Midnight Butterfly

five.

Slowly and reluctantly, I uncover my face. I blink, close my eyes, and blink again. Streaks of sunlight penetrate the window and blind me. I sit up, drag my feet off the bed, and rub my knuckles onto my eyes. I hear conversation from downstairs. Another day reliving the same day. I look over to my left and see my box still wide open. I shut it and toss it under the bed this time. I get up and slowly open the door, scared of what awaits.

Carly and Charlie are arguing, this time in the kitchen, probably about me. I slowly make my way down to the kitchen. They awkwardly stop their dispute as if I'm a child who just walked in on their parents.

"Morning bro."

"Hey guys." I lean against the counter.

"I have class in a few so I'm going to take a shower, but we should hang out later. What do you say Max?"

"Yeah sure." I sighed.

He pat my shoulder as he went on off.

"Want a smoothie?" Carly offered.

I hadn't even really looked her in the eyes yet. Just hearing her voice made my heart ache.

"I'm good."

"Is everything okay?" She grabbed my arm.

I looked away as if her soft touch hurt me. I wanted to save her, but I just couldn't bear it anymore,

"Carly!" Charlie called from upstairs.

She gave me a sad look as she left the kitchen. I took a deep breath and went into the living room. My only chance to talk to Carly was after Charlie left. After a few minutes they both came down the stairs after each other.

"Charlie wait!"

"I'm late." He said coldly. "See you Max."

Carly cried as he shut the door in her face.

"Carly?"

She sniffled trying to hide her tears. "Yeah?"

"Can I talk to you for a second?"

She came over and took a seat next to me. I shifted myself to face her on the couch.

"Carly, does Charlie hit you?"

"What?" She tried to play it off.

"Does Charlie hurt you?"

"You know how Charlie is. We argue but he's nothing more than a hot head."

I sighed. "I want to tell you something."

She stared at me with her big eyes.

"Charlie doesn't talk about our childhood much, and truthfully I don't either. But Charlie, he's just like out father. When we were kids, our dad was always there for us. He was our entire world. But then one day he got hurt at work and they laid him off with nothing but a disability check once a month. He got so depressed and he started drinking. We were only eight. My mom had to go out and work two jobs just to make ends meet. So the woman who once protected us from the world left us with the man who turned our world upside down. Dad was always a hot head too, he just never had anything to fuel that anger. I guess the liquor was enough to fuel him. So he started beating us. I got the worst of it, but Charlie got pretty messed up too. He's the oldest you know, so he was always a daddy's boy. And it crushed him to see the man that was supposed to protect us, hurt us."

"Charlie's talked to me about his dad a few times but never about that."

"I guess what I'm trying to say is, that's why Charlie is the way he is. It's not his fault but that doesn't make it okay Carly."