Aces [#NANOWRIMO2017]

Ace Learns About The Power of Hugs

Tʜᴜʀsᴅᴀʏ, Fᴇʙʀᴜᴀʀʏ 22

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No — what are you doing? a part of me screamed internally. Stop crying!

I tried valiantly to slow down the tears that were a week overdue, but they just wouldn't stop coming.

I'd spent the past week caring for my mother. My father had come downstairs the day after I made my discovery with no recollection of the night before, and I'd given him hell for his actions. He'd seemed legitimately stunned, but I didn't buy it. What kind of man beats his wife and then forgets about it?

After I'd told him what had happened, he'd acted completely horrified. For the first two days, he'd shut himself in the guest bedroom and refused to come out ("for all of our own sakes'," he'd said) except to use the bathroom. I spent almost all of that time by my mother's side, and she and I had had a heart-to-heart with each other for what felt like the first time in forever.

I'd tried to apologize for how I'd always treated her so nastily. She'd accepted it right away, excusing my behavior as "typical teenage development" and "to be expected". I should've been overjoyed, but instead, the realization that even after my mother had gone through so much, she still had such a deal of patience and love in her to forgive me so readily? It was painful. I didn't deserve her.

My mother hadn't wanted to talk about the abuse at first. That was understandable. But bit by bit, she started to open up to me. She told me a little bit here, as she was cutting vegetables (I'd tried to get her to let me cook, but she'd refused, saying that she needed the distraction), a little bit there, as she was knitting in front of the television...

In the end, I managed to gather enough from the subtle hints and implications of what she was saying to piece together that the belting had become a fairly common occurrence since my father started getting drunk. That explained why she'd become so drawn into herself, so insecure, after Hazel had left. It was because my father was hitting her.

I also found out that my mother had never told my father what he was doing, because she'd been afraid of him, but also because she didn't want him to have to bear the guilt of knowing that he'd been abusing his wife as a result of his alcoholism. She was unrealistically strong in that sense; she always put the needs of others before her own. So my father had continued to drink late into the night, and then continued to beat my mother whenever I wasn't home — all the while not even aware of it.

I was grateful for the days when my father stayed inside his bedroom all day, because whenever he was around, I tensed up. I couldn't stand the sight of that man. His hiding away was what let me relax and think clearly enough to do whatever it was that my mother needed me to do.

I'd been hesitant to come back to school and leave my mom alone with my father, but she'd insisted. "I can't let you just stay here with me all day; you need to get your education," she'd told me with an almost-smile.

I'd almost refused, but she'd pleaded with her eyes until I couldn't say no.

And, well, why not admit it? I had missed Sera. A lot.

"Ace."

Sera's voice, carrying a note of fear, shook me out of my thoughts.

"Ace," she said again. "Please. You're really scaring me. Tell me what's wrong."

I tried to respond, but couldn't seem to find my voice.

Until strong yet gentle arms wrapped around me and pulled me close, making me feel safer than I'd thought possible for anyone but Hazel to make me feel. I hadn't realized until then how in need of a hug I was — how comforting and warm the touch of someone who cares could be. In the sea of everything that was so, so wrong, Sera's embrace felt profoundly right.