I avoid the school for the next few days, and since I was also avoiding Jason's(and one thousand percent not going back to the house), I was forced to come up with some pretty interesting ways to spend my time. After two days of close calls with the cops about my choice of day-time activity, I decided that a suicidal Jason was better than being brought to the house in a cop car again. It had only happened once, but it had triggered a change in Bruce.

After my mom had died, Bruce had actually mostly ignored me, only acknowledging me when I brought myself to his attention. For the first four years, his insane rages had been horrible, but impersonal. That had all changed the night I'd been stupid enough to get caught smoking in an alley behind the church downtown.

******

"Okay Jeanie, I got the name: Fletcher, Duncan. Says he's thirteen and lives with his step-dad."

The portly cop standing over me lifts his thumb from his radio and eyes me as he waits for an answer. Cuffed and terrified at his feet, I stare fixedly at his tail light, hating him for being a meddling dick, and hating myself for being a stupid, slow coward.

A garbled voice crackles over the radio, confirming the information, and the cop frowns down at me. "Thanks, Jean." I can feel him staring at me, and glance at him from the corner of my eye. Hands folded over his slightly protruding stomach, he sighs and shakes his head. I grit my teeth and return my gaze to the tail light.

"Alright, kid, I'll tell you what. I've already confiscated your pot and disposed of your paraphernalia-" he grinds his foot in the dusting remains of the one pipe I had, and my stomach clenches even tighter- "So I'm just gonna take you home and have a talk with your dad, okay? No need to file a report over something this small."

He reaches down and helps me to my feet, giving me a kind smile as he does so. I keep my face averted, afraid that he'll see the stark terror on my face and ask questions.

The cuffs come off and the cop puts me in the back of the car, puffing into his seat belt as he pulls away from the curb and flicks the lights off. He attempts small talk, but quits when I won't open my mouth. He tries to reassure me that he's just going to talk to Bruce: 'Your dad'll be mad, but not as mad as he would be if he had to come pick you up at the station'. I have to fight down the bile rising in my throat: Bruce is going to fucking kill me.

When we pull up to the house, the cop opens the door and escorts me to the front door, his hand firmly locked onto my upper arm. As he knocks, three solid thuds, I do my best to keep from trembling and stare at the worn-out mat we're standing on.

The door opens and light spills out. A wash of stale sweat and booze waft out, and I don't have to look up to know what's in the doorway: Bruce is in unwashed shorts and undershirt, the stubble on his chin and bleary eyes mute testament to his state of mind. The cop hesitates a moment, but recovers from Bruce's appearance and begins to speak. My ears are ringing so bad I can't make out the words, but I do recognize two different voices; Bruce is responding occasionally.

Before I truly register the conversation end, Bruce is wrapping his hand around my arm in a vice-like grip, and the cop is telling me to behave myself. Bruce waits until the cop is in his car and the engine has started before pulling me into the house. Slamming shut the door, he flings me away from him so that I stumble backwards, landing heavily on my back just inside the living room.

Almost before I can take a breath, Bruce is on top of me, his hands twisting into my shirt. "What the fuck are you doing, bringing cops to my house?!" he screams at me, lifting me and shaking so that my head flops on my neck. I can't take a breath big enough to speak with him sitting on my chest, and I'm starting to hyperventilate.

"You stupid little faggot!" Bruce screams, pinning my head in place with one hand still twisted in my collar, "You fucking useless bitch!" Bruce hits me full in the face and I cry out, which makes him hit me twice more.

He leans down and locks eyes with me: His pupils are huge, and I know I'm gonna die. He wraps a hand around my throat, tightly enough that I can feel how easily he could snap my neck, but loose enough that I can still breathe, if I work at it.

I struggle for air, tears streaming down my face, eyes held in his. Bruce puts his face even closer, and tells me, "You ever bring a cop to my house again, and I will kill you."

He gets to his feet, pushing on my throat as he does so, nearly crushing my windpipe. As I curl in on myself, coughing, he delivers a swift kick to my chest which knocks me into the end table. The lamp crashes to the floor, but Bruce ignores it.

"Do you fucking understand me?!" He roars, taking a step forward. I cough violently as he gets closer, trying desperately to suck in enough breath for words.

Bruce gets two steps closer before I can finally rasp out, "Yes! Yes! Please..." I'm cut off by another bout of coughing, and Bruce takes the last step, putting himself withing perfect kicking distance. "I won't! I swear-" I push myself away from him, knowing it's the wrong thing to do, but I'm too sacred for rational thought- "Never again! Please, I won't!"

I trail off with a whimper as Bruce closes the small distance I've managed and squats down. I can't move; I know I've made him madder by trying in the first place. There's no escape now.

"You better fucking not."

******

From then on, Bruce had taken a personal interest in my life, at least when he was clean. He demanded that I was home when I wasn't in school, so he could 'keep an eye on me', and made me tell him who I was hanging around with when I was in school. And when I was home, he piled work on me to 'keep me out of trouble' and 'make me into a man' (this last always said with a scoff).

At least once a day, he'd remind me how weak and pathetic I was, how much he hated me, or how useless or stupid I was. He mocked me when I'd cringe away from him, and he just loved to explain to me that I didn't have friends because I was a worthless piece of shit. After two years, I had almost started to believe him, even as my resentment at his unfair treatment of me grew.

I started fighting back when I got picked on at school, and I discovered that even though I wasn't as big or 'built' as the other guys, I could take a punch better than any of them. Since I had endured Bruce's beatings for four years, the other boy's punches were like nothing to me. My punches, on the other hand, were far more effective, since these kids had mostly never been hit.

Detention became an almost weekly occurrence for a while, and I soon discovered that even though it pissed Bruce off and gave him a reason to scream at me, it gained me some kind of twisted respect in his eyes, and I didn't get hit for it.

I started picking fights just to get an extra hour away from Bruce, but after a few months, the school called Bruce, and I came home one day to the threat of a beating from a 'sober' Bruce. I quit starting shit at school real fast.

I still got picked on, but by the time Bruce threatened to flay me alive if I didn't toe the line, I'd been won enough fights that people were wary of fighting me. I started using my mouth to defend myself, resorting to my fists only when it didn't work.My mouth did get me into a few fights, but I could usually talk my way out of a detention by proving the other kid hit me first: Even though no one really liked me, some of the other guys that got picked on and a couple girls who felt sorry enough for me would occasionally come to my defense.

But even those kids weren't my friends. Sympathy and pity were two things that I couldn't stand; I had learned thoroughly from Bruce that weakness was to be despised and stomped out. For years, I had kept myself distanced from everyone I encountered. Kids hated me because I was a jerk, teachers didn't like me because I wouldn't come to class. The only person who didn't seem to mind having me around was Jason, who I'd met about a half a year after the whole cop incident.