Chapter 1: The Wrong Beer
CRACK!
The sound wasn't just heard; it slammed into my bones. Glass broke against the peeling wallpaper beside me as my dad threw the bottle of beer, soaking the sticky linoleum with a spume of cheap, bitter-tasting beer and cut-glass sharp. The acrid bite of it mixed with the always lingering odor of stale cigarettes, spilled whiskey, and desperation that clung to the walls of this rotting house. My house. My prison.
"Stupid, useless girl!" The yell was thick and slurred, a physical force hitting me a split second before his hand did.
The slap came as no surprise. It was the punctuation to a life sentence. White-hot flame burst across my left cheekbone, to be instantly followed by the sickening thud as my knees buckled. I slammed to the floor with a jarring impact, the shock jolting my teeth, flooding my mouth with a coppery liquid, blood welling where I'd bitten down on the flesh of my lip. The chilled, beer-slicked linoleum seeped through the thin denim of my jeans.
I looked up, blinking helplessly through tear filled eyes. He loomed over me, a huge, darkening shape silencing the yellowish sickly glow of the one exposed bulb. His face was a staggering, contorted rage mask, his eyes rimmed red and unfocused. Near his scuffed work boot lay the broken-off top of the bottle. My eyes flashed to the label still intact on a larger piece of glass lying on the ground. Not his usual brand. Not "Gold Rush." Something lesser, something wrong.
My mistake. My fatal, goddamned mistake.
"Can't even get one goddamn thing right, can you?" Spit flew off his lips, cold and wet against my burning skin. "One easy errand! 'Get my beer, Amara!' But no! Amara the fuck-up! Always! Can't even buy the right piss-water!"
He leaned over, the reek of stale beer and unwashed fury surrounding me. His hot, poisonous breath on my face. "Always making things worse. Always causing problems." His tone shifted lower, deeper, fouler, laced with venom that sliced sharper than any shard of glass. "Like you did with Ethan."
The name Ethan Hit me like a punch to the gut, sucking the breath from my body. The familiar, smothering weight bore down, greater than his fist had ever been.
"My boy." His voice cracked, but not with grief. No, it was pure, uncut rage. “….my perfect son...dead. Because of you. Should have been you who died. Should've been you buried six feet deep, Amara. Should've been you!"
The phrases weren't new. They were background music to my existence since the accident. But hearing them then, unfiltered and bellowed over the broken glass and the stench of bad beer, they sliced new wounds. He's right. He's always right. It was my fault. It's always my fault. The blame was a living entity, wrapped around my chest, sustained by his venom.
He rose, staggering wildly. His hand strayed to his rumpled leather belt. The buckle clinked , a sound more terrifying than the broken glass, more final than any sentence. "Get the fuck up!" he bellowed, his neck veins bulging. "Now! Get out there and bring me my goddamn beer! The right one this time! Gold Rush! Hear me? Gold Rush!"
Panic, wild and savage, burst through the numbness. The belt. Flashbacks burst, crack of leather through air, burning bite on flesh, bruises that bloomed like ugly flowers. Fear overrode the throbbing in my cheek, the bite in my palms where fragments of glass had dug in when I fell. I scrambled, sliding on the oily floor, ignoring the sharp pricks. Get up and out. Now.
Tears streamed down my face, hot and humiliating, mixed with the blood oozing from my split lip. I did not dare look towards the living room door. I knew she was standing there. Mom. Invisible, a ghostlike presence in her tattered armchair. Her presence at that moment, her refusal even to respond, screamed louder than his anger. Her silence was the lock on my cage.
My trembling hand clasped the cold metal of the doorknob. I flung it open, staggering out onto the groaning porch. The door creaked shut behind me like a jail gate clang sound, vibrating through the thin wood.
The rain hit me then, a cold, nagging drizzle that felt like needles poking my puffed cheek. I wrapped my shoulders, pulling my worn-out jacket tighter, attempting to merge with it. The walk to the corner store was a gauntlet. Broken pavement, overflowing trash cans filled with garbage, the blue TV light behind darkened curtains. I kept my head down, eyes scanning the wet sidewalk. They knew. The neighbors always knew. The shame seared hotter than the bruise already forming on my face. Amara the fuck-up. The survivor. The one who caused it.
My thoughts were a chaotic, painful storm, my throbbing cheek was like a drumbeat under my skin.
My palms stung, tiny reminders of the shards I’d left embedded in the kitchen floor.
Blood. Metallic and warm on my tongue.
“Should've been you." The mantra, echoing, relentless.
Ethan's face. Not the laughing, golden boy everyone remembered. Just the accusation in his eyes, the blame I’d put there. The star that burned out, leaving only darkness for me.
Hopelessness. A dark, suffocating blanket. This is it. Imprisoned. Blamed. Beaten. Worthless.
Defiance? A tiny, bitter spark. His beer? Let him wait. Let him die of thirst. But the spark was instantly killed by the cold look of the buckle. Fear was the only constant.
Halfway to the store, I passed by the bus stop. The plastic shelter was busted, labeled. The sign inside had faded, and was barely legible. My eye, seemingly automatically, scanned the smeared letters. "CITY CENTER. LAST DEPARTURE: 10:45 PM." I glanced at the crappy plastic watch on my arm, the one with water underneath the shattered face. 8:32 PM.
My hand seemed to go of its own accord into the inner pocket of my jeans. Fingers touched the small, tightly rolled ball of bills. Tips. Weeks' accumulation of tips garnered, tip by tip, sweeping old Mrs. Henderson's house after school. Hidden deep, beneath loose strings. Enough? The question was a chilling, exhilarating shock.
The enormity of it crashed down on me. Where? How? Father would come for me, and then he would kill me. The terror was a frosty hand clenching around my heart, poised to extinguish the small flame before it could even grow. But the seed had been sown. Planted in blood, watered by tears, fed by his poisonous words. The bus. The money.
I landed at the stuttering neon sign of the "Hank's Corner Mart." The fluorescent lights inside hummed with indignation. I pushed open the door, the bell ringing with forced cheerfulness. I walked right up to the cooler, ignoring the curious gaze from the slacker teenager behind the counter. My hand still trembling, I closed around the familiar green and gold label. Gold Rush. The cold glass felt like a verdict delivered.
I set the bottle down hard on the counter. The teenager skimmed it, his eyes darting up to my puffy cheek, then back again in a flash.
Indifference.
Another sort of blow. I fished out the exact change from my pocket, not the secret money. Coins only and a crumpled one-dollar bill from the other pocket. I couldn't risk touching the secret money, not yet.
I stepped back out into the rain, it was pouring heavily now, the cold bottle felt as heavy as sin in my hand. I looked down the dark, long street, rain-soaked and slick with the sickly yellow of the streetlights. At the end sat the house. The yelling. The blame. The belt waiting if I was slow enough. The silent ghost in the armchair.
Step by step. The movement was automatic, drilled into me. Back to the cage. Back to the pain. Back to the place where I belonged, because I deserved it. Because it was my fault. It will always be my fault.
The bus stop sign's vision, its promise of 10:45 PM, glowed in my mind like a dying ember. The hidden money pressed against my thigh, an invisible, impossible weight.
I took a deep breath, and the chill air stung the split lip, and started the slow, stumbling walk back to hell.