A Broken Home

Many things I don't remember.I don't remember my first bicycle ride, or what my first word was, or the toys i used to play with. I don't remember many family vacations, or my first pet. Maybe I was to young. Or maybe I purposely blocked out a lot of memories. But the thing I do wish I could forget, still, and will always, is painted delicately on the rigid and scarred parts of my memory. How the man I once called my father, broke our home in two.

Dad starts yelling at Mom, Mom starts yelling back. The kids silently walk to their rooms. The hot tension literally thick enough to cut with a knife. Dad now starts to get really mad. Mom tells him on last time to leave. We watch as he storms out of the house, the door slams, a loud boom echoing threw out the house, signaling his absence.

When it turned dark i could here his truck. Creeping over the gavel, as quietly as possible. He was back. Mom would start by saying no. He says it's the last mime. My heart beats anxiously to hear what she says... but we already know the answer. She lets him back in. He promises the same thing as last time, and the times before that. That things are going to change. The slimy lie rolling right off his tongue.

I remember us kids not understanding. Why did she do it? Why did he always come back? Why couldn't he just leave for good? On a night just like every other, he did leave, and never came back to say sorry and make his dirty promises. Mom was the one to say it was the last time. She said no more. So dad moved far away. Far away from us.

I remember sometimes I would lay in the dark before sleep crept over. i would ask myself why dad left. I used to be sad about it. Until one night i closed my eyes really tight, squeezing the last of the sad tears out. And i prayed he would never come back. Yes, dad was gone, far away from us. But now the bad was gone, and the good had time to grow. And mom held our broken home together.