Bastards

“You bastard!” Father screamed. Son was staring at Father under that dim light. “You bastard!” Father screamed again. Son was trembling with fear seeing fury in his Father’s eyes. The wrath of slap landed on Son’s left cheek threw him, hitting hard to the kitchen wall.

“You have become a sin in my life! How could you do this to me!” Father screamed.

His tender heart suffered. He got up and ran through the drawing room, landing on the bed where his mother used to sleep. Crying. Hiccuping. Crying. Angry. Crying more. He couldn’t even curse because he did not even know how to.

Father poured another glass of whiskey. He did not have a count when he was angry. Count on his whiskey glasses nor the lashes on his son. He believed that world was far worse than he was. This gave him enough comfort to sleep every night. He slept with that same peace that night.

Father left to work early morning. His Son woke up with raging fever. His ten-year-old body couldn’t take the lashes which was a ritual of almost every day since his mother died. He walked to his room to find his Dog wagging its tail. He took the Dog into the garden to play fetch the stick. The Dog fetched but refused to give the stick. He tried to pull the stick from its teeth but Dog started to threaten him with low growl. He forced it more, dog did not give up. He pulled with such force that the Dog’s growl tuned to fury, landing a bleeding bite on his hand. The Dog went silent as soon as it heard a scream from him.

Son went mad and screamed, “You bastard!” at the Dog. “How could you do this to me!” He picked the stick and thrashed it with an innocent fury on Dog’s head. It gave a loud cry, and ran away. The Dog limped for a while and collapsed. Father came home late night. He found the Dog’s corpse on the porch and the stick in the grass. His blood flowed faster towards his hands and less to his head.

He banged the door open. Leaped to his Son’s room and screamed “You bastard!” But he did not find his Son there. “I should kill you now!” His mouth working faster than his mind. He found the Son on his mother’s bed. He hissed, “Bastard! Get up now”. He held his hand and turned his face up just to find it burning with fever, hand bleeding and his voice whispering to itself, “Bastard Dog.. Bastard Dog..”