Heartland

I was eleven years old when my mother was faced with the biggest decision of my life. Our shack that her new husband once promised would be her dream house had been falling apart since the day we moved in. It was not the weathered boards that held the house in place. It was my stepfather whose fury was that of a raging bull, forever seeing the vibrant shades of red.

He wore dark red pullover the night he cornered me. With a loud, reverberating voice that frightened me into my niche of the living room, he scolded my opinion of him as he fanned the ripped pages of my diary in his hand. The tiny broken lock that secured my most personal journal pages laid hammered apart on the coffee table just beneath my mother's solemn, thoughtful eyes. She had given me that diary for my birthday, and she encouraged me time and again to use it as a personal tool. Now, my mother said nothing. She did not intervene.

She glanced at my teary grief-stricken face, but then turned her head. She held the leash to the beast that taunted me. She knew it very well. All she had to do was give a tug and it would all be over. But the uproarious humility continued. I was forced into a place that I seldom liked to visit. It was a safe, imaginary place, with soothing colors and sounds. There were familiar faces and friendly animals to pet. But even in that place, he found me.

"Are you delirious?" he hollered as his fingers wrenched into my pink diary pages. His taut arms folded across his chest and I mustered the courage to look up at him. I found that he awaited an answer.