In The Storm

December 19th — 2010

Archie:

I don’t tell anyone where I’m going.

I’m up and out the door before Dicky or Evie get up, before anyone can corner me with a question that means either lying or telling the truth.

Evie’s asleep in my bed, on her side, half buried in the duvet, hair everywhere, one hand tucked under her face. She’s got a crease between her brows even when she’s out cold, like she’s arguing in her sleep.

My chest goes all tight. That seems to be something that happens every time I look at her. Which is a lot since she barely leaves my side these days.

Not that I’m complaining. I’m not. If anything, I’ve got used to it—her in my space, her things mixed in with mine, her voice in the background when I’m doing nothing in particular.

I fucking love having her near me. I mean, I don’t know how healthy that is and I don’t particularly care either. I watch her for another second, then I drag a hand over the back of my neck, shut the door quietly behind me, and leave before I talk myself out of it.

It's two hours to the house. I've done it more times than I can count. I've driven it in every state—tired, relieved, dreading it, resigned to it.

I've never driven it like this before.

Because the dread weighing heavily on me since the car park on Wednesday has not fucking eased. I thought it might. I thought sleep would take the edge off it, or time, or Evie's voice last night carefully not saying the things she was thinking. She’s worried and she’s scared and it’s because of that fucking bastard who can’t leave things alone.

But I woke up at five this morning with the heaviness still there, and I lay in the dark for twenty minutes before I accepted that there was only one thing that was going to get rid of it.

I have to go home. I have to look him in the eye and tell him to his face that this shit stops right now. Whether that changes anything is a question I can't answer yet. My father has never once in his life done what someone asked him to do, especially not when that someone is me, especially not in his own house.

But I'm going anyway.

Because he has Paddy's name now. He has Evie's background stored away somewhere in that meticulous, psychotic fucking head of his. I can’t just sit around and wait until he breaks her out of some sicko need to be in control all the time.

My love for her can’t be the thing that fucks her up.

I turn down When The Sun Goes Down by Artic Monkeys when I reach our street. The iron-wrought gates are open as I pull up. The house sits at the end of the drive, looming over everything the way that flash prick likes it. All pale stone, large windows.

It screams, look at me! Look how rich I am!

I park the car and sit there staring at the place. A nervous sort of anticipation settling over me. Gripping the steering wheel, I take two calming breaths before I get out.

I’ve got to do this.

I can’t bottle it.

She needs me to do this.

My feet crunch on the gravel as I force myself forward, punching my key in the door with more force than necessary, before pushing inside. I don’t even know if they’re in, but it’s early enough on a Saturday that they should be.

The last thing I expect is Molly coming down the stairs in her blue spotted pyjamas, brown hair pulled back, tiptoeing like she’s trying to get through the house without anyone knowing she’s up. Which means it’s been one of those weeks.

She stops when she sees me, one hand on the banister, her face crumples as soon as our eyes catch. The guilt hits me immediately.

Fuck.

I should have called more.

“Arch,” She whispers, eyes checking the hallway behind her, something we both learnt to do before we learnt anything else in this house. “What are you doing here?”

I cross to her, checking her over. My footsteps echo on the marble. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine.” She mutters quickly. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to see him.”

She must sense the anger on me because her eyes go wide in panic. “Don’t. Archie. He lost some deal on Monday, he’s been in a foul mood all week—worse than usual.”

I clench my jaw. “So you’re not fine?”

“I’m doing okay.” She pulls her sleeve over her hand, her tell for when she’s uncomfortable. “I’ve kept out of his way mostly. But he’s really gone after Mum this week.”

“Is it bad?”

“She hasn’t come out of her room since Tuesday.” She nods, quietly relieved to tell me. I’m a useless prick, I really am. “He had a go at her about the Hendersons dinner. Said she’d embarrassed him in front of people.” She looks down at her feet. “He hit her when they got home. She’s been crying on and off ever since.”

Nothing new, then.

Same old shit, same awful house.

“You should have called me,” I tell her, meaning it. I’d come home anytime and on any day if she needed me.

She looks up. “And what would I have said? You’re at university, Arch. You’re supposed to be there.”

“I don’t care about—”

“I know you don’t.” She furiously whispers, eyes searching my face. “I’m not your responsibility. You have a life to live. And I’ll be going to uni soon. If I bothered you every time he lost his cool I’d never be off the flipping phone.” She takes a breath. “What are you actually here for, Arch?”

