I hate my father. Oh my god, I hate him. I’ve wished for him to get into a car accident and die, and leave my life forever. I just want him to disappear so that I can live my life without his putrid breath breathing down my back. Am I a horrible person?
My mother says that he loves me. I bet she thinks he loves her too. But the way he treats me, my mother, my sister, even sometimes my brother—that’s not love. It’s a combination of verbal and physical abuse, some dictatorship reminiscent of Big Brother, with some terrorism thrown in for good measure. The way his mouth pulls taut and his eyes widen—oh, I just shuddered. Those are the scariest moments of all, because all you see is dementia behind those glassy eyes; no voice of reason, no compassion, no conscience. He becomes an overweight ape-like animal, focused on hurting his prey in any way possible: cutting remarks that seem to leave marks not only on the flesh but all the way to the bone, or a random slap or push to knock you off balance and send you to the ground, as if you needed another disadvantage.
He disgusts me. Book smart, yes; but able to socialize? No. Never. He wonders why he was layed off in this bad economy. No, I want to tell him, it’s not that you are a bad worker or aren’t as smart as the others, you’re just so unlikeable no one wants to be around you. The combination of temper flare-ups and forcing your way, stubborn and obstinate, ignorant and arrogant—how could my mother had ever fallen in love with you? Did she know what she was doing fifteen years ago, when she said the binding words of “I do”?
She couldn’t have. She must’ve been blind to his future: fat and angry.
I need to get out of here. Oh, to be eighteen! To have control over your life and the people in it, and to make your own decisions, to have the freedom to linger or have fun. Two more years, I think; it’s the only thing that can comfort me now.