STUCK

Chapter 12

The days started to blur and before I knew it, it was Friday. I didn't see Joanna as often because I avoided stopping by the front office at all costs. Nathan acted as nothing happened and didn't even mentioned it when we went back  to class with the copies. 

Megan was always at the house with my dad and I, making us dinner, cleaning, and glued to him. She seemed to be making herself at home but it was starting to annoy me that I couldn't do anything without her knowing.

Today, though, she wasn't here when I got back home from school. I was relieved that I didn't have to put up another act in my home. My dad wasn't home yet, so I go straight to my room and started texting Ashley.

She has been on my case ever since what happened in her house the other day. 

I did my best to convince her that something like that would not happen again.

Tomorrow we have another group project meeting at Evan's house and we are almost close to presentation day. We just need to meet up one more day after Evan's but there is no way that I can let them go to my house. My dad wouldn't let that happen even if I wanted them to come.

I finish texting Ashley, letting her catch up on her Kdramas and find myself dozing off.

~~~~~~~~

I wake up to someone shaking me. "Wha-" 

"Rachel, wake up!!" my dad was in front of me shaking me. "What? What happened?" I ask in panic and he grabs my hand pulling me out of my bed and towards the living room. 

The living room was a complete mess. There was shattered glass on the ground that were as big as erasers. He was pacing around without shoes, shouting some nonsense that I couldn't understand. 

"Dad, you're gonna cut your feet please stop walking around" he seems to ignore me completely and continues to shout. "Do you hear that?" I pause confused, I try to calm my breaths so I could listen but I didn't hear anything. 

"I don't hear-" "Shush! Fucking listen!" he cuts me off and looks around like a crazy person. "There! The knocking!" he shouts pointing at the wall but I couldn't hear anything. 

I walk towards him and try to stop him from walking towards the glass on the ground. I grab my dad's arm pleading, "Dad, I don't hear anything, let's go back to bed. You just need to sleep you are just stressed out"

He pulls away from my grip and grabs my head slamming it against the wall. I let out a yelp and he presses my head on the wall, "Right here, just listen! The knocking, I've been hearing them all night."

I could smell the beer coming out of his breath as he spoke, however, that wasn't all, he smelled really really bad. "You can't fucking hear it? It's knocking right now!" "I can't hear the fucking knocking, alright! Dad you are scaring me!" I cry as he lets go of me walking too close to the glass now. 

"Ah, fuck!" he shouts, falling to the ground grabbing his foot. "Dad! I told you to calm down, now look what you've done." I say pulling him towards me. I try to look at his foot but he pulls away. I could see that he had a big piece of glass in his foot.

"Get away from me!" he shouts but he was bleeding and I wanted to help him. He was on the ground and faced away from me. I was so confused of this whole situation and start pleading. 

"Dad-" he doesn't respond and I call out again, "dad..." he ignores me again. I stay quiet and suddenly hear my dad crying. Crying but it was so soft I only barely heard it. Then out of reaction I found myself hugging him. It was a back hug since he was facing away, he started shaking holding his tears in.