“I came to see him,” I say again. “He’s been fucking around with Evie’s life. Offered her brother some job, apparently. Even though her brother has been a builder for years. There’s no reason for him to do that except to fuck with me.”

The colour drains from her face. “I didn’t know. I would have—”

I raise a hand to rub her shoulder, dipping my head to get a good look in her eyes. “Don’t do that. There’s nothing you could have done.”

“I would have warned you.”

Shaking my head, I give her shoulder a squeeze. “You probably would never have known.”

She steps down the last stair and plants herself directly in front of me, both hands on my arm. “It’s a bad idea, Arch. He’s been looking for a fight all week. That’s probably exactly why he did it, because he knew you’d come home and he’d get one.”

“Yeah, well.” I move toward the hall. “He got what he was looking for then.”

“Arch.” She grabs my arm harder. “Please.” Her voice breaks. “Remember what he did with the iron poker? You remember how bad that week was? He’s worse this week. He’s looking for an excuse.”

I look at the hand gripping my arm and the fear in her face and I think about an iron poker. Then I think about a girl asleep in my bed, and I think about Paddy O’Doyle getting into a car last Wednesday smiling like a man who has no idea what’s coming for him.

“I remember,” I say quietly.

“Then leave him alone.”

“I have to do this, Mol.”

“You don’t—”

“He went after her.” I grind out. “He is actively going after her and I can’t be that person. I can’t be the person who lets him do whatever he wants to whoever he wants and just accepts it because that’s how it’s always been.”

Molly looks like she might cry. “This isn’t going to end well, Archie. It will backfire on you.”

“But at least I’ll know I tried.”

She holds on for another second, weighing if she wants to argue more. Then she lets go with a dejected sigh. “He’s already up. He’s in his study.”

I turn around and head down the hall.

"You know what happens when you try and put your foot down,” she calls after me.

Yeah, I usually get the shit kicked out of me.

As I walk through, I realise the house hasn’t changed at all. It’s the same as it’s always been: high ceilings, polished floors, everything immaculate, echoing and totally fucking clinical.

There’s no warmth in it.

Frankly, there never has been.

The place is so clean and pristine I’ve, more than once, had the passing thought of offing myself in the living room just so I could leave my mark.

There are fresh flowers on the small round table by the stairs. That’s also the same. Mum’s ordered white flowers every week for as long as I can remember. Because he likes white flowers.

Her favourite flowers are pink roses and I’ve only ever seen them in this house once.

I must’ve been about eight. I picked one from the garden and brought it inside, all proud of myself, as if I’d done something good and it would make mum smile.

He lost his fucking mind.

Honestly, you’d think I’d dragged a dead rat inside. He started shouting. Slamming doors. Going on about how the house looked like a “cheap florist” and how she was trying to embarrass him. I remember the way Mum stood there, holding the rose like it had burned her, glaring at me as if I was deliberately trying to ruin her day.

I never did it again.

The study is at the end of the hall. The door is this expensive dark oak, which is never open. The rule in this house, unspoken and absolute: you knock and you wait. You don’t open the door until invited. You don’t arrive without warning or without permission. You make yourself small and you wait to be seen.

I knock once. And walk straight in without waiting.

Fuck him.

He's at the desk. Wearing what he likes to call his. ‘weekend shirt’, which loosely translates to a shirt he won’t wear out of the house.

The pompous prick.

He looks up when I walk in, unimpressed by interruption. If he’s surprised to see me he doesn’t show it. "Archie." He takes his glasses off and sets them on the desk. "I wasn't expecting you."

“Were you not?”

“No.” His eyes dart past me. "Close the door, will you?”

I close it and turn back to face him, standing near the door with my hands loose at my sides. I look at him and I can hear my own heartbeat pound in my ears. It’s fucking embarrassing but I rehearsed what to say on the way here.

“We need to talk,” my voice very calm for how nervous I am.

Dad leans back in his chair. “Do we?”

“Yes.” My hands twitch.

“About what?”

"Paddy O'Doyle."

He holds my gaze. "What about him?"

"Whatever you've offered him—whatever job, whatever opportunity, whatever you've told him—you need to withdraw it."

“Hm.” He crosses one leg over the other, pressing a finger to his lips, his cold gaze stares back at me. "Does he know you're here making this request on his behalf?"

"It's not a request."

Dad visibly bristles at that. "Sit down, Archie."

