A memory, or a dream: A river side, an unknown time ago.

"Do you still dream of that day?" She wasn't much older than me. She held her hands behind her back and slowly walked toward the water. "Back then, when you-?"

"I don't like to talk about it." I said. I clenched my fists and struggled to keep my anger in check.

She looked at me. "You're doing it again." She said. "Holding it in, if you keep doing that, you'll explode."

"I... don't want to hurt anyone else." I replied. "Hurting people sucks."

"Are you afraid you'll hurt me?" She asked, brushing her purple-dyed hair behind her right ear.

"You know you're stronger than me." I said. "I couldn't hurt you if I tried."

"What about emotionally?" She asked. "Are you afraid you'll say the wrong thing and chase me away?"

I didn't answer her, I simply stared at the river as it flowed by. How many people did I hurt because I couldn't control myself? How many more would be hurt?

"You're thinking about it again." She said.

"About what?" I asked.

"What happened wasn't your fault." She replied. "You were in a situation where acting was the only thing you could do."

"This is different." I said. "Nothing can be the same, I hurt people, Callie, I could have killed them."

"But you didn't." She said. "Nobody stopped you except yourself."

"And what if I hadn't?" I asked. "What if-?" I sighed. "What if I couldn't? It didn't feel like me, it felt like I was desperately trying to pull back on a giant monster with a flimsy leash."

She walked over to me and hugged me. "You are stronger than you think you are." She said. "I am certain that, when the time comes, you will do your best to do the right thing."

"Callie..."

A memory, or a dream: A rainy night, an unknown time ago.

I walked along the street, ignoring the rain as I went. I felt hollow, empty. Another argument with my brother, another argument with my father, both railing on me at the same time. "Why aren't you trying harder?!" "Why do you always give excuses?!" "When are you going to actually try for once and stop leeching off everyone?!"

I was unable to get a word in edgewise, and when my father took my silence as a challenge, he approached me, raised his hand to slap me, and I punched him. How long ago had it been since he taught me how to throw a proper punch? I couldn't remember. All I knew was that it had been hard enough to cause him to trip over the solid wood coffee table and land on both it and the couch.

"I'm not your goddamn punching bag!" I shouted. "Nor am I an idiot kid who gives excuses because he's lazy! I'm trying as hard as I can, but when the deck's stacked against you, you can't exactly try any harder!"

How many years had it been since he last raised his hand to me? Was this really the first time he'd tried to hit me?

"What the hell?!" Alex shouted. "You punched Dad!"

"He's had it coming a long time!" I snapped. "Always yelling and telling me I'm not trying, treating me like a child instead of an adult, doing nothing to actually be a decent father! And trying to hit me!"

My father struggled to stand up, which was understandable considering his ass was between the couch and the table. Alex stared at me as if I'd done something horrible.

"What else was I supposed to do, huh? Am I supposed to take it like some ten cent prostitute?! Haven't I always been told to stand up for myself?! "

Alex moved to help him get unstuck, and I took the opportunity to get the hell out of there. I could take the old man by surprise, but in an actual fight, I was fairly certain he could kill me. And so I walked, out in the rain, uncertain what the hell was going to happen to me. Could Mom even convince him to let me stay after what I did? Was he going to adamantly state that I was out of there?

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

I stopped at the railroad tracks again, and though all was quiet, I couldn't make myself move. Nothing came to mind, no justification to myself, no anger to drive me forward, no spite to force me to press on. Just me standing there. My knees gave out, my chest heaved, and probably for the first time, I was afraid that I had nothing else to keep me going.

I heard the distant wail of a horn, and I still felt empty. The bright light of a distant train fell on me as the alarms on the railroad crossing sprang to life, the red lights painting the world stark red intermittently. I closed my eyes, unable to move, and suddenly, I was thrown from the rails and the train passed. I barely registered the impact of my body against the road, and wasn't entirely certain what had happened.

"Train's a painful way to go." I heard. "'Specially like that. I heard Joe managed to stay alive for a while with his entire bottom half gone. