End of day

New assignment

“I want to be a scientist! I had to see how the cat would react!”

Looking back, I see how weak I had been up to that point. After years of bracing myself for escalating tantrums, I still hadn’t built the emotional capacity to deal with a mutilated pet, and my 11-year-old refusing to hand me its tail.

I put on a calm face and asked him to get washed while I scraped the entrails off the sink. I had less than 15 minutes to dispose of the kitten, and I had to make sure he wouldn’t dig her up again. A winless battle, unless her remains were flushed down the toilet. Worth to try. Dinner was still pending. I’d manage.

Job induction

I always hoped I’d be the one to break the cycle in my family. For every time he beat me or I found her passed out over the sink, I knew my powerlessness was only temporary. My fantasies for an ideal family grew stronger, starring me in the role of the perfect, loving mother.

“What’s your dream job?”, would ask the teachers in third, fifth, eighth grade.

“I want to be a mum. No, THE best mum”, my first thought raced, burning to be spoken aloud.

“That’s cute sweetie, but that’s not a real job”, came their answers.

“Being a mum is a full-time job. Not! It’s two full-time jobs”, answered the voice from that detergent commercial which still played in my head, loud and clear. “It is the equivalent of two and a half full-time jobs”, added Dr. Something-Somethington from a talk show a couple of years later on.

Now, the living proof of my failure was leaving wet footprints on the carpet and shaking his hair, howling like a dog. The scent of soap and cleanliness scattered around the room; me-time was already over.

As they say in business

“So, how was school today?”

“You look different.”, he replied with a staggering adult voice.

My heart paused. His eyes pierced through me and for a moment I slipped into a fight-or-flight mode.

“School was fine. Dee brought a copy of Pet Sematary. We read a lot these days.”

“Beth’s mum called. They’re pressing charges.”

He laid back in his chair, an inappropriate smile forming on his lips. He chuckled at the astonishment on my face.

“Oh, they didn’t think this through now, did they?”

When did he learn to talk like that? “I need you to talk to me. I need you to.”

“Funny, because I need you all to shut up… I’ll figure something out.”

“You will…”

“They don’t have proof; they don’t monitor those corridors! She got what she deserved and now everything is in order. Ma, she knew what was coming. This one is on her. We’re good. She got what she deserved.”

He played with his food as if this were any normal conversation to have.

Past experience

When Max was proclaimed “untreatable” by the sixth best-in-his-field therapist in a row, I had long ago stopped sinking deeper in my despair. The words that once triggered cold waves of panic in my lungs now sounded more like white noise. Like dialogues in nightmares that repeat themselves until your brain can make sense of them and proceed with the storyline.

He showed symptoms of clinical depression, ADHD, BPD and an alphabet of “problematic behaviors”, combined with the innocent narcissism of children. They tried to refer me to a researcher, seeing there was nothing they could do other than turn Max into a lab rat.

We went through with it. Told Max we were sending him to summer camp. He was thrilled; it was impossible to believe he was merely putting on a show.

He returned almost a shell of his former self. During his recovery, he was manically asking to see a girl called Brittany. She would give him smuggled candy and assign him tasks on the daily. He showed me how he plucked and ate his pubic hair for her, how they sharpened pebbles together and used toothpicks to give themselves nosebleeds.

When I questioned the institute, they assured me it was all part of the process. Max and Brit were always supervised, as all kids were, by doctors assigned especially for the two of them. They wanted to see him again after the span of 15 years, to “better examine the development of his social skills”. Certainly, they estimated he’d end up in juvie way sooner than that.

End of day

“Where is my experiment?”

“Hm?”

“My cat.”

“Let the poor animal rest, sweetheart.”

A sudden thump on the table, followed by the roaring sound of glass and cutlery falling, froze my thoughts.

“My. Cat.”

Taunting. I’m still in control.

“MY. CAT.”

He stormed out the backdoor, in search for any sign of where I had buried her. It didn’t take him long to notice the grass was intact.

He returned with a leaking garbage bag and spilled its contents on the floor.

“You won’t find it. I FLUSHED those lumps of meat down the toilet. It’s over.”

He paused for what seemed like an eternity. First, one step. Then another. He approached the bathroom door with a newfound invisible force that stopped the flow of time around him.

The subtle sound of the door locking. I could barely keep my train of thought on track.

“He is going to hurt himself. Again. But if it means getting his way…”

The first slam on the door sounded rather timid. Again. Again. Again.

“His knuckles must be bleeding now.”

The single, rhythmical strikes evolved into a thunder of punches, kicks and possibly head-butts.

“If this is the only language he understands, I’ll make my message clear.”

I found my medium of choice with a quick look in the living room: his baseball bat. I landed my first hit as high as I could; the door was still holding strong, but I didn’t want to risk him getting more hurt.

A few more slams did the trick. He slowed down; I did not. I would not. Not until I could see his face through the cracks.

One more. One more to go.

One.

More.

And there he was. The last shred of wood gave in, welcoming my curiosity. It almost felt embarrassing peeking at my son like that, as if I were spying through the keyhole. He was motionless, standing in front of the mirror, hands on either side of the sink.

He was taking his time. I opened the door and headed back to the kitchen.

A terrifying thought crossed my mind: my job as a parent was still not done. But it would be.

As soon as I figured out how to quit.