Page 64 - Dark Matter Issue5 Part II

he shot himself in the head. I found myself frequently reliving this event as I planned my

own demise, trying to come up with the perfect solution after my failed, shameful attempt

with the aspirin.

On hot, muggy early summer nights when she was out with her men, I waited to hear her

returning footsteps, my emotions swinging from rage to terror. When angry, I fantasized

about finally shouting my nearly nine-years-worth of anger at her. When frightened, I

saw myself clinging to her legs as she tried to kick me away, or wandering alone forever

in the narrow confines of our apartment. These night terrors were fueled by her

uncontrollable mood swings during the day, when she’d threaten, “I ought to just leave

you and never come back.”

One Saturday morning, after one of these anxiety-ridden nights alone, I wandered

outside to sit on the front steps and watch for her to return. Some neighborhood kids

began to tease me, and I got up to go inside. I’d momentarily mistaken their attentions

for friendship and let them know that I was home alone, waiting for my mother. As I

jumped up to move toward the door, they ran past me into the apartment and slammed

the door in my face. Blindly, frantically, I pushed to get in. Five of them held the door

closed from within laughing at my ineffective effort to push the door open. Suddenly, the

energy of fear and anger coalesced, giving me the strength to push harder. My hands

and arms broke through the upper glass in the door. Only the sudden explosion of

broken glass and blood stopped me.

The kids scattered except for one, a girl named Barbara who dragged me up the block to

a small free- standing weekend emergency room repeating, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” as

though she was praying the rosary. Several hundred stitches closed torn flesh while my

anxiety mounted about my mother returning. Barbara said goodbye and ran off.

Overwhelming dread and misery engulfed me as step-by-step I neared the apartment.

With bandaged arms and hands, a beating seemed certain for the mess, the broken

window and the bill from the emergency room stuffed in my pocket.

I paused as I approached the entryway; I had seen movement inside and stiffened,

anticipating the blows my mother would rain down upon me. To my surprise, the kind