Paige. I think its time I share something of my past self. Its time someone knows."

I nodded my head. I wish I could be ready to share about myself too, but I doubt that could ever be.

Chris exhaled, then begin in nothing short of a whisper, all the while with sorrow welling up in his voice:

"I was once, unbelievably, a well-adjusted little child. That is, until I was about nine years old. At that point, my father's business was failing. This stressed him greatly, to the point that he took up alcohol at nights and on the weekends to flush out any ideas of bankruptcy that were inevitably taking place.

"My mother, a gentle, loving human being, tried to help cure my father of his "habit" as she called it, though by the time I was ten and a half, I realized it was not a habit at all, but a terrible addiction.

"One of the worst things that slowly happened over time was a complete change in my father's character. He went from a strict, overworked man to  a violent, abusive drunk."

At the word "abusive" a pang of pain and a deep realization hit me. Out of all of the things I had considered possibly a part of Chris's past, direct abuse hadn't really been one of them.

Chris's eyes took on a vacant look, as if he was being transported to another time and place and had forgotten I was with him.

"Abuse...is one of the things I find hardest to fathom out of all the evils that ravage this world. To take advantage of someone defenseless, or make them so, is so uncomphrensible, yet still happens, rampaging and ruining so many lives." He shook his head slowly, surely trying to block out painful memories. I knew then he didn't want to talk in detail about the abuse he or his family suffered from the hands of a person who should have protected the little ten year old boy he was.

"My father... was once a man. But to the little child I was, he had turned into a monster, allowing an addiction to override every part of not only his life, but all that he had been as a person. Since he couldn't handle the idea of his business, income, what he had made into his entire life-failing, he let himself be overcome entirely. The idea of going bankrupt was hideous to him.

"He was a sort of narcissist. Very self-focused, always, but honestly he wasn't horrible until taking up alcohol became his life story. Its as if all his bad qualities were taken up in the addiction, and anything good in his character totally dissipated.

"For a long time, I endured it. I was fifteen before any real change took place. I couldn't stand seeing my mom work herself to death while my dad was still the abusive drunk he had become for years. But I bore it, until...one day. I seen my mom had marks on her arm by accident...and I knew his abuse of her wasn't simply emotional, as I had been hoping. It was also physical. I kinda lost it then. I yelled at my father, and said things no one would ever dare think of saying to their parent's face. The truth was, I had been able to deal with my father...abusing me, but not my mother. Not the woman who had cared and loved my father even as he evolved into a hysterical drunk.