"I'm fine standing."

"Sit. Down." The authority in his voice has me reacting the same way I have my entire life.

I sit.

He assess me for a moment. “You’re here about the girl?”

"Her name is Evie."

"I know what her name is." He drawls in a bored voice. "I know a great deal about her, as it happens."

"Then you know she's done nothing wrong."

"I know she's from the Pembury estate." He pauses. "I know her mother has a significant psychiatric history. I know her father has eight counts of assault on his record. I know her brother has spent the better part of the last four years addicted to class A drugs, and that he has, on at least three occasions, been complicit in their distribution." He tilts his head slightly. "Shall I continue?"

"You had her investigated." I reply deadpan, though my heart seems to be picking up speed with each second. "You had a teenager you don’t know investigated. Purely because she’s dating your son?”

"I looked into the background of someone who has inserted herself into my son's life, yes." The way he says it, like it’s a normal thing to do. The fucking nut job. "Which is what I do. Which is what any responsible—"

"She hasn't inserted herself into anything. She's my girlfriend. I chose her."

"You chose her," he repeats, brow furrowing. If I were stupider he’d almost seem concerned. "Yes. That's what bothers me."

We look alike and I’ve always hated it. I don’t want to see myself in him. But we have the same eyes, the same jaw, same skin tone.

"Withdraw the offer to Paddy," I demand, keeping my voice level. "That's all I'm asking. Leave him alone. Leave her alone. Whatever you're planning—"

"I'm not planning anything." He picks up his pen. Turns it between his fingers, never looking away from me. "I offered a young man a job. A well-paid job, with prospects, which is more than he's likely to find elsewhere given his history. If you'd like to argue that I've done something harmful, I'm afraid you'll have trouble making that case."

"You know exactly what you're doing."

"I know exactly what I'm doing," he agrees pleasantly. "I'm trying to help a young man who clearly needs direction. What I'm also doing is giving you the opportunity to make a sensible decision before this goes any further." He sets the pen down. Folds his hands. "End it with the girl."

"No," my hands ball into fists on my thighs.

"Archie—"

"No." I glare at him, trying not to squirm under his intense stare. "That's not happening. Not because you decide it should. Not because of an image or a family name or any of the rest of it. No."

Something moves in his face that I don’t fully understand. I’ve never been fully able to read him, even after nineteen years. He uncrosses his legs. "I don’t like that answer.”

"I don’t give a fuck."

“Language.”

I almost laugh. Twenty years of this man slapping me about as he calls me a worthless cunt, and he’s going to pull me up on language?

“I mean it. I don’t give a fuck,” I say it slowly, making sure he can hear it. “About your answer, about your opinion, about any of it. She’s staying. Whatever you’re planning with Paddy, it isn’t happening. Withdraw the offer.”

“Break it off with her first.”

“Get real, dad.”

Slowly he gets to his feet before he comes around the desk and I fight not to shrink back from him. “Let me explain something to you,” he says, stopping a few feet away, hands clasped behind his back. His voice is so level it’s almost gentle. “I have never asked anything of you that wasn’t entirely reasonable. I gave you the best school in the country. I gave you Oxford. I’ve given you a life that most people would trade anything for.” His jaw ticks, a sign that he’s pissed. “All I have ever asked in return is that you conduct yourself in a way that reflects well on this family. That’s it. That’s the entirety of my expectation.”

I glare up at him. “What is your point?”

"I don’t think you’re aware of the conversations that will happen, the questions that will be asked, about what people will say when—"

"I don't care what people say."

"I know you don't." He clicks his tongue. "That has always been your problem. You've never understood that what people say is everything." He brings his hands forward, pushing his palms to the ceiling. "Your grandfather built this company on reputation. I have maintained and grown it on reputation. Everything we have, everything you have, sits on the foundation of what people believe about this family." His lip curls slightly. “And you want to inject a girl from a council estate with a scumbag family into our lives?” Dad takes a step forward. “I won’t allow it, Archie. You will not tarnish this family’s name.”

I spread my hands out. “I am not breaking up with her. It won’t happen.”

He levels me with a look that makes my spine straighten. “You are not remaining with a girl whose mother has spent time in a fucking nuthouse.”

A what?

A mental hospital? Who spent time in one? Evie’s mother? She’s never told me that. How could she not have told me that. When? How long for? I hate how much she has to carry. How much I still don’t know about her. I hate even more that he knows things I don’t.

