Page 87 of Breaking Ophelia
I clench my fists. I want to tell him I’d rather die. I want to tell him I’d burn it all down if I thought it would hurt him. But I’ve learned from him. Sometimes the best move is to wait, to let the other man bleed first.
“Say what you need to say,” I spit, “and let me go.”
He leans in, nose an inch from mine, breath sour with whiskey and contempt.
“You’re going to do what I say because you have no choice.” His voice drops, not quite a whisper. “Because I am your father. Because blood is law. And because I’ve spent twenty-six years breaking you down until there’s nothing left but my own reflection.”
I want to scream at him. Instead, I hold still.
He pulls back, wipes an imaginary fleck from my shirt.
“You mistake fear for tradition,” I say, and watch his jaw go tight.
He slaps me, open hand, hard enough to crack bone.
The sound echoes in the vault of the room, followed by a bright ringing in my skull. Blood fills my mouth, copper and salt, and I let it drip onto the carpet.
He straightens his cuffs, never once raising his voice. “When you come to your senses, you’ll do what’s required.”
He gestures to the guards. They step forward and wait for his order.
I don’t fight. I don’t run. I simply stare at him.
He returns to his desk, the tapping of his finger resuming, now with a fresh, wet rhythm.
“Think about your mother,” he says, eyes never leaving mine. “She wanted a better son than this.”
He turns his attention to paperwork, as if the conversation is over.
But I can feel his eyes, burning through the black. Even now, even after all these years, I want to make him proud.
But I want to make him suffer more.
Blood runs down my chin, warm against the cold.
I don’t wipe it away.
I let it stain the carpet, a mark that will outlast both of us.
The sting from the slap barely fades before the memory hits. It’s not nostalgia. It’s childhood memory.
I’m eight, knees on cold marble, palms flat, forehead pressed to stone. The air in my lungs is a block of ice. I’m counting the veins in the tile because if I look up, I’ll see the belt and the buckle, and I don’t want to give him the satisfaction. I count cracks, watchthe spread of old blood in the grout, wonder if it’s mine or my brother’s.
The belt whistles through the air. He likes the sound. Says it’s the only music we’re allowed to enjoy in this house. I take the first hit, back arched so it’ll catch more flesh, less bone. The second lands at my hip, the third across my knuckles when I flinch. The trick is to go limp—not resist, not tense. If you tense, it cuts deeper, leaves a mark. He doesn’t want to mark the face, that’s for the outside world. He wants the inside ruined.
His voice is flat, emotionless. “Montgomery men never cry.” Every time I fuck up, he makes me repeat it. “Montgomery men never kneel to anyone but their own blood.” Once, I asked what would happen if we ran out of blood. He hit me in the face for that one.
I learned to keep my mouth shut. I learned to let the pain wash over, then out. I learned that what doesn’t kill you doesn’t make you stronger—it makes you colder. Harder. It makes you crave the moment you can pass it on, even if it means hating yourself for it.
Eventually, he leaves. Always leaves. The sound of him walking away is better than a lullaby.
I’m left in the dark, listening to the silence, memorizing it. One day, I promise myself, I’ll be the silence that comes after.
The memory fades, but the pain of remembering doesn’t.
I have never hated someone the way I hate him. The way I fucking hate everything he stands for. Blood on my tongue, the metallic pop and fizz, adrenaline burning a hole in my gut.
He’s watching for a reaction. Anything. But I give him nothing. He wants me to scream, or break, or spit in his face. Instead, I lick the blood off my lip and smile, just enough to make him want to hit me again.
