Just Like His Father

Brenda didn’t know what to do about her son. She had reached the end of her tether years ago, but now her desperation was bordering on pathetic obsession. She didn’t know what she’d done wrong. 

He’d been such a charming youngster just like his father, always eager to learn, eager to laugh, desperate to know everybody and get them to know him, too. They’d been such a perfect little family unit. He was 6 when they’d told him the news: “You’re going to be a big brother.”

Brenda was elated, and Phil had appeared to be at the time. But Sammy didn’t respond the way Brenda thought he would. She thought he’d jump for the moon, excited to have another person around. Someone he could care for. Somebody he could teach. Someone who would admire him. But she was wrong. He was distinctly unimpressed, not speaking to anyone for days. Not even to Phil. Not even after “the accident.”

Brenda was sure that Sammy had pushed her. That he’d left his cars at the top of the staircase on purpose. He was always such a considerate young boy “wait there, Mummy, the racers need to get out of the way” that it seemed hard to believe that he would make such a careless mistake.   

She’d shared her concerns to Phil one night when she hadn’t realised the whiskey had crept back onto his breath. He’d just laughed maniacally at her. “Are you that stupid?” He slurred, lunging across the carpet towards her. “That you need to blame your clumsiness-” Please don’t, Phil. Not by the hair! “-on a 6 year old boy?” Phil, stop! That’s not what I-

He’d thrown her across the room and split her lip again. Her face was swollen from where the blows had landed, and her stitches came undone from where his foot had connected with her body. She was cleaning blood and vomit while waiting for the ambulance alone, where she had remained ever since. 

It was in those moments of excruciating pain, seconds stretching into an eternity, when Brenda thought she might be wrong. She’d been wrong before, not ever realising she’d married a brute before it was already too late. But Phil was gone, and whatever happened, in an unhealthy state Brenda chose to love her son. The years passed, the lies crept in and somehow Phil came back. There was more blood in her house than she’d ever cared to clean and now she was forced to clean house one last time. 

She paced back and forth in the kitchen, lamenting the sudden change in Sammy once Phil was gone. Broken windows. Slashed tyres. The knives. The complaints. The threats. The fear. She knew she wouldn’t miss it, but the pain of knowing what she’d finally done was going to torture her more than both of them ever had. Brenda snapped out of her thoughts and turned towards the living room and saw Sammy lying in a clump on the floor, covered in blood, not really sure where things had gone wrong. It wasn’t supposed to be like this, but the boy really was just like his father.