My Daughter, Audrey [ON HOLD]

The Clemency

Peter arrived at the train station’s cabin.  The black stained stones underneath his feet grinded together as he shifted his feet uncomfortably upon them.   The train was stationary and was in the midst of repair.  There were a few workers roaming around, but none looked familiar.  Peter swallowed a dry lump and headed up the slope that led into the cabin.  He couldn’t think of what he would say to his father, that is, if his father was still there.

               “Excuse me,” Peter said to a nearby worker.  “Is there any chance a man by the name, Phillip Holmes, works here?”

               The worked tongued his cigarette in thought and his brows, smudged with coal, wrinkled.  “Yeah, mate.  He ain’t been his self lately.  Fits of violence at some times, but when we put him to work, he puts his anger into good use.  Why ya need him?”

               “I’m his son, Peter.”

               “Huh.  Never mentioned the likes of ya.  But ya can go see him.  Careful now, he ain’t in a fair mood!”

               “Thank you.  And don’t worry.”  Peter gave a grateful pat on the man’s shoulder and made his way up the crunchy pathway.  He tried to put on good spirits, but all he could think of was his father’s face stretched in screaming anger and his hard hands going away at his face.   Peter knocked on the wood outside of the cabin.  In a gentle whisper, Pete spoke.  “Father?  Dad?”

               The man in the chair looked up through two slits.  His face was darkened by the sun and his facial hair had grown out in an unruly manner.  His hair was slightly oily, but Peter could see that he had been making a better effort in caring for himself.  “Wot ya want?”

               “It’s Peter.”

               The man’s face perked at the familiarity of the name.  Peter couldn’t tell if he was excited to hear it, or disgusted by it.   There were moments where the father had a spell of sanity that was enough for him to have a decent conversation.   Though when it passed, he fled into his senselessness.  “Peter?  My Peter?  I ‘ave seen ya in me room, hauntin’ me.  Yer voice--”

               “Father, of course ya do.  Yer not right in the ‘ead.  But it seems that ya had some cure, or ya wouldn’t be workin’.  ‘Ow did ya do it?” Peter replied, rather wooden.  He cleared his throat and entered the room, keeping his eyes on his father’s every move.

               “Wot do ya want?”  His father repeated in a harsher tone. 

               “I came to take ya back to Mum.  She’s worried.”  Peter pulled up a chair and straddled it backwards with his arms folded on the seat rest.  “Ya comin’ ‘ome, whether ya like it or not.”

               The father made eye contact with Peter, and as if Peter’s face triggered a terror from the man’s hallucinations, Mr. Holmes leaped for his chair, knocking over, and grabbed Peter around the throat.  Peter gasped and his first response was to yield to the beating like he had done so many times.  Seething violently, and cursing under his breath, the father’s grip tightened and Peter could feel his throat caving in to its death.

               Peter, in one movement, twisted out from underneath the untamed hands and threw the chair he had been sitting in at his father’s chest.  The man tumbled to the floor and then pain distracted him long enough for Peter to grab him by the shirt collar.   “Listen ‘ere!  I ain’t ya bloody imagination!  Ya got to remember me!”  Peter felt his face burning again and warm streaks of tears trickled down his face.  Looking into his father’s crazed and confused mind made Peter feel utterly hopeless; there was nothing he could do to make him sane.    The poor man had grown crazier the older he became and it would only grow worse.   Peter slapped his father’s face twice, wishing that that mild physical contact would stir a memory, or at least a fraction of one.