Trust Issues Chapter 3

Number one was my father, and my brothers. Number two fathered my sister. Number three was an angry man who targeted me, most likely from the moment he came into our lives. I newly a teenager, tall and athletic. I played basketball a few days a week at the rec center with girls I'd grown up with. My mother had begun working outside of home, which is how Number Three got in. He stuck to my mother like lint until his secret destroyed him and freed me. 

We moved from a duplex in town to a ranch closer to the countryside. We had a large backyard, a pool, playset and an awesome couple next door for us to socialize with. In town, the neighbors in the duplex had a teenage daughter who was always being arrested. One time a kid with a robotic arm lived there, and another time a family so quiet that were forgot they existed. As an adult, they're the ideal neighbors. As a child, I didn't realize that silence could be fatal.

I was moved from the main floor of our ranch home to the basement. A cement slab, washer, dryer and exercise equipment. My mother used the stepper and treadmill as forms of punishment. She'd barge into my open floor "bedroom" and thrash around, throwing things from the bookshelf beside my basic bed. She eventually pushed the bookshelf from the wall onto the floor, breaking every sensitive and valuable item to pieces on the cold basement floor. She would scream at me to clean the mess up, then pull me away to get on the Stepping Machine until my legs gave out. Then came the name calling, the obvious acknowledgement of my being a failure, as I lay limp on the floor. 

I rarely missed school back then. School was the safe place. It was home I feared.