Hard, Cold World

Prologue 

I used to think the world was a place of madness.  The madness that once it consumed you, you became apart of it, unable to break free. A world that is full of ignorance, no control, no sympathy for anyone or any being.

 I still think of it that way, at times.

But my mind has recently changed.

My mind now thinks of the world as the place everything can happen. Everything from being an outcast to accepted, and from thinking the world is full of fools to full of confused and curious people.

And sadly, my mind was changed by one of those ignorant, no control, unsympathizing fools.

Start 

From early on in life, I decided I was different. 

I was an exact copy of my father, whose large, rough hands strangled my mother countless times in front of my eyes. My large head, just like his. My honey brown eyes, like his. Even the copper-toned skin, I inherited from him. 

It seems like I inherited nothing from my mother, except her emotions. 

The emotions that I carry on my shoulders, from the time I wake up to the time I go to bed. 

The emotions that I shut out to please my father. The emotions that stayed hidden away until nightfall when I would let all of them out when everyone else in the house was asleep. The emotions that I never let out in front of my mother, to protect her, for the fear of getting slammed against a wall. The emotions that I never could conjure up to my father to tell him leave my mother alone.

The emotions that told me, everything was my fault. 

I was the cause of the beatings, the damage,the secrets,the lies, and the tears. 

Years before I was born, my fate was decided.

My fate was decided that my mother would love and my father would 'love' me but would really be jealous of my birth and take it out on my mother for years, physically and verbally. 

And that is how I am here today, keeping my mouth closed as my parents argue over something that I will eventually lock away and cry about the next day, as I always did.

A tear slips, and my father sees.

"Do you see what you have done to him?! You have made him too soft, and he is crying like a little girl!" He yells so close to her face it looks as if he is ready to eat her.

"I haven't made him into anything! Maybe if his father would have actually been there to make him into a man instead of being a bum all day he wouldn't be crying!"

"I WORK! It's your lazy ass that doesn't do anything!" 

"I have been there more for him than you ever have!" 

And that is when the match was lit and the explosive happened.

My father lifts his hand to hit her, but it doesn't land. Everyone is frozen.

"Not today, not now," he says pushing me out of the way to leave the house as always.

The front door slams and I flinch, some things never change.

No, some people.