Trained To Kill

ten: evaluation.

I stare at him. “You’re kidding right.” I say, dumbfounded.

“No.” He looks at me seriously. He lets go of my hand and gently pulls it off his face. He leans forward in his chair, so that his elbows are resting on his knees. “I mean it.”

“You… you… how are you gonna do that?”

“I don’t know yet. But I am.” He says and gets up. He takes the bag of ice from me and walks to his kitchen. I follow him.

“But.. what about you?” I say quietly behind him. He turns around to face me with a curious look on his face. “What do you mean what about me?”

“I mean… what about you?”

“Don’t worry about me. The only thing that matters is that you’ll be safe.”

“Jacob.” I sit on the counter. I shake my head no. “If they don’t have me to control you, how do you know that they won’t just get rid of you?”

“I don’t.” He grabs a bottle of water from his refrigerator. “But like I said, that’s not what I care about.” His eyes land on mine and they stay there. I just keep shaking my head no. As much as I want to see my family, I’m not leaving this place if it means that he’s going to be in danger. I’m the type of person who cares too much for people. I care too much for Jacob. I’m not selfish enough to leave him here knowing what his fate will be. “Stop shaking your head like that. I’m not asking for your opinion about it.”

“No.” I protest. “I’m saying no.”

“I don’t really care.” He furrows his eyebrows at me, like he’s confused. “I thought you might actually appreciate it instead of trying to fight me.”

“You know, you aren’t the boss of me.”

He smirks and starts walking towards me, backing me up against his counter. “Oh? I’m not?”

“No. And if I say I’m not-“ I’m cut off by him leaning in close to my face and I have to turn mines to the side so they don’t touch. “If I say no I mean it.”  I put my hand on his chest, his heart beating fast against my palm, which has the salty evidence of nervousness all over it.

“What makes you think you can say no to me?”

I stare him down.

You know, everyone has a breaking point.

And once you’ve witnessed someone reach theirs, you can’t look at them the same.

I witnessed my father’s breaking point.

Surprisingly enough, it wasn’t my mother dying after giving birth to Kaya. I mean, yes, he was in love with my mom. Yes, it killed him inside when she passed. But he didn’t break at that point. No, he was numb for years. He just did what fathers have to do when mothers die: he kept going. I admired him for it, continuing on the way he did, trying his hardest to take care of us, despite the excruciating pain it caused him.

But then his breaking point came.

It was one morning, when Kaya was in the restroom and asked me to do her hair. I didn’t think anything of it, just did her hair like a big sister would. I brushed it for her and put it into two pigtails, finishing it off with blue ribbons wrapped around it. My dad stood and watched us in the doorway, silent tears streaming down his face. This was his breaking point. Dad? I questioned him, and then he lost it. He just… cried. And cried and cried and cried. His sobs were an alien concept to me so all I could do was stand there and watch him sink to the ground, covering his eyes and sobbing like a baby crying for his mommy.