I try not to show my shock but he notices and smirks. “She never told you? Evie’s mother has spent time in Maudsley. On multiple occasions. I wonder how far the apple falls from the tree? Hm?”

"Watch what you say next," I warn. That base level anger I always feel is just beneath the surface. I could knock his jaw square off, but it wouldn’t help. He would only retaliate harder.

“I don’t think you’re in a position to threaten me, Archie.”

“I wasn’t threatening you. I was warning you.”

He cocks his head. "Are you aware that the girl you're throwing everything away for," his voice is laced with careful venom, "is a dirty council estate tart who is no better than the psychotic whore she came out of?”

I see red.

I'm on my feet before I know I've stood up. The chair scrapes back. He's coming towards me too, already anticipating it, but I'm faster. I'm across the room, and my hands are in the front of his shirt, shoving him back.

"Archie—"

I hit him. It's not the same as when I hit someone in the boxing gym. It's something far more explosive. He falls back into the bookcase and for the first time in my life, the bane of my fucking existence, looks shocked.

He straightens and takes a step towards me. “You little—”

“Cunt?” I supply for him. “Language.”

The mask slips and the man I know comes out. He rushes at me. Faster than a man his age has any right to move, but I’ve always made the mistake of forgetting what he actually is beneath the composure: a deranged degenerate.

He’s strong. He’s always been strong. And he’s angry now, truly fucking seething with me. He drives into me with his shoulder and the impact knocks the air out of my chest. I catch myself on the edge of the desk but he’s already got a hand in my jumper turning me, using my own momentum to slam me into the floor.

My shoulder takes the impact and before I can get my bearings his knee drives into my chest and his weight settles on top of me as his hands close around my throat.

I get my hands up, both of them, fingers wrapping around his wrists, tugging at him, but he doesn’t move. I’m on my back with forty pounds of pure fury straddling me to keep me in place.

“You hit me,” he calmly informs me, as if he isn’t currently strangling me. “In my house.”

I pull at his wrist again as it becomes increasingly hard to breathe, my legs kick underneath him but they do nothing.

Useless things.

“You came into my house,” he continues, over me, hands getting tighter, “uninvited, and you put your hands on me.” His face starts to sneer a bit. “So now you’re going to lie there and you’re going to listen to me.”

I can breathe. I can breathe, it’s not—I’m fine.

My heart is going very fast and the room is starting to blur a little. “Let go,” I strangle out.

“When I’m finished.”

“Let go of me—”

“I said when I’m finished.” He looks at me with those blue eyes that are the same as mine, and there is nothing behind them. Nothing warm, nothing frightened, nothing that resembles any feeling I can name. “You think that girl is worth this? You think she’s worth coming into my house and making this kind of scene?” His grip tightens again and the pain in my chest get worse. “She is nothing, Archie. She is a temporary distraction from a council estate who has made you stupid and emotional. If you cannot see that then you are less intelligent than I believed.”

I get my hands under his wrist and push with everything I have, it does fuck all.

Weak. I am so fucking weak against him.

“You will end it,” he demands, his voice deepening. “You will end it and you will withdraw from whatever arrangement you’ve made with her. You will come back to this family and you will behave correctly. That is what is going to happen.” He leans forward slightly, putting more of his weight behind his hands, and the room nearly goes black. “Because the alternative is that I make her life considerably more difficult than it currently is. Her brother. Her place at Oxford. Her mother, who is one phone call away from another stay somewhere with locked doors. Do you understand me?”

I can’t answer.

I can’t breathe.

I can’t think.

He’s going to kill me. This is where it ends. At least it’s happening knowing I was trying to protect Evie. There isn’t really a better way to go, is there?An insane part of me starts to think; it’s kind of ironic, isn’t it? That I’m a rugby player and I box, yet I still can’t take on my biggest bully.

Refusing to give up, I continue to fight against him. Somewhere behind the roaring in my ears I think I hear—

“LEAVE HIM ALONE!” Molly screams before she hits him from the side with everything she has, both hands on his arm, her full weight behind it.

It’s not enough to move him on its own but it breaks his concentration and his grip loosens. I drag in a breath that scrapes all the way down.

“Get off him!” She tries to shove him off. “Get off him get off him get OFF—”

“Molly,” Dad grunts, reaching for her.

