"Once that wall was part of a restroom, but the water fountain never worked"
His hands could have swallowed my face. He was so much bigger and so much stronger, I never fought back, I usually just ran.
“Slap!” it was like a flash bulb burst behind my eyes, I stood there stunned for a moment, tasting nails and iron, warm liquid running down my chin, dripping all over my shirt, all over the floor. I wasn’t even putting up a fight anymore, but he was too busy yelling and bashing me to realize it.
With vision clear I twisted free and ran. I ran like usual, I ran like a coward: blood and tears leaving a breadcrumb trail behind me.
With lungs on fire and rubbery legs, I stop running and spit a mouthful of blood and saliva and tears onto the green tennis court cement, staining it rusty red. Absentmindedly I rake a dirty hand across my mouth, wiping away fresh blood from the split, thinking that blood tastes very much of pennies.
Everyone else is home, children have long been called inside to wash up for supper. Everyone but me. I am wandering, spitting penny tasting saliva off the old railroad bridge. Everyone else has log abandoned the swing sets and the baseball diamond. Everyone but me. I am chasing myself around they hard pact clay path, home run!
Everyone else is laughing and happy. Everyone but me. I am wiping away stale tears, gingerly checking to make sure the newly split lip has stopped bleeding, my dirty fingers leaving a stinging calling card in the fresh wound, hoping he wont find me in the park, wishing I had thought to grab a sweatshirt when I tore out of the house.
The man who has the audacity to call himself “father”…he never comes to look for me.
I wander back over the bridge, though the sports fields, past the tennis courts, through the graffiti ridden playground to the wall. I sit with my back to the cement, covering an ornate “Fuck You!”
And I cry.
I cry with my back to the cement wall because I know that the darker it gets, the more dangerous it becomes. I can already see one of the big neighborhood boys skulking around, waiting for a dealer.
I cry with my back to the cement wall because I know that going home is equally as dangerous. Blood tastes of pennies. A fact that I know all too well, but I am just as surprised to rediscover every single time.
I cry with my back to the cement wall because I know that mom isn’t home, and isn’t going to believe me anyways, and that he who has the audacity to call himself “father” will not be out looking for me.
Would I really want him to find me?
The good thing about a cement wall is that it will hold you up when no one else will.
“Slap!” it was like a flash bulb burst behind my eyes, I stood there stunned for a moment, tasting nails and iron, warm liquid running down my chin, dripping all over my shirt, all over the floor. I wasn’t even putting up a fight anymore, but he was too busy yelling and bashing me to realize it.
With vision clear I twisted free and ran. I ran like usual, I ran like a coward: blood and tears leaving a breadcrumb trail behind me.
With lungs on fire and rubbery legs, I stop running and spit a mouthful of blood and saliva and tears onto the green tennis court cement, staining it rusty red. Absentmindedly I rake a dirty hand across my mouth, wiping away fresh blood from the split, thinking that blood tastes very much of pennies.
Everyone else is home, children have long been called inside to wash up for supper. Everyone but me. I am wandering, spitting penny tasting saliva off the old railroad bridge. Everyone else has log abandoned the swing sets and the baseball diamond. Everyone but me. I am chasing myself around they hard pact clay path, home run!
Everyone else is laughing and happy. Everyone but me. I am wiping away stale tears, gingerly checking to make sure the newly split lip has stopped bleeding, my dirty fingers leaving a stinging calling card in the fresh wound, hoping he wont find me in the park, wishing I had thought to grab a sweatshirt when I tore out of the house.
The man who has the audacity to call himself “father”…he never comes to look for me.
I wander back over the bridge, though the sports fields, past the tennis courts, through the graffiti ridden playground to the wall. I sit with my back to the cement, covering an ornate “Fuck You!”
And I cry.
I cry with my back to the cement wall because I know that the darker it gets, the more dangerous it becomes. I can already see one of the big neighborhood boys skulking around, waiting for a dealer.
I cry with my back to the cement wall because I know that going home is equally as dangerous. Blood tastes of pennies. A fact that I know all too well, but I am just as surprised to rediscover every single time.
I cry with my back to the cement wall because I know that mom isn’t home, and isn’t going to believe me anyways, and that he who has the audacity to call himself “father” will not be out looking for me.
Would I really want him to find me?
The good thing about a cement wall is that it will hold you up when no one else will.