Page 51 of Like Fathers, Like Son
Ihadtotakea deep breath and let it out slowly, or I was going to choke her to death with my fucking bare hands.
She was playing innocent, and I didn’t know how she even had the nerve to pretend. I mean, she was scared, obviously, and it suited her like it always had, but she was surprised too.
“I…”
“Yeah? What are you going to say to justify it? How did you even know that? My dads were discreet about that, because it was the kind of relationship they were always having to justify to outsiders. And it didn’t even matter if it hadn’t been true, because you must remember what happened next, right?”
She was really acting like she didn’t remember. Like it hadn’t fucking mattered enough in her pathetic selfish head, because she was popular and I was a nothing. Not worth her time.
“Blaze-”
“Jesus, what kind of fucking self-absorbed asshole are you? The rumours? You don’t remember the fucking rumours? Suddenly I was ‘the freak’, the kid with the twisted parents who all fucked each other. The one with the gay dads. My school days were hell, with older kids bullying me, beating on me, pushing me down the stairs.You remember that, surely?I broke my arm in three places, and had to have surgery twice.”
Her jaw dropped, and she started blinking rapidly, but whether that was recognition or just some pansy ass shit she was trying for sympathy, I had no idea.
“I’m… I’m sorry. I remembered you being injured, but I just assumed it happened by accident. I didn’t… it was so long ago, Blaze. I’m sorry you went through that, but we’re grown up now, and we have to move on from… from…” Her words choked off as I grabbed her throat in one hand and squeezed.
“You’re seriously telling me to get over it? Aw poor Blaze was bullied in school and bears a grudge. What a pussy… that’s what you’re thinking, right? You wanna know the really awful part? That shit didn’t stop, but I hardened myself to it. I fucking soldiered through it, dealing with my locker being trashed regularly, and those messages they kept leaving on it. I dealt with it when they took my clothes, beat me and kicked me after school, and I went home each day and pretended like I was just getting into normal teenage shit. All of that shit, I dealt with it, because I fucking had to. You know who didn’t cope though?My fucking sister. My beautiful, sweet sister, Ember. She had to go to that same fucking school a few years after me, and they ate her alive. They destroyed her. They hurt her so much, she…“ Suddenly I couldn’t fucking even voice it, I couldn’t breathe because all I could picture was the way she seemed to wither and fucking die inside because of them.
“Blaze!” My grip had loosened and Anneka was pulling on my wrist, grabbing vital breaths while she could. I should have protected Ember better.
I should have realised that by hiding what was happening to me at school, I was letting her go into it unprotected. I was letting my parents send her to a school primed to destroy her, particularly after they’d failed to break me.
It was my fault, wasn’t it?I was blaming the wrong people, because even though they were culpable, it was primarily my fault for not speaking up, for letting my pride keep all that hate a secret. I managed to rise above it, but I let Em go into that fucking place as blind as I was on day one.
Something that sounded scarily like a sob rose in my throat, and I scrambled back from Anneka as I covered my face with shaking hands.
My god. Any way you could look at it or break it down,it all came back to me. I should have been smart enough to realise that she should have gone to another school, or I should have at least told one of my fucking dads what was happening. Why didn’t I?
Pride, definitely, but also that fear inside me. The one that said if I told them, what would happen? Would the school suddenly burn down? Would it burn down with students inside it for hurting me? Even if the risk might be that the wrong ones were in there when it burned? Would their homes be burned?
The one thing I knew about my dads was that retribution was always a guarantee if someone hurt our family. Except with what happened with Ember, when her health and her survival had to become the priority.
“Blaze?”
I drew in ragged breath after ragged breath, but I couldn’t fight the overwhelming, agonising surge of despair at the realisation, too late,that I was the cause of everything Ember had suffered.
Anneka
DESPITE MY FEAR, AND the ache in my throat from being choked by Blaze yet again, I couldn’t fight the desperate need to try and help him. To do something, to ease his pain.
Something had happened to his sister, and I realised I had nothing. No knowledge, no memories of what had happened with her. I was in my final years of school at that point, and so much of school had been a blur, because of one thing or another.
I remembered those last few years of school being rough for me, because my mum was having issues with her health, and was eventually diagnosed with fibromyalgia after months of being blown off by doctors, and suffering in silence. I remembered that it was around the time that Blaze started our school that Boon started hounding me to give up my virginity, even though I was only thirteen to his fourteen.
The pressure on kids my age was insane, and he expected me to remember something like a conversation with my boyfriend at the time? I hated the fact that it had led to so much hurt, but it had been an innocuous comment, and I hadn’t even realised the knock on effect it’d had. In fact, I wouldn’t have put it past Boon to make sure nobody let on what was going on, to keep me out of it, even if it was just another way he tried to control my school years.
“Blaze.” He was fighting so hard to hold back the desperate emotion that was clearly destroying him, just like the cruelty of teenagers had attempted to destroy his sister. Maybe they’d even succeeded. My god, what if she’d died because of it?
I crawled across the bed, reaching out to grab his shoulder, as his whole body started to heave with guttural sobs that I couldn’t do anything to ease. He just kept muttering ‘it’s my fault’ over and over again, and for some bizarre reason I ended up holding him, cradling him against my chest as he cried.
It was a bizarre facet of my humanity, leading me to comfort the monster who’d tormented, raped, and threatened me with death. It was the inability to watch another human, no matter how cruel, in pain. He wasn’t holding me as he cried, but he was letting me hold him. Was it strange and messed up that I was holding my captor, my rapist, trying to offer him some semblance of comfort, when he’d offered me none at any point? I just couldn’t help it.
“Blaze, shh it’s okay,” I murmured, wondering if he could even hear me over that ragged chanting of his. He was taking the blame for whatever had happened, but he hadn’t even finished explaining everything yet. Was Ember still alive? I vaguely remembered that adorable blonde girl, who’d been so whimsical, and giggly, and sweet.
“It was my fault,” Blaze whispered, shuddering in my arms. He’d finally started to calm down, but I wasn’t fool enough to think he’d stay that way.
“How could it possibly be your fault? You were being bullied, Blaze, and I’m so sorry I didn’t know. I had… there was stuff going on with my mum back then, and I was distracted. I’m surprised I even passed my exams, because… anyway, you don’t need to hear that. What you need to hear is that you were just a kid, and none of whatever happened was your fault.”
