The Fires Of October

Just a warning. There's about two curse words in here. And the content isn't really R rated, but it is isn't PG-13 either. It's in between. Atleast in my opinion. When you give me your thoughts, please be nice.

The Fires of October

Annabel and October are two frequently abused siblings looking for a way out. Just when October is considering suicide, he suddenly blacks out and wakes up in the woods with his sister, having no memory of what just happened. Knowing only that he cannot go back, he tries to raise Annabel in the ominous forest, taking the responsibility of father and brother all at once; all the while he dreads the impending winter.

Chapter One: The Birth of Disorder

One of my earliest memories was seeing my Mom hide the jewelery in the attic. The reason why it stuck in my head so much was because it happened before I didn't exist for seven months.

When I woke up, I saw an infant in my Mother's arms.

It pretty much started like any old banal fairytale. Then one day, Mom couldn't take it any more. And from there, it all spiraled into hell.

My Mother, Abigail Ryder, was born to a family of perfectionists and strict parents. In her youth, she was seldom allowed to watch TV, go to the movies, talk on the phone for more than 15 minutes, or get C's in school.

But this hardly vexed her; her strict upbringing taught her it was forbidden to complain of her life, lest she be corrupted by freedom and become a drug dealer or a prostitute, among the dregs of society. So she never uttered a word against her parents. Instead, she drowned herself in the pleasures of literature, music, horseback riding, and daily walks about the family estate.

She was a calm, peaceful beauty that loved adventure and books. Pleasing her parents was very important to her. She studied diligently, was excellent in behavior and appearance, and won many academic awards that only collected dust in the dark confines of her closet.

She adored flowers and gardening, forcing herself to remember the names of hundreds of different breeds of flowers. She was known for tending to the meadow outside of her home.

Painting was also another passion of hers. She gained acceptance in the artistic society, even selling a few of her paintings for 150 dollars each. Dozens of others went to art shows and even a studio.

And lastly, was her infatuation with music. She loved the violin and the piano the most, even briefly teaching me to play them in my youth.

To many, she was a timid goddess among mortals, men's eyes following her wherever she roamed.

Unknown to the public was her secret desire. All the while she wanted a normal life more than what the lap of luxury bestowed upon her. That too, of course, was forbidden. Her social standing and controlling parents would not allow it.

In school, she was seen as the too well-behaved, beautiful progeny of a prosperous family; the girl with long, curly brown locks, observant green eyes, and lanky figure. “She could have been a model if she wanted to”, said several people who knew her when she was young.

But while she had the riches, the looks, the kind of life that had no space for desire or envy, inside she was unhappy.

Why couldn't she experience the normalcy that the others did? Why couldn't she go out with her friends for ice cream? Why was it such a crime to blush at a good looking boy?

Many nights, she confessed, she had laid in her bed pondering these questions. Having no one to confide in, she died a little more with each passing day. And the questions were still left unanswered.

One night, she came to a conclusion. Her answer was this life. The life she was living was keeping her from all these experiences. Her parents, the mansion, the money, the responsibility, the perfectionism. It was tearing her apart. She just wanted to be normal. That's all. Just normal.

But how would she accomplish that? Her parents would hate her forever if they knew what she was thinking that very moment.

A week passed with these rebellious notions flickering in her head. But one day, she finally regained her self control and they disappeared. She couldn't bear to think them anymore. What would everyone else think about her if they knew?

So years passed. Fifteen years old. Sixteen years old. Seventeen. And finally, the big one eight.

She was still young then, too young for a bad boy like my father to fall into her life. From there it was just the show everyone who envied Abigail Ryder wanted it to be.

Girl falls in love with boy, boy gets girl pregnant, girl runs away from home with boy and they are never heard of again.

And thus I was born. But I'll go into more detail about that a bit later.

My father's name is John Lee Haynes.

His parents died in a plane crash when he was 15. To avoid the orphanage and being adopted, he moved in with a friend. In less than a year, he was involved in drugs and petty crime, owing to the influence of his low life acquaintances. He skipped school often, almost never did his homework, and spent his days smoking pot on the side walk or demolishing old cars in the junk yard.

By 16, he already had a lengthy criminal record, had been to a Juvenile Detention center, and was suspended from school numerous times for violence. But despite this, he used to be a teenage heart throb. As such, he had plenty of experience with girls in his lifetime. This experience enabled him with irresistible charm and charisma; as the years went by, he grew into a self-proclaimed professional at reeling women into his traps.

I am truly sad to say that Mom was just another one of his victims. A long-term victim of his, at that.

He met Abigail via her best friend, Chloe Abernathy, to discuss prom dates. Unfortunately, he just happened to be at school that day, prowling for a girl to take to the dance.

He was immediately mesmerized by my Mother's beauty and asked her if she would grant him the honor of taking her to prom. She reluctantly accepted; she wasn't too sure if her parents would allow her to go, but if they did, she would definitely accompany him.

So, the day of prom, her parents predictably said she was not allowed to attend, especially considering the reputation of the person she wanted to go with.

She was picked up right after school and commanded to remain home until tomorrow morning.

My mother was overcome by a foreign rage at the news. She burst into tears and slapped her father, and ran into her room to weep alone for the remainder of the day.

According to the testimony of several friends of hers, John was smitten the first time he saw Abigail. He frequently asked her friends what she was doing, what classes she had, and even her favorite activities and tastes in music. He was determined to alleviate her of her oppressive family and run away somewhere to start a new one.

After a few weeks of dating secretly, John and Abigail had a mind to make an utterly stupid decision, as all teenagers do. They were going to leave school, their friends, their neighborhood, all for the sake of a love that would last forever.

Mom said he bribed a butler and was loaned a ladder to climb up to her window to retrieve her. I rebuked her story when she first told it to me. I complained that it sounded way too much like Rapunzel.

She simply replied, “My life practically is just a big fairy tale.”

They spent one night with each other, since they couldn't run away right that second. There was far too much at stake. So they postponed her secret liberation for another day.

But then some time later, Mom was afflicted by morning sickness.

The moment it leaked out that there were insidious rumors circulating about the high school paragon Abigail Ryder, her fellow classmates were quick to hate her.

She finally had no choice left. All her dreams were slipping away right before her eyes. Her friends turned into enemies, the rumors blew out of proportion, and even the teachers gossiped about her when her back was turned.

If that wasn't horrible enough, her parents threatened that if the rumors were verified (her belly was not protruding at that time, and she denied all rumors of the pregnancy) she would be left to the charity of the father's parents and lose her inheritance.

Unable to deal with her present situation, my Mother finally ran away with Dad on a cold January night.

For the remainder of her pregnancy, she lived with Dad in the basement of Marcus Hunter, a friend of my Father's. Ironically, despite smoking pot with him when he was a kid, he became a police officer and was even forced to arrest my Dad for drunk driving. He later drove him home and let him off with a warning. To this day they're still friends.

Marcus was an open book when it came to my Mother; whenever Dad was gone doing whatever it was that he did, Marcus would tell her stories about his troubled childhood and how painful it was to suffer through his parent's neglect. She comforted him, giving him wise advise, which was unheard of at her age. Besides her counsel, another form of consolement for him was to rub her stomach. He loved it when I kicked.

Around the week that I was expected, Dad was beginning to suspect that Marcus had fallen in love with Mom, so he began to set restrictions on how much time they could be together in his absence.

She swore to him time and time again that even if Marcus' feelings for her were stronger than they should be, the understanding was not mutual.

He refused to believe her and grew more jealous as the week came to a close. It even came to the point of violence when Dad confronted Marcus on his feelings for Abigail.

Marcus' defense in his case was that Dad was almost never with her. Instead, he was always out doing God knows what in the streets. He claimed that the reason why he was so jealous was because he was dating other women behind her back, and the guilt was eating away at him. Thus, he tried to justify his unfaithfulness in the hopes that Abigail and Marcus were going out behind his back.

What stopped the fighting was not physical intervention, but when Mom shouted that her water had broken in the midst of the quarrel.

Marcus was the smarter of the two. He let go of his anger and suggested that Dad do the same. There were bigger things at hand now.

So Marcus drove Mom and Dad to the hospital. He waited in the reception room while Mom was brought in and Dad followed.

She told me the story of giving birth to me numerous times. While she changed the words and added new feelings and experiences to the story, she always remembered to leave in what she thought of me the moment the doctor placed me in her arms.

“You were so damn beautiful,” she would say, with tears in her eyes, “Anyone who saw you would gasp and start crying. So damn beautiful, you were..”

I saw my baby pictures. I swear I looked like a little bush baby. I had wavy brown locks, which looked more like a chocolate mess all over my forehead and sticking up at weird angles from the goo I was just flushed out of. My skin was bright peach; my cheeks very, very pink. Almost like I was blushing at the person who took the picture. My eyes were bigger than any infant's should be, which added to the monkey-like appearance. Like big, blue orbs of confusion and wonder.

Mom would ground me for saying that. She wanted me to have the same exact opinion of myself as she did. I was the world to her. I couldn't have low self-esteem. That wasn't allowed for a person as beautiful as I was.

I was named after the month I was born in. My father thought it was the stupidest name he's ever heard of; Mom was besotted with it. She said it was completely unique, and hoped I would grow to like the name.

And so I became October Lee Haynes.

Other names that were being considered were Edward, Julian, Seth, and Tristan. My Mother liked the name Tristan the strongest, since it was the name of a little boy who saved her from falling in a pond when she was four years old.

There was a brief romance between them, but then he moved away when she was seven. She found out he had died of Leukemia when she turned 16, so she had a mind to name me after him in honor of his memory.

I was the only person she told this to, and I was not to breathe a word of this to Dad.

“He has a bad jealousy problem,” she said, referencing his suspicions regarding Marcus Hunter.

We were later to find out that jealousy was not the only problem we were confronted with when it concerned my Father. I will also approach that subject shortly.

Despite leaving her friends, parents, and neighborhood behind, she received what she desired for so long. A normal life.

When I turned three, Mom became Abigail Eileen Haynes.

All was well the first few years of the marriage. Dad got a job at a local battery company, rented an apartment, bought a car, and split the financial responsibilities equally between my Mother and himself. He even sent Marcus a brand new VCR as payment for housing them in their time of need, and as a apology for fighting with him the day I was born.

My Mother helped run the downtown bakery, finding that she had a liking for making sweets. She also bought a car several months after he did.

Before I turned five and had to go to school, we had a very enjoyable daily routine. She woke me up at 7:30 in the morning, took us to the bakery, and we spent the day decorating cakes and baking cookies. Then she closed the bakery at 6, we went home and waited for Dad. He usually got home from work at a quarter to 6.

We played hide and go seek, ring around the rosie, and board games for an hour or so. Then Mom would cook dinner, and we would all eat at the table and discuss our day, which is now rare in today's families. I watched TV with them until 9:30, my bedtime.

Then the cycle repeated itself. Our life was based around one principle: Everything we did, we did as a family.

My life was pretty good then. My parents gave me the utmost love and attention, though I had a slight preference for Mom. She got me into more feminine things, much to the dismay of my father, such as painting and literature. She was going to take me horseback riding once, but she had a nervous brake down in the stable and we had to go home.

I was worried, but Dad reassured me, “She gets like that sometimes, it's nothing to worry about.”

Later Dad disclosed that somethings that reminded her of her previous life, “the time before I was born”, caused her to become very sad.

“Its not a subject we talk about at the table. Its not a subject we talk about before a bedtime story. Its a subject that you don't talk about at all.” He once said.

Looking back on it, it was obvious that she needed help. Certain, every day things would trigger these memories, and she would have breakdowns regularly. Dad was almost never present at the time of these emotional occurrences, but my testimony should have been sufficient for him.

He simply told me, “Forget about it. Thats what Mom wants to do. She wants to forget. Make it easier for her, and forget too. Simple as that.”

I dismissed it and life returned to normal.

But eventually, problems started to arise within the marriage; problems that, one by one, arose with increasing prevalence with the passage of time.

While working at the factory, he made a few friends he shouldn't have. They revived his addiction to alcohol and drugs, and nurtured his lecherous habits. Unbekowest to us, of course.

His inappropriate activities went unnoticed by us for a few weeks, until one night, he didn't come home at the expected time.

After Mom closed the bakery, we came to a darkened house. That was a red flag right there. But all Mom did was switch on the light, put her jacket on the coat hanger and mumble to herself, “That's weird. Wheres your daddy?”

I told her I didn't know. Having my childish and undeveloped imagination, I assumed he wanted to play hide and go seek. He was probably in the closet, I reasoned.

She smiled and kissed me on my forehead, appreciating that I made her laugh. But I didn't think it was funny. I hated it when Dad played hide and go seek with us. Just when I thought I had found him, he jumps out of a totally different place in the house and scares me nearly to the point of soiling my undergarments. Then, when he finds my Mother, he tells me to go downstairs and watch TV! That's no fun at all.

Dad had a playful nature, so Mom seemed to believe me for a while; she checked the closet, the basement, in the bathtub, under my bed, and even under the sink.

She approached me where I was waiting, patiently sitting on the couch and watching Blues Clues. She didn't look happy.

She licked her lips and drew in a breath. “October...Daddy isn't here.”

She sat down and rubbed my hand, as if to console me. But she was the one with a disturbed countenance.

“Don't worry, Mama. He's...well...he's not doing something bad. Daddy doesn't do that. So don't worry.”

She closed her eyes. “I know, honey. You're right. I should listen to you.”

I nodded. “Don't worry. Watch Blues Clues with me.”

Mom reluctantly complied, and we were content for about another 2 hours. But then she remembered that he wasn't home yet, and her panicking commenced. I managed to console her a second time, and we went back to watching TV.

But by eight o' clock, Mom was frantic. She called the police to set out a search for him. That night, all she did was pace around nervously, crying to herself, or shaking her head and reiterating a frustrated, “No.”

At about 12:45 at night, the police retrieved my Father at a bar on the other end of town, stone drunk and slurring.

You should have seen the look on her face. She just couldn't believe what she was seeing. Here was her husband, who was always home by 6:00, intoxicated and cursing like a sailor in the backseat of a police car.

After that disturbing instance, there was a rift between them. As time flew by, it only grew deeper, and their relationship only got uglier.

Apparently dissatisfied with his current income, he began to gamble. Mom knew the moment she came home and their suede couches were gone. She knew when she saw him, sitting on a chair, angry as hell, sipping from his bottle of amber colored poison. His way of telling her he had lost a bet.

Her reaction was licking her lip, pursing them together and bowing her head in shame.

“Who did I marry?” She mumbled, almost inaudible to my ears. “Who?”

Who, indeed.

Drinking was the least of his issues, though it was responsible for bringing on his compulsive immoral habits. Mom sought to stop them.

We got up at 7:30, as we did every morning, and quickly got dressed. Then we trotted down the steps and quietly passed by Dad, who was sleeping on the couch. Assuming he would go to work today, she ordered me to keep quiet and still while we waited in the back of the house, looking out for his car to withdraw from the drive way.

I didn't know what she had up her sleeve exactly; I thought we were going to get into her car and follow him. She was also having suspicions that he was being unfaithful; though there was only evidence of his drinking and gambling, as far as fornication goes, we knew nothing. There was only speculation when it came to that subject.

At about a quarter to nine, his car pulled out of the driveway. He was well on his way to the factory when we slipped back into the house again.

“What are you looking for, Mama?” I said, tugging at the hem of her dress.

She turned back to me. “We aren't looking for anything, October. We're going to hide all of Mommy's things, and yours, so Daddy doesn't take them.”

“Why would he take my toys? Am I bad?”

“No, honey, you're an angel.” She said, smiling. “But Daddy has a bad habit of taking things that aren't his and...” she turned her head toward the staircase, “Doing other things with them.”

I nodded my little head, and we walked up the steps and hit all of the rooms, hiding all of the valuables in the attic. She even hid my dream catcher and my black music box.

That night when Dad came home, he didn't seem to notice anything was missing, he just slouched back in the only chair we had left and sipped from his bottle. Mom said nothing. She only peered at him from the safety of the staircase, caressing my dark brown locks.

It wasn't a look of anger, of shame, of heartbreak, or even disgust. It was pity. She truly and utterly pitied my Father.

About a month later, she had ample reason to conclude that he was indeed sleeping with other women.

At first, she berated herself for thinking that about him. She hit her forehead and cursed to herself, telling herself over and over she knew she was wrong. Other times, she had the look on her face that just told me, “Who am I kidding?”

She usually rested her palm on her chin when she came to this point, squinting her eyes together like she was trying to banish the notion, but it kept coming back. And coming back. And coming back.

How could she not come to that devastating conclusion? He came home at 2 to 3 in the morning, never slept in the same bed with her, drank constantly, had a filthy temper, and she also had the misfortune to come across a small pile of condoms in his car.

I was too young to see the turmoil we were really in. But she always had that look on her face, so I knew it was serious. Because of my age, I was only entitled to the role of the child in the middle of it all.

Mom was beginning to see that my Father was very mended in his ways, changing for no one, not even his wife. Thus the marriage dwindled.

She quit her job at the bakery, stopped using her car, stopped paying the bills, and even went so far as to neglect me for a while.

She never seemed to recover from that stunning realization. Once she knew deep in her heart that he would not change, she denied him in everything. I learned when I was older that not only had she denied him her presence, she rejected him when he wanted to make love to her, even kissing or hugging.

The need to tend to her flowers and play melancholy tunes on the aged piano became her daily and all-consuming occupation. My Father was convinced that music and flowers were what took his wife away from him, not his cheating, gambling, and ceaseless drinking. So he vowed to destroy all of it.

First he attacked the garden. He ran over all of the flowers with a lawn mower, spilling dirt and fragments of pedals all over the place. And thus her garden was no more that a dead field of a colorful mess.

Next and lastly, he pried all the keys from the piano and made her watch as he threw them away.

He was consumed by the choke hold grip of an evil force more powerful than he. Alcohol became his best friend, his dictator, his life. His daily activities composed of drinking with his friends all day, work, driving around and picking up women, and coming home to wield his terrible strength over us.

The daily routine changed to going to school, coming home, and fearing Dad from the confines of my room.

It took us a while to become accustomed to it, but flying into a rage turned into something expected of him, even normal. I even adapted to his ridiculous rules regarding Mom: no going out to the back yard, make dinner before Dad gets home, clean the house before Dad gets home, and most important of all....“stay away from the fucking piano”.

For a while my Mother held in all protest, and heeded to his demands quietly, though not caring to shield her new found hatred for him. He pretended at times that this did not irk him, and life was normal...no, undisturbed, for a period of time.

But as the days fell off the calendar, she became more and more detached from everything around her. She descended into a state of solitary musing. If you wanted to talk to my Mom, she was always at the window, peering at the outside world from her bedroom. A world she was not allowed to touch, by the tyrannical command of my Father.

She wouldn't speak to you, but you could tell her everything. The only way she intimated that she heard you was with a simple nod. It was barely a titter of her head, but I guess it was still a nod.

The doctor stated that the stress from being trapped in the house all the time was causing her to slowly lose her sanity. He prescribed her medications, advised that she be let out more, consider marital therapy, and that was that.

Dad didn't want anything to do with her upon hearing of her mental illness. He didn't want to deal with a mentally disturbed wife. So he abandoned her. But, to show he still harbored some lingering feelings for her welfare, he sent me up to her room every single day to supply her with her daily dose of meds.

She rejected them every time, insinuating that I hide them in her pillow case or throw them out of the window, making it look like she did what was expected of her. The least she did was drink her glass of water, and that was it. I obeyed her without objection.

Her aversion to the anti-psychotic drugs didn't concern me; I had it instilled in my head that she did not need them. What she really needed was to escape.

Dad completely ignored the advice of the doctor. He kept her walled up inside her lonely tomb, breaking into a fit of passion if she tried to walk down the steps. She was apparently “too sick” to do anything a human being naturally did; she was not allowed to move, to talk, to complain, make her own food, or even be in the same room with her own son for an extended span of time.

In her absence, I suffered the most intense emptiness a four year old child could possibly feel. My toys were as useless to me as my existence, and I grew more irritable and sullen by the passing of each solitary hour I spent in my room, never caring to wipe the ever flowing tears from my pale cheeks.

Time passed. Time passed. Time passed. In the duration of this unbearable interlude of pain, my Mother remained as silent and docile as a church mouse. My Father remained as impertinent and foul tempered as any man conquered by the disease of his own sinful nature could be.

