His father had come stumbling into the house only a few minutes before while his mother was cleaning up the kitchen after she and Whip had eaten.
His father had been very, very angry that they hadn’t waited for him to come home to eat or that a plate wasn’t waiting for him on the table. He had been over an hour late, so Whip’s mother decided to put away the leftovers and clean up.
That had been a mistake.
Now she was paying for it.
His mom always told him that at four years old he was now a “big boy” and he needed to be brave.
He wasn’t feeling so brave right now. He wished he was bigger and stronger so he could stop his father from hurting his mother when he’d been drinking the stuff that made him mean.
But he’d tried that before by jumping on his father’s back, by pounding his fists on his father’s head, by kicking his father to try to make him stop. Whip ended up thrown across the room, breaking both the wall he crashed into and his arm.
His father blamed his mother for Whip’s injuries, even though she had nothing to do with it.
Bobby Byrne said she had “made” him do it. He insisted it was all her fault for not listening. That night after they got back from the emergency room with Whip’s arm in a cast and a made-up excuse to tell everyone how it happened, she ended up with broken ribs and bruises in places where no one would be able to see them.
The story was that his arm had broken when he fell off the swing hanging from the big oak out front. If Whip told anyone the truth, his father would break his other arm.
But that was then, this was now. Despite covering his ears, he could hear her crying and begging.
For him to stop.
For him to leave her alone.
To wait until Whip was asleep.
Promising she’d never not keep a plate warm for him again.
Promising she’d keep supper on the table for him.
Promising, promising, promising.
Anything to get him to stop.
Promises never did any good. His father ignored them all and his yelling continued to fill Whip’s ears.
Whip winced with every thump.
Cringed with every cry.
Then he jumped out of his skin when the bathroom door banged open so hard that the door stopper twanged loudly.
His father stepped out of the bathroom, his mother’s hair in his fist as he dragged her down the hallway toward their bedroom.
Tears streaked her red and swollen face, blood trickled from the corner of her lip, and her eyes widened when she spotted him sitting on the floor with his knees pulled to his chest and his hands covering his ears.
“Get the fuck in your room and don’t come out!” his father bellowed at him with spittle flying from his mouth. His face was red, too, but for a different reason than his mother’s. His eyes were bloodshot. The stench of whatever he’d been drinking so strong it made Whip’s nose wrinkle and his stomach hurt. “Pickled” was what his grandfather called it.
Whip hated pickles.
He hated his father.
He wished the man was dead. Then he couldn’t hurt his mom any more.
Whip helplessly reached his hand out to his mother. He wanted to save her. “M-m-mom!”
“Tyler, go to bed!” she ordered on a sob.
“You don’t get to your room right now, boy, I’m gonna beat you bloody. Do you hear me?” his father yelled.
He wanted to yell back.
He wanted to hit his father.
He wished his father would leave and never come back.
He wanted him dead.
Dead.
Dead.
Dead like the squirrels his pap shot.
He was too small to pick up his pap’s shotgun. It was too heavy. Too big.
And his pap forbid him to touch it.
One day when he was visiting his grandfather he got caught doing that. His pap swatted him so hard he couldn’t sit down for an hour. He was told to never touch it again.
Ever.
He sat frozen in the hallway as his father finished dragging his mother by her hair to the end of the hallway, her hands gripping his wrist, her tears continuing. Her body dragging along the carpet because Whip’s father wouldn’t wait for her to get onto her feet.
She didn’t fight it. If she did, it would only make it worse.
“Go to bed, Tyler!” his mother cried one last time before they disappeared into the bedroom and his father slammed the door shut.
His heart was pounding in his chest. His bottom lip was trembling. His muscles ached and shook. His eyes burned. His cheeks were wet.
His room was right across from theirs.
He’d hear everything.
Everything.
All of it.
Every second of it.
Until it ended.
He forced himself to rise from the floor, to get to his feet.
He should run away. Right now. Just run as fast and far as he could.