was going to come crashing down on him. That was fine with Billy - it gave him something to concentrate on other than this latest parental tirade.
“Oh, well,” his father said in mock relief. “The boy was curious. That explains everything. The boy turns his back on everything good and holy, everything he’s been taught since we brought him into his world because he was curious. It’s all right, Mary. The boy was just curious.”
His mother’s large blue eyes were as wide open as possible. She took in a full breath of air in anticipation of a lengthy speech but, as if she suddenly changed her mind, held the breath as she stared in disbelief at her only son, her sholders at the apex. Her left hand shot out and encircled her husband’s hand and pulled it to her bosom as hand and statue sunk between her breasts. The statue’s arms, normally held out in welcome, now seemed to plead for help before death by suffocation. Billy could not help himself. The thought of suffocating between two breasts was just too funny for words so, try though he did, he could not stifle the laugh. There was a fairly large reserve of snot in his nose and, as he involuntarily brought his hands up to cover his mouth, all the air pressure from the laugh was redirected to his nasal passages and snot projected out of his nose at a perfect 45-degree angle, hemming his mother’s black skirt, coating her nylon-covered legs, and landing in blobs on the pointed toes of her black high heels.
As she exhaled, she seemed to implode. She looked down at her shoes and rasped, “Billy!”
His father, with one hand still buried, knocked Billy down with a powerful backhand. Billy knew this would come as it had so many times before. He left his feet, slammed into the wall, and fell in a heap on the bed. His ears were ringing and his head was filled with a sickening pain. Red lights trimmed with white exploded before his eyes and he lay in semi-consciousness.
“John,” his mother screamed, “Don’t hurt him!”
“Don’t hurt him? Why, Mary, I’m not going to hurt him. I’m just going to satisfy his curiosity!”
John Harold, dealer in heating oil and coal, handed the statue to his wife’s safekeeping and, snatching up the book entitled The Occult – from Aphrodisiacs to Witches, knelt before his youngest child. Taking the book so the back cover rested in his palm, thumb on one edge and little finger on the other, he grabbed Billy’s shirt.
“Here, son, take a good long look.” His father lifted him off the bed and slammed him down on the floor, the back of Billy’s head making a cracking sound against the hardwood. John Harold pushed the front cover of the book into Billy’s face and started grinding and rotating the book back and forth. Billy screamed out in pain and his mother heard crunching cartilage. Blood spurted from Billy’s nose and rolled down either side of his face, pooling on the floor.
His mother threw herself on her husband’s back, looping her arms around his bull-like neck as she tried to pull him off of her son. Her legs flailed in the air, searching for leverage to pull her husband back.
“Stop, John! You’ll kill him!” But her husband ignored her as huge muscles bulged, straining at their task.
Repositioning herself, she yelled in his ear, “Stop, John! Enough, enough!” Her husband heard and stopped. As he pulled the book away, it was covered with sticky, red fluid. A clot slipped off the underside of the book and landed sickeningly on the floor. Billy’s face was covered in gore. His head rotated instinctively, his mouth open as the only source of air. Between rotations, blood flowed from his nose into his mouth. As Billy coughed, red bubbles formed and popped between his lips.
John Harold looked questioningly at his wife. “I don’t know what to do anymore, Mary. He’s not my son. He can’t be my son. He’s some devil’s spawn put here to try my faith.” John Harold rose to his full six foot two inch frame. Sweat glistened on his forehead and he leaned menacingly toward his wife. For a moment, she thought he was going to strike her, again.
“I know he’s your son because you carried him for nine months. But, right now, that’s all I know.” He walked out of the room and into the hallway before he turned back to his wife.
“Since we know he’s your son, you deal with him. I’m going to read the Bible with the blood of the wicked still on my hands.” He held up two blood covered palms as if they were trophies. “I will kneel before Him in prayer, triumphant in His cause. You can clean up the mess.” He turned and walked away, breaking into a loud, off-key version of “Onward Christian Soldiers,” stomping his feet loudly in time with his singing. She heard the door to the study slam and knew he would not come out for several hours.
She knelt and forced herself to look at her son. He was lying on his back, his feet folded back underneath him, one shoe untied and partly off his foot. He was semi-conscious and his hands were instinctively covering his face. The flow of blood had partially stopped but he was still coughing. Tears made wet trails through the blood in the direction of the floor. As his mother rolled him over on his side to keep him from choking, a trickle of blood came from the corner of his mouth and dribbled onto the floor. Tears sprang to her eyes as she tried to reposition some of his blood-matted hair.
“Oh, Billy,” she whispered. “Dear, sweet Billy.” She helped him to his feet. He was conscious enough to move his legs as she guided him into bathroom. She soaked a washcloth with cold water and held it over his nose. When he opened his eyes, she saw the residual fear and began to reassure him.
“It’s OK, baby. He’s not here. We’re going to the hospital to get you better.”
She told him to hold the washcloth over his nose while she went to the refrigerator and wrapped ice in a dishtowel. Returning, she said, “You hold this ice over your nose while I get cleaned up. I’ll be right back.”
She left him on the floor of the bathroom with his head tilted back over the edge of the tub. His thoughts intermingled with the nausea and pain. His hatred for his father was a given, something he lived with, like some deformity. He loved his mother, he supposed. He was fairly sure she loved him; sometimes she just didn’t act like it.
His father provided a very comfortable living, and his mother took care of all the money. Billy supposed she was good with money because there was always enough for his father to do what he wanted: go to Bible retreats, boxing matches, or buy the magazines of naked women he kept locked in his desk. The bills were always paid, they ate and dressed well, and his father gave a substantial contribution to the First Pentecostal Church of Greater Boston every Sunday, fanning out the various bills and placing them in Reverend Popejoy’s hand as worshipers left the church. “Here you go, Reverend,” he would say loudly. “I’m paving the road to heaven with my good works.”
Billy had a sister from his father’s first marriage. His father’s first wife died from falling down stairs and breaking her neck. His father and mother never talked about it. His sister Grace was ten years older than he was, and only lived five miles away but never came over unless their father was gone.
When his father was away from home, his mother always called Grace to see if she would stay with Billy. She never refused. She would come over or sometimes his mother would drop him off at Grace’s apartment. Often, his mother was gone all night and Billy and Grace would talk about all sorts of things, especially the occult. Grace called herself a witch. He couldn’t see how because she didn’t even have a pointy hat. Plus, she was nice to him. How could she be a witch and be nice to him when his own father, a church deacon, knocked a back tooth out of his mother’s mouth for burning a roast. He would never tell his parents, but Grace was the person who gave him the book.
When his mother finally returned to the bathroom, she had completely changed her clothes and put on fresh makeup. She also had
