Tar

The way my dogs look when they creep so carefully into my bedroom, paws touching the echoey floor so painfully lightly to not be heard, that almost breaks my heart more than the profanities I have no choice but to listen to. My parents lost the respect to care what their child hears through these paper walls a long time ago. I crouch down, taking their fluffy, taught figures into my arms, and together on the carpet, I rock the two of them back and forth, letting my tears roll into their softness.

I had a good childhood, I remind myself, as the glistening memory of those two parents who loved each other grows that little bit weaker. I feel like a piece of straw, whose tiny fibres have been stripped and stripped away for so long, the moisture so dried out of me, that if I let myself get even that tiny bit closer to the chaos in that lounge room, I will surely catch alight, burn, and then that will be the end of me. I bury my face deeper into their soft fur, even as one tries to lick the salty wetness from my eyes.

"Ill call the police! Get in here! I need a witness!"

I can’t help but physically flinch. I know she’s calling out to me. I always get pulled back into the middle of it on the really bad nights. I bury my face deeper into the dog’s soft bodies and grind together my teeth, knowing even though she’s the one screaming it, its almost him that needs the physical protection more than her.

I’ve gotten involved too many times before. I’ve lost count how many heart-ripping encounters it’s taken for me to learn its better just to stay within the safety of my bedroom’s four walls.

It always goes the same way. I close my dogs in my room. I step between them. Physical attacks turn back to verbal ones, but they’re now directed at me. I take them on, headfirst, trying with everything in me to draw rationale and logic from the obscenities, and explain it back to them. I know their words come from a place of pain. I remind myself that as I build up the courage to scream back. What else can I do when they take my use of a calm voice as condescending? I hear the wails of my dogs, now scratching at my bedroom door. I try. I try so hard to break through this snowball of gunk they’ve created, even when I know its no use. It’s tar-like, thickening around their marriage so ferociously over so many years, that if you wanted to remove it, you wouldn’t succeed unless you used to a multitude of damaging chemicals. A ripping-off of a Band-Aid. A divorce. But they never do. They’ve resigned to always pick at the tar, to convince themselves they want to stay together, and to struggle beneath the tar’s restrictive casings, even add more layers to it, and then pick at it more. They never choose the thorough chemical option to do what it takes to break free. No. The tar blinds them. They don’t even see what the outside world looks like anymore, because they’ve convinced themselves if they pretty up the inside of their prison enough when they’re playing happy family with one another, it wont feel like a prison anymore. But it still is.

I stand just outside this tar. I see into it, more than I'd like to, and I also see the rest of the world evolving, full of opportunities, of happiness, of possible better lives for both of them. I can’t tear the tar off them as much as I want to, but I can’t bring myself to step too far away from it either. I love them. I'll always love them, and I fear for what they'll do to each other if I let myself get too far away. I also can’t bring myself to leave my dogs in there. Blissfully unaware of the complexities in that household, they love my parents so incredibly much, but they’re also smart enough to know when its time to crawl to the refuge of my bedroom.

Instead of interfering, I try to just stay in that bedroom most times. I cuddle my dogs. I put headphones in. I study and fill my mind with too much other information that it crowds out what skin-crawling language I’ve had to listen to. I go to bed, sometimes I cry, but not as often anymore, and then I wait for the morning when the apology comes knocking at my door. The explanation that this is painful, but they think they’re making progress! I internally roll my eyes, but not externally. Externally I smile back, play into it, because seeing them at least have the reprieve of playing happy families for a few hours the next day is better than not seeing them happy any time at all.

I wonder what life in this family will be like when I’m older. When I one day get to do my father-daughter-dance. When I have my own marriage, and I try to keep our relationship as far from the tar as possible.

And then a plate smashes in the kitchen. I'm jolted back to right now. Another sound. Maybe a hole in the wall? There’s been plenty of them patched up in this otherwise 'beautiful' home. Good thing my dad’s a tradesman. Wouldn’t want anyone else seeing what lays beneath the surface. Beneath the masks we all wear in public.

My resolve that its best to stay out of it gets tested. I think, maybe if just this one time I say the right thing, strike the right chord with my words, it might make a difference. I put away the headphones, swallow down the voice of reason who knows how this goes far too well and decide to open my door.

We scream. We cry. All feels lost. They threaten to leave, which I internally hope they will do, and then nothing. I’ve exerted all the energy in me, physical and emotional, and its lead to nothing. Same as always. I return to my room, scolding myself for having hope that this might be the night things change. Things never change. They’re too deep in to escape. The tar is too thick. I close my eyes and wait for the cycle to continue. The morning apology is on its way.