Freeze

It was dead winter. Snow everywhere. White as far as the eyes could see. But my mother would still get up at 4 am every morning to walk 13 miles to work in 11 degree weather. Just to support the family. That’s me, Janey (my little sister), and my so-called father. I don’t think he’s worth that title though. He’s never here unless he’s out of money for booze. He comes home at about 9pm when my mom’s ready to go to sleep after her hard day at work. When my father comes home he bats my mother around, then moves on to me (I’ve had 3 broken arms and 2 broken legs, I’m only 14). He’d take her money (leaving us barely anything to survive), then leave to town and stay there for weeks in the gutters near a bar. And he still expects me to respect him. Janey is only 4½ and is witness to all of this and sometimes even gets a pop herself every once in a while. At least I’m old enough to understand that awful people like him exist in this world. She deserves better. She’s only 4½. Well, now that you know about my daily life, I guess I can tell you what made this winter so different. One night, when dad came home, he and mom were having their usual rounds.
“YOU STUPID WORTHLESS PIECE OF GARBAGE! YOU’RE NOT GOOD FOR ANYTHING!”
>SMACK<
“WHY DID I EVEN MARRY A BRAINLESS IDIOT LIKE YOU IN THE FIRST PLACE! YOU CAN’T DO ANYTHING RIGHT!”
>SMACK<
“Where’s the money, Sherry? WHERE’S THE MONEY!”
“It’s in my wallet. But the kids need the money this week for clothes. Please.”
“Are you refusing me?” He takes off his belt and whips her over and over.
“Get off her.”
“Did you just say something, boy?”
“Don’t hit her.”
“Are you telling ME what to do?”
“I’m telling you not to hit her.”
“Alright, son. I had enough of you!”
He punches me and I fall to the floor. He hit me with his belt about 20 time. It felt at least 100 though. After that, he grabbed my mother’s wallet took all the money and left to town. Later that night, we all went to bed as is nothing had happened. Just like every other time he comes home. My mother was a little more jittery than usual, but nothing to concern myself with. When I woke up it was totally different from how I usually wake up.
>CRACK<
I get up and grab my coat, boots, and gun. As soon as I look out the window I see my mother’s body lying in the ground in front of a tree with a rope tied to her neck and tree branch. She hung herself and was too much for the tree to support. Kinda like how her life was too much for her to support. The both just snapped. Like I said earlier, this was totally different from how I usually wake up. The first thing I had thought was to keep this from Janey. I truly don’t want her to see this. She’ll be devastated. She has a bad enough life as it is. How will I hide this? How will I explain that mommy’s too selfish to consider us. Too selfish to even think about leaving us with father. They were the reason I never ran away. They needed me to take care of them. Janey and I needed her to take care of us. So, now what? I can’t get a job. What would Janey do all by herself at home? I need to be able to take care of her. I can’t take her w/ me. That’s a 13 mile walk every morning in the freezing cold. I couldn’t do that to her. Thanks mother. So nice of you to think of us, even in death. I’ll figure out something. I have about 20$ I stole from father when he passed out a few months ago. I have enough bullets to last us the winter. Once it clears, Janey and I will go to town and sell our mom’s stuff, and leave to the city. But, how to get rid of the body for now? Janey can’t see this. I’ll have to bury her somewhere before she wakes up.
“Hey, Scott. What are you doing out there in your pajamas? Who’s laying down in the snow?” Please don’t see this!
“Never mind that! Go back inside, you’ll get sick.”
“So will you. So, I can come out too.”
“I told you to go in.”
”No. Who is that?” She walks over to mother’s body.
“Mama? Is this mama? Why is she sleeping out here? It’s freezing. She’ll get sick.”
“Janey, she’s not gonna wake up.”
“Why not? Is she mad at us?”
“No. She just can’t.”
Tears fill both our eyes. But for two different reasons. Janey kneels at her mother’s side.
“Wake up mama. Wake up. You have to get to work!”
“Janey, she can’t hear you. Come on. We need to go in. We’ll get sick”
“Alright.”
She understood what I was telling her. We go inside. I take a shower and get dressed and so does she. Later, I bury mother. Janey was crying her eyes out. She could barely see. It was freezing to both of us, but we didn’t care. We forgot about it after a while. After about an hour, we headed inside. I had to regain the feeling in my toes and Janey was sneezing and wiping her nose already. I told her she wasn’t to go outside for the rest of the day. I went hunting and got us dinner. I had to make Janey some soup since she wasn’t getting any better. The next few days she got worse. She had a terrible fever and couldn’t stop shivering. Her temperatures kept on going from fiery hot to icy cold. I didn’t know what to do other than keep her bundled up and make sure the heat was on at all times. She got worse and worse. I decided that I had to make a trip to town and get a doctor. So, I grabbed my gun to sell it to pay the doctor, and told Janey where I was going. I came back in a few hours along with the doctor. He examined her and pulled me aside for the results.
“I’m sorry Scott. There’s nothing I can do. She has the flu, but her body can’t defend against the virus because the part of her brain that tells her body to defend against it wasn’t fully formed. There was a slight accident to you mother when she was carrying Janey. So, now she can’t defend against certain viruses that get into her system. She doesn’t have long to live.” I paid the doctor and told him to leave.
“So, when am I going to get better?” Janey asked. I didn’t want to lie to her, but I know I couldn’t tell her the truth. I couldn’t tell her that she’s going to die soon. That because of our cruel father hitting out spineless mother when she was carrying her that she can’t get better. I can’t tell her that.
“You’ll be better in a matter of days. Just rest and drink a lot of fluids.” The next day, after dinner, I told her to take a nap. She was out like a light. I knew she’d be asleep all night, so I turned in myself. The next morning I got up, went about my day as usual. But at about noon I knew she was dead. She never woke up. I tried to tell myself she was just really tired, she’d be up soon. But I knew what had happened. I went out to the backyard, and placed where I knew Janey would like to be, with her mother.
I knew my dad would be getting back soon, looking for money, looking for someone to beat on. I wasn’t going to stay around. I still had about a 30$ from selling my gun, and I took some of our antiques and jewelry mom had hidden from dad, to sell in the city. I packed a few pairs of clothes, a picture of mother and Janey, and split. I left for the city and never looked back.