Daisies and Wine

"He can't do this anymore," he said to the dark.

Mascara filled tears streamed down his cheeks as he thought about what was going on.  How he couldn't let it happen anymore.  He knew Father would do it again.  Someone had to stop Father from doing it anymore.

"I will be the last thing he sees.  Father will know what He has done is wrong!"  But the only reply the dark had was passing headlights from outside of his window.

He picked up his favorite bat on the way out the door to confront this monster that was his father.  He had made up his mind that it was going to stop here.  Tonight.

"Well, don't you look like a right pretty tart?  Your mother will love this look," said Father.  The lisp and slur was heavy from the drunken nature of barley.  Father sat in his old rocker recliner.  TV remote in one hand and cheap beer in the other.  Father was the perfect picture of how laziness should be.  Dressed only in boxers and a stained old t-shirt, Father felt as superior as ever.

He lifted the bat in his best home run stance.  This was it!  He felt the adrenaline start to flow as he hadn't thought about what he was actually going to do, until this very moment.  Panic started to take over and he didn't want to go through with this plan.

Sensing the briefest of pauses that had been presented, Father spoke again.  "You don't have the stones to do it.  You don't because you know that as bad as you think I am to you, what comes after this is far worse then what could ever be imagined.  Once you are done, the things that'll happen to you will make the prophets of old shudder in their robes.  You're life here will be a field of daisies and wine compared to just the tip of the iceberg that will be inserted in your ass.

"Son, I have never hit you out of anger.  Never raised my hand to you for anything you didn't deserve and have given you everything would ever need.  So if this is what you think is you have to do to be a man, then stop thinking and do it you slimy little sissy. Hahaha!  Life is about to start for you one way or ano.."

**Thud**

Father had the look of complete disbelief.  The bat had connected at the top of the crown and Father's scalp had been split from the blunt force.  Now he felt so superior to Father as Father was trying to think of what to say next.  Before Father had a chance to let his unexpected gasp go, he swung again and made contact with the side of Father's face.  Father knew then that this was a child.  Only a child could do something so brutal.

He knew that Father's cheek was broken, but that Father wasn't going to go down so easily.

Father didn't say a word, just looked confused as he stood up.  Father was a towering fat man that would have instantly struck fear into any man, but not tonight.  Tonight Father was tall, fat and bloodied.  The look of confusion changed to a look of rage as Father reached for him.

He knew Father had a deceptive strength.  Father might have been fat and lazy, but Father new how to use his weight and leverage to accomplish anything that needed to be done.  Right now, what needed to be done was to stop this child.

Father reached out with is right hand to clasp his son, when his arm was met with another blow from the bat.  The yell of pain from Father was mixed with excitement and revelry that made his child quake with fear.  If Father got a hold of him, he would be in a world of hurt.

Father's arm didn't stop.  Father's forearm was broken.  It was clear by the queer bend that both the Ulna and the Radius were both snapped, but Father's arm was still extending to grasp the target.

He felt his father hand tighten his shirt as Father's grip twisted fabrics.  The look in Fathers eyes were of fire, spit and vinegar.  He had never seen his father this angry before.  Father wasn't going to stop now.  This child, this kid, was going to be stopped at all costs.

He knew this wasn't good and that Father could easily get the upper hand if he didn't act quickly.  Swinging the bat upwards he hit Father's forearm again and dislodged the grasp Father had on him.  At the apex he brought the bat back down and connected on the crown of Father's head again.

Father took a stunned step back as the room started to spin.  Reflections and shifting lights from the TV were making Father's target hard to focus on.

He knew it was time to start swinging like a lumber jack.  Left to right.  Right to left.  He swung the bat as hard and quickly as he could.  Every swing aimed at Father's head.  How could this old fat man still be standing?  How could Father still be spewing hate from those infuriated eyes?

The last swing made Father's head cock funny to the side.  Father's knees immediately buckled like someone had taken the bones out from those tree trunks of legs.  One last swing he thought, to right the head and send Father off properly.

As he swung he noticed that Father still had all the fire and fury in those eyes.  Right up until that last second.  After the last connecting swing, Father's eyes had an odd glazed look, that confirmed Father was lost to the darkness of unconsciousness.

When the police arrived a few minutes later, he sat in the middle of the floor, still in his makeup, smudges from his tears, wearing is favorite black and metal clothes.  As the cops arrested him, he didn't put up a struggle or offer any explanation of what had occurred.

Down at the police headquarters, the District Attorney was questioning him about what had happened mere hours earlier.

"Was he beating or abusing you?"

"No. Nothing like that."  Said this over grown child.  "I am a freak.  I am what I am because of that man on the floor back there.  He never hit me, never abused me, only provided my mother the seed to form some hideous spawn.  I knew that Mother and Father were going to try and have another child.  How?  How could they do such an abominable thing?  They have me!  Weren't i not wrecked enough?  How the fuck could they not see how messed up I am?  And they were going to do it all over again.  I couldn't let them.  I couldn't sit idly by and let them make the same mistake and torture someone else like this."

When asked to plead, he admitted his guilt and was sentenced to the maximum he could receive according to the state law.  He had heard stories of what happened to people in prison.  How they are made to do things that are unspeakable and how it can destroy a man in a matter of moments.  It did to him, too.

Father didn't lie.  Father was honest and right with his last words.  Father didn't hit him, beat him or molest him.  Father was just that, his father.  And years later he would think back on his father's words and remember that this was the tip of the iceberg for all the bad andheinous things to come for the rest of his life.