And so days turned into weeks, and weeks turned into months. It took a while for Dad to realize that Mom was not improving, and the medications he was sending me up with were useless.

On a rather frosty autumn day, I was trotting up the steps with a plastic tray that composed of her medications, a glass of water, a piece of bread, and Mary Shelly's Frankenstein. She had recently been reading a lot of scary books; among them were Goosebumps, Dracula, The Phantom of the Opera, Interview With the Vampire, and the short stories of Edgar Allan Poe.

I assumed she created this habit as a way of nurturing her state of melancholy.

While she immersed herself in the world of phantasmagoria, I would sit by her chair, watching her intently, which indicated that I wanted her to read to me. She looked down from her page, and very unexpectedly, obliged.

Perceiving that I would not like Frankenstein, she chose another book, which was old and tattered and bore no title. She flipped open the book and instantly came upon the page she was searching for, and began to read silently to herself. I waited patiently.

Then she cleared her throat, breathing the first words that came out of her mouth in 2 years. She began to narrate the story in her own words:

“Once upon a time, there was an insane man in jail, writing about the horrible things he had done before he would be hanged. The story begins when he was a little boy. When he was small, he loved animals. Then he grew into a man and got married. Him and his wife kept many pets; a monkey, a bird, a fish, a dog...and a black cat...”

Just as she had done to herself, she had completely submerged and fascinated me with the dark literature of by gone times, filling my head with bloodthirsty vampires, misunderstood creatures such as Frankenstein, and the disfigured Opera Ghost.

I was a young boy of 6 then. I remember she would always tell me how grown I was when I said her stories never gave me nightmares, and I always wanted to hear more. Reading to me became her favorite activity, and I never grew tired of it.

Everyday, when I brought up her medication, I would immediately discard the pills and sit down for another three to four hours of storytelling.

But one day, while carelessly throwing the pills in the trash bin, my father opened the door and saw me.

At first, he just stood there with the blankest look on his face, as did I. Then his eye brows furrowed, his fists tightened, his teeth clenched. I could only manage a gasp as I tried to flee and hide behind my mother.

He grabbed me before I could will myself to scream and shook me back and forth, yelling, “What the hell are you doing with those pills, boy? Don't you know I pay hard earned money for that shit? You listen to me, you hear? Your Mom's sick! She's crazy! You don't listen to crazy people!”

She sprung up to assist me, to which he quickly delivered a swift slap across her face. The impact forced her to fly back and hit the floor. She slid to a stop near her chair, holding her fiery cheek in frantic disbelief.

“John? What the...what are you doing?” She uttered breathlessly.

He sneered at her, pulling back my head by a heap of hair he held in his fist. I cried out, raking at his fingers for release. He only tightened his grip. My vision was blinded by tears, and I could hardly concentrate on anything but the pain.

She stood up again and tried to retrieve me. He threw me into the hallway and closed my Mother's bedroom door. The moment I fell down, screams descended on my ringing ears. Mom banged on the door with sudden urgency. She was immediately stopped. Through the door, I could hear her being gagged and subdued.

I didn't know what to do. I screamed helplessly, banged on the door, peeked under it, shook the knob, anything I could think of. But none of my frenzied actions were alleviating the situation at hand.

Looking in through the crevice underneath the door, I saw him over Mom. I covered my mouth in horror and awe as he tore the white gown from her body, throwing it in the trash bin where I had discarded the pills. The last thing I could bear to see was him unfastening his pants, then I fled in terror.

I forced myself to forget all memory of my Mother's rape, just as she had told me to. But I didn't forget only that. I let go of everything. I fell asleep that night and never woke up.

Right now. Where is everything?

I don't know.

Where is here? I don't see anything.

Everything is black.

But I can't be dead, can I?

I don't remember dying.

Did Dad send me back to God, like he always said he would?

I can hear screaming. At first it is very faint. But then it begins to intensify. Growing louder, louder, and louder. Screaming that seems dangerously close to my ears. The person releasing those bloodcurdling sounds could be near me. But I don't know. Everything is black.

Does this place even have an exit?

Wait. I see a light. I think I'm being let out. At least I think I am. I should go to it. I don't want to be trapped in this nothingness anymore. So I run to the light. Its getting farther from me. It doesn't want to be caught. I tell it to wait. It listens.

