Fear of Falling

it’s just me feeling this pull, and I’ll leave you alone.”
    Kami stepped in closer, if that was possible, and met my determined gaze with a steely one of her own. “You’re wrong, Blaine. I don’t feel a damn thing. I never do.”
    She eased back and spun on her heel, retreating into the back room. I was still standing behind the bar, shell-shocked and speechless when she reappeared with her things. She made her way over to her friends who had waited for her at one of the tables, still celebrating their newly acquired weekly gig at Dive.
    She never even looked back as she slid through those double doors. But I had seen this before. I had experienced her reaction when she was backed into a corner by truth’s unrelenting glare. Kami was running. But I’d be damned if I let her get away.

I didn’t speak until I was 5. It wasn’t that I didn’t know how, I was just afraid of what my words would trigger. My mother was often slapped and punched in the face whenever she spoke. Even before I even knew what her words meant, I knew the consequences of speaking. I didn’t want to meet the same fate, though I knew it was inevitable. Silence wouldn’t be able to spare me for much longer.
    My father wasn’t stupid. He knew that bruises fueled questions, and questions warranted explanations. So as much as he hated me, as much as my very existence disgusted him, he usually refrained from leaving physical scars. Instead, he chose to etch them into my young, fragile psyche. Those scars would never heal. They followed me like a bad omen, marring every relationship I had attempted since. Those scars were the security blanket that crippled my emotional growth, leaving me lost, alone, and tragically afraid. I clung to them, letting the scar tissue form a wall around my heart. They held the pain inside, so it wouldn’t completely devour me.
    There was a coat closet he liked. I remember that closet because it never held any garments. The only thing I ever saw strung up in it was my mother, her hands bound by rope above her head, naked and hysterical, as he had his way with her. I remember how he would laugh at her tears, how he found her weakness arousing. The things he did to her, his young daughter just feet away, were unimaginable. Except to me. I had the displeasure of witnessing every unspeakable act, bound by my own terror and unable to run and hide. That was what it felt like to be frozen with fear. How it gripped every muscle and joint, stripping all mobility and forcing you to live through your worst nightmares with eyes wide open. I knew that feeling well. I lived with it every single damn day as a child.
    Sometimes when he was feeling playful, he would pour a bucket of ice water over her naked frame as she struggled to get free from her restraints. Then he’d grab a curling iron, the toaster, anything that could be plugged into an electrical socket, and threaten to throw it at her feet while she stood in a puddle. He’d bring the electrical device as close as he could to her, getting off on her bloodcurdling screams, laughing at her wide, horrified eyes.
    Seeing her so broken down and pleading for her life revealed something to me. It showed me what true desperation looked like.
    My introduction to the closet fortunately was more merciful, though not by much. On nights when he was overcome with drugs, alcohol, and his own sickening thirst for our tears, he would lock me in that dark closet. The light switch was on the other side of the door where I could hear my mother’s cries, pleading for him to let me out. Hearing her child wail in the dark, my little fists pounding the door until they were raw and bruised, tore her in two. But part of me was relieved. He would have his fun with me, my tiny whimpers sating his sickening need until his chemical high plummeted him into a coma-like sleep. She would be safe for the night.

    “Ok, spill it. And don’t say there isn’t shit to spill.”
    I rolled over Saturday morning to both Angel and Dom lying on my bed, wearing their nosey-as-hell, shit-eating grins. I was pretty sure why, but I decided to feign ignorance anyway. Damn, I wish I could lock my bedroom door. It was way too early to submit to an interrogation.
    “What are you talking about?” I asked with a yawn.
    Angel rolled her eyes before scooting me over and folding herself around my body. Dom was close behind her, hopping over our bodies and easing down on my other side. He was snatching one of my