“Don’t touch me!” She screams as she pushes at his shoulder. He catches her wrist. She yanks it free. “Don’t you dare touch me, don’t you—”

“Mol.” My voice comes out thick and raspy, pain grinding through my throat. “Mol, stop—”

“Let him up.” She’s standing over me, between us, shaking from head to foot, face completely white, eyes streaming. Looking at our father with pure hatred. “Let him up right now! I will call the police! I will tell everyone—”

The mad bastard rolls his eyes at her. I fight to get my breath back, preparing myself for another attack. Suprsing the shit out of me, he stands. Smoothing that stupid fucking shirt as he does. He moves around to the desk, picks up his pen, and sits down.

Molly drops to her knees beside me. “Are you okay?” Her hands are on my face, checking, tilting my head. “Arch. Look at me. Are you okay?”

I’m okay. I’m fine. My throat feels like someone has dragged something rough through it and my shoulder is wrong, but I’m fine.

“Yeah.” It’s too deep and too strangled. I bark a cough. “I’m alright.”

Holy shit.

“Your throat—”

“I’m alright, Mol.”

She looks at me for a long moment. Then she looks up at him. “What is wrong with you?”

“Me?” Dad asks, flipping the pen. He waves a hand in my direction. “He’s the one causing all the issues.”

“He’s your son,” Molly cries, her whole body is trembling. “He’s your son and you had your hand around his throat.”

“He came into my house and struck me.”

“Because of what you said!”

“Molly.” His voice drops into the register that has always, always worked on both of us.

“What you said was disgusting,” she hisses. Apparently it doesn’t work on her anymore, it certainly has the same effect on me. “About that girl. What you said was gross and you know it.”

“What I said was true.”

“You can’t—”

“Molly.” He sets the pen down. Openly glaring now. “That’s enough.”

“It’s not enough.” She cries out. “It’s never enough. Nothing is ever enough in this house, we just—we just keep—” she breaks off, pressing her lips together. “He’s your son.”

“Not for much longer if he carries on the way has been.” He picks the pen back up, turning his attention back to the papers on his desk. “Help your brother up. And then go to your room.”

Molly glares at him but he doesn’t both to look back. She turns toward me. I shake my head slightly. Don’t. Not worth it. Not today. She nods before she bends to help me up. Once I’m on my feet, my throat throbbing and my shoulder killing, she turns back to him. “I’m going with Archie for the weekend.”

He doesn’t look up from his papers. “No you’re not.”

“Yes I am.” Her voice is unbelievably steady. “I’m going with Archie for the weekend.”

I watch my seventeen year old sister stand in the wreckage of this study and hold our father’s gaze. She doesn’t shrink, or flinch, or backdown from him. I feel terrified, and proud, and deeply inadequate.

“Molly,” he warns. “You’ll do as you’re told.”

“No. I will spend tonight with my brother. ’ll be back tomorrow.”

“You’ll go to your room.”

“I’m going with Archie.”

He shoots her a look. “I won’t ask again.”

“Then don’t.” She reaches down and picks up her dressing gown from where it’s fallen on the floor. Pulls it on. Ties it it. Looks at him. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”

God, the air is so thick it’s hard to breathe.

Or maybe that’s from where he was just choking me.

“As of right now, until he comes to his senses, your brother is not part of this family. You will go to your room.”

“I—”

“MOLLY.” Dad booms, causing both of us to flinch. “GO. TO. YOUR. FUCKING. ROOM.”

He never shouts because he never needs to, and the fact that he just did fills the room with something worse than the shouting itself. Something that tells me exactly how far I’ve pushed it today.

Molly has gone white.

She looks at me. She’s trying very hard not to cry and is losing the battle, and I can see the exact moment the fight goes out of her—her shoulders dropping, chin coming down, the seventeen years of this house winning out over the thirty seconds of defiance.

“Mol,” I whisper.

She shakes her head at me before she looks at him one more time. He’s already picked the pen back up, indifferent to his two broken kids. She walks out. I listen to her footsteps on the stairs. Slow this time. Getting slower. Then a door closing, very quietly.

I stand in the study. Just the two of us, the clock, the pen, and the silence.

“You’ll stay away for Christmas,” he says, without looking up. “When you’re ready to conduct yourself appropriately, you know where I am.”

“And you’ll go fuck yourself,” I rasp out. “I want you to know, I’m going to fight you on this. I’d literally rather die than not be with Evie.”

“Then you’re even more stupid than I could have imagined.”

“Maybe,” I hiss. “But at least I’m not you.”