In time, I reach the light. I fall into a bright chasm.

I open my eyes.

The world is white...colorless. Mom is on a bed. She's holding my Father's hand. She has a look of excruciating pain on her face. A man as colorless as this room is over her, iterating the command to push. The thought suspends my animation, the will to speak, or even to exert a soft gasp. The realization that...

Dear God...

I have no idea where I am.

She's crying out in pain. I stand there and do nothing. I'm just looking around this white room, trying to place myself somewhere familiar. Everyone but me knew they were in a hospital. I don't even remember how I got here.

What is Mom pushing out? Is she sick? Why is she holding Dad's hand? He just hurt her yesterday. Did they forgive each other? What is that man pulling out of her? Wait—what's...that thing? Why is it so blue and scary?

Why is it crying so loud? And did he just take that out of my Mom?

All these questions were whirring about in my head, searching for answers I could not supply myself with.

For a few minutes, the baby was placed in her hands. Its eyes were closed, motionless. So pale. It inherited the thick black locks of my Father, but my Mother's small nose. The lips were blue and quivering. Like it was so scared it didn't want to open its eyes.

I regretted opening mine.

I ran up to the side of the bed and inquired if it was a boy or a girl. Both of my parents eyed me with confusion simultaneously.

“What are you talking about?” Dad said gruffly, hardening his look into a glare.

“October, honey, I told you it was a girl. You were here for the ultra sound. Don't be silly.”

I shamefully averted my eyes to the ground and became silent. She caressed the baby's fair hairs before she came to a decision.

“Your middle name is Lee.” She said to my Father, looking at the baby.

“Yeah, so?” He said haughtily.

“Annabel Lee.” She smiled. “Yes, I like that.”

Dad squinted in disgust. “Annabel?” His eyes softened into carelessness. “Fine, whatever, I don't give a shit what you name the kid.”

My Mother never took her eyes off the baby; all the while I gaped at him with horrid surprise. Did he just say that to Mom? Why is she acting like she doesn't care?

The infant was placed in the incubator minutes after birth. It's lungs did not have enough time to develop properly, so it had to be connected to machinery for a few weeks.

Mom suffered from insanity and delusions on the false pretenses that Annabel was going to die, since Dad had confirmed it for her. He figured since the infant was so weak, her fate was sealed.

Dad swore me to secrecy concerning Annabel's welfare; if she was improving I could not inform Mom on pain of being disowned. The reason being that he wanted to drive her over the edge so she would die, thus freeing him of her burdensome existence.

I never asked what plans he had for us after Mom's death should she die; I didn't want to know anyway.

I was later to find out that he had been maintaining an affair with another woman for almost 2 years, around the time when she was constantly ignoring her husband because of his unchanging, inconsiderate disposition.

Knowing acting out was beyond my power, I resigned myself to silent rage.

Every day, Dad dropped me off at the hospital and left to do God knows what. While my mother lay napping in the bed, the TV emitting annoying screams and laughs and such, I sat by her side.

I always watched Annabel. Dad told me frequently that if I didn't watch her, she was going to die. What he probably meant to say is that if we ignored her for a prolonged period of time, we wouldn't be able to act right away should something go wrong, for what ever reason. But the way he said it gave birth to an unshakable fear: if my eyes ever left her, her heart would immediately stop beating.

And if she stopped breathing, and Mom found out, she would be mad at me. She wouldn't tell me scary stories anymore. She'd probably tell Dad what I did. And then he'd beat me senseless and send me “Back to God”. That was his favorite term for death.

I know its ridiculous to think that, but I was only 6 at the time. I was still very naive at that point in my life. I dreaded my Father more than any creature that dwelled in the Earth, and I loved my Mother with an intensity just as strong. I couldn't disappoint her. And I couldn't evoke his fury.

Every day, I held her soft hand. I still remember how fragile it was, even wrapped around my small fingers.

“Now we're one.” She always used to say to me. At that time, I didn't understand what she meant by that. But a few years later, I did.

Even though the atmosphere of the silent hospital was the perfect place to sleep, I was not allowed this privilege. Her frail figure in that small transparent box always haunted me.

So I watched her from far off, praying that her tiny heart would not stop beating.

So, what do you think?