A BAD FATHER

NIGHTINGALE

***

My cheeks stung and there was a ringing sensation in my ears as his hand connected with my cheek. My eyes watered, but I refused to let the tears drop. I haven’t cried in front of him since I was a teenager. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing he made me cry as an adult.

“GIVE ME THE MONEY!” He shouted and spit flew from his mouth. I moved backward to avoid getting sprayed and to put some distance between me and the stench coming from him. 

He stank of alcohol and sweat. I doubt he had even showered in the past few days, but he didn’t care and neither did I, not anymore.

“We need it. We haven’t eaten today, you took my morning pay and I had to go work for this so we wouldn’t starve to death.”

His palm connected with my cheek again, this time it was hard enough to send me to the ground.

Don’t talk back at me, you filthy piece of shit. Give it to me.”

I yelped as he dragged me up by my hair and pinned me to the wall with a hand wrapped tightly around my throat. His other hand began to search in my pockets for the money I had just been paid for walking Mrs Elm’s five dogs.

“Where’s the rest of it?” He asked as he brought out two notes from my left pocket. I couldn’t speak with his hand wrapped around my throat. He had already searched the right pocket so he moved to my back pockets and I began to squirm. 

He must have taken that as a sign that there was money in it because he spun me around and pressed my face to the wall so my back was presented to him. He held me down with a hand at the back of my neck while I tried to free myself.

I knew that there was no money in my back pockets. The reason I had been squirming was to get rid of the feel of his hands against my ass, and I had made it worse. Now that my back was to him, my backside was exposed to him. His hands lingered more than was appropriate while he searched my back pockets. Did I say more than appropriate? That was wrong because none of this was appropriate at all. My father shouldn’t be forcing me to give him the little money I wanted to use to buy food for my sister and me. He shouldn’t be hitting me whenever he doesn't get his way. When he didn’t see any money in my back pocket, he pushed me to the floor again and I scraped my elbow.

“This money is too small. You’re fucking useless.” He kicked me once in my midriff and I curled into a ball.

I would have laughed at the irony of his statement. The drunkard, negligent father calling the person who works and makes the money he spends on his habits, useless. If it weren’t for me, he would starve to death. He muttered angrily to himself and stomped out of the house.

“Nightingale!” Quetzal said as she rushed to help me up.

I had warned her to never interfere while our father was having one of his fits. It was an unspoken agreement between my father and I that I would take all of his insults and the physical abuse as long as he keeps my sister out of it. But that was as long as she stayed out of the way. if she got between him and me while he was at it, it would kind of be a breach of agreement and all bets were off.

“Are you okay?” She asked as I sat up and leaned against the wall.

“I’m okay.” I said as I looked up at my seventeen year old sister.

We both looked alike… Olive skin, curly brown hair, with amber eyes and full heart shaped lips, just like our mother. My sister had a light dusting of freckles over her nose and cheeks and she was the most beautiful of the both of us. I have protected her from the harsh reality of our lives as much as I can, but there was only so much I could do. We just seemed to be cursed.

Our mother was now one of the country’s top politicians and she was married. She had been engaged to the heir of a wealthy family when she met my father. He had been her driver. She hadn’t wanted to marry the man chosen for her by her parents so out of spite, she got pregnant for her driver. That wasn’t enough to stop her parents though. They made her deceive her fiancé into thinking the child was his and that hastened the marriage plans. Then when she gave birth, her parents paid the doctors to kill me so my real paternity would never be discovered. They would have made her abort me, but I was useful at that period to make my mother’s fiancé marry her less than a month later. And while she lived with him, it was impossible to get the abortion so that was why they had waited.

My mother paid the doctors more than her parent's had to pretend that another dead baby was me and then give me to my father. They continued seeing each other even while she was married, till her parents found out about it. By then, she had given birth to a child for her husband and was already pregnant with Quetzal. They did the same trick as before and gave my sister to my father. He was offered a huge amount of money and made to sign a contract by my mother’s parents in order to get it. The agreement was that he would disappear from their lives with my sister and I, and never return, never show his face, never try to publicize us or there would be dire consequences. He took the money and left. My mother didn’t care enough to fight for us, my father had just been a means to defy her parents, a distraction and a way to pass time.

My father had squandered the money he had been given while gambling, but he always blamed my sister and me for his misfortune. He had repeatedly told me this story while adding how we were nothing but bad luck to him. He had always been a negligent father, but every attempt to get us taken away by social services never worked. My mother’s parents made sure of it. We looked like our mother too much so if we somehow got into the government record, someone may become suspicious and find out our identity after a little digging. That was also the reason why I couldn’t report the abuse I’ve endured for years to the police. Who knows if they’ll send someone to assassinate us.

Our mother must love birds a lot because she named us both after them. Or maybe we weren’t important enough to actually name so she gave us bird names. Who knows.

“Nightingale, You’re bleeding!”