[Dad left to see Maggie, again. Mom's getting pretty angry. Today I might not have dinner again. Luckily I did manage to sneak the apple from the vendor last time dad took me to Maggie's, so I could eat that before sleep. Hopefully mom doesn't find out. Oh no, here she comes.]
I slowly backpaddle into the corner, and cover myself with the blanket, as my mother comes storming into the room.
"JEREMY! GET OUT HERE NOW!" she screams as she holds the beating stick in her hands. She found out that dad left her again, so she's upset. I try to stay absolutely still, because she can't see me in the dark room. She can't see me when I stay still. Dad always said to stay still when a monster came near me. Dad always knows what to do.
"You little bitch! Come out when I tell you to!" She pulled the blanket off my head and hit me with the beating stick, and then pulled me by my hair towards the door. She was gonna make me pay for letting dad leave on his own. I knew I should've left with dad, but he didn't want me with him. I stay quiet as my mom drags me to attic again. She hits me a few more times until I start bleeding, and then locks the attic door.
[My head hurts. Why did dad not take me with him. I wanted to go outside again.]
I limp towards the sleeping blanket and lay down a bit to rest, and grab the apple that's resting behind the small portrait next to me. The apple has gotten all soft and mushy, which means it's good to eat still. I take a bite out of it and look at the portrait from the little amount of light that reaches here. It's an old portrait from 5 years ago, when I was 3, and everyone was happy. Me, Mom, and Dad. If only dad hadn't met Maggie, then I wouldn't be stuck here, and I would be eating the porridge mom makes without needing to be hungry for a day.
I grab part of the blanket and image everyone being happy, and slowly fall asleep. I wake up a few hours later to the sound of glass shattering, and screaming. Dad came home, and mom is confronting him. The arguments always last a long time so I tried going back to sleep, but couldn't because I was hungry. My stomach was aching, and I had no energy to stand up , so I just laid there playing with a stick that was sticking out of the wall. I thought of the stick as a person and talked to it while my mom and dad fought.
It told me stories of flying through the sky as a bird, and finding new friends at the bottom ocean, and while it told me is stories, I heard the fighting getting more serious, so I backed myself into the corner of the attic in case they came up here to hurt me again. There I met more friends, small and long sticks, and they told me their stories. I held them all together and asked if they would be my friends forever, and they agreed, so I hugged them all tightly. It was then when something large fell to the ground beneath me, where my mom and dad were fighting, and I accidentally broke all the sticks. I cried as they all told me that they were ok and that I would be fine , as their voices slowly disappeared from my head. Then, one of them told me that they can come back, once they are all together, and then it got quiet.
I cried as my friends were now gone, and then tried doing what they said, grouping all the sticks together, and it didn't work, then I tried again, making on long stick, and it didn't work. As I was losing hope, I grabbed my blanket and ripped a bit of it, to hold all the sticks together. I formed legs and arms, in hope of making all my friends into one friend, and formed the head out of little scraps of the sticks, and it worked, I heard all the voices of my friends again, and they were fine. I started feeling sleepy, and told my friends that I wanted to sleep, and they sang me a lullaby, a sweet and caring one, one that I haven't heard since I was a baby, I drifted off to sleep, ignorant to what had happened that day, below me, because I was happy.