Who Is He?

(TW; mention of substance abuse)

Getting in the car, Alexandria lets out heavy fearful breaths. Her hands fumble with the car keys and the charms on a ringlet attached to them, with not a single light showing her anything but what she sees a few inches in front of her. The door to the garage swings open as she gets the key in the ignition, the sound of her dads white Volkswagen Rabbit coming to life when she turns the key. She looks up which makes her greasy and long hair fall in front of her face, and when she brushes it off, she sees that same dad running across the garage and straight for the driver's side door. Just as she finally starts to react, her hand landing on the shift, the door suddenly opens and she gets hauled out of the seat by familiar calloused hands on her arms. Her heart beats loud in her ears, making her ribs hurt and her vision shaky. She had learned not to make noise after so many years, especially when her dad was being particularly hard on her. Her dad pulls her to eye level, her being short for seventeen years old, and gives her a death glare- but it’s not him. It’s never him when he’s drunk, or high, or really anything that messes with his mind; that makes him different. He really is the sweetest man, just a bit violent sometimes.

His face is beat red, dripping sweat, and his eyes rage-filled as he stares at her. He yells, something she can’t comprehend from how loud and close to her face it is, before throwing her on the concrete ground of their garage, just in front of the car. The car still runs, but as he walks over to her, she knows he has no interest in stopping it right now. A sharp pain blooms in her hip as she feels the strong kick of his boot hit her, and she scrambles away, her hands getting cut on the broken glass that still sits there from a few months ago. He wasn’t himself then either, so she can’t blame him.

With countless kicks, her heel finally collides with his crotch, making him step back and wince in pain. She gets to her feet as quickly as she's able to, breathing heavily, and finds the nearest weapon; a wrench he had used to fix the car a couple days ago. She thanks god in her head that the car is fixed, but that thought is abruptly interrupted as her arm moves without any thought, the wrench colliding with his temple and knocking him over. He lays on the concrete floor, his shirt rolled up from the force of his land, and his eyes closed. She stands there, staring down at him with wide eyes, then as soon as she sees him take a breath, her feet move by themselves and to the car. She gets in and shuts the door before grabbing hold of the shift and moving it into drive and presses the gas. Nothing. She feels as if her heart starts to race faster, though she isn’t sure that's entirely possible. She presses the gas again; slams her foot against it multiple times- nothing. She sees as her dad starts to get up, groaning so loud and so angrily that she hears through the door of the car. Without thinking, she grabs her small backpack from the passenger side, and pushes the door open, stumbling out before regaining her balance and starting off. She hears her dads yelling from behind her, something about a broken transmission, something about how she’s the worst person in the world- she knows that isn’t right though. He’s drunk. He doesn’t mean that. She’s his best friend. He’s hit her, but he never really meant that. He never means anything he says or does under the influence, and she knows that.

It’s only been them for the past few years since her mom died from cancer, and she knows her dad took that hard. That doesn’t mean they stopped being best friends though; they were together forever and still are, she knows that. He had always been a bit hard on her, but that’s just how he was. He only ever beat her when he was drunk, and she doesn’t hold that against him. There were only a few times he just got angry, then ended up beating her, but that was her fault. She was the one in the wrong. She was the one who made him angry, and she got what she deserved. Tonight he was just a little angrier than usual, and he never kicked her… that was something new, she supposed.

Her thighs and lungs burn as she runs down her street, taking only left turns until taking a right one and running straight. Anywhere but home right now, she thinks as she runs faster than she ever has in track at school. As she finally slows down in an alley after running for at least three miles, she starts to realize how wet her face is from tears she hadn’t realized fell. Her chest falls rapidly and her tears suddenly burn her eyes at the rate they are falling. She clutches her backpack tightly, her fingers turning white in the black straps. Her head pounds as she stands in the darkness of the alley, a feeling she’s never felt before and so strong. As she breathes deeply trying to get herself to calm down, she starts to think. What if she hadn’t just run? He would have calmed down, she knows that for sure. He would have blacked out on the alcohol and left her alone, she would have checked out the bruise she knows is growing on her ribs. She wonders if she hadn’t left, what would have happened. The same thing that always happened on nights like these, probably. Her mind races and pounds as she uses the wall behind her to keep herself up, and she starts to wonder if she should go back to the house. She doesn’t really think he could manage by himself- he’ll drink himself to death. She knows it. But her ribs hurt so bad- her legs burn and shake from the running. She didn’t know who she was at that moment, and she didn’t know who she wanted to be, or where she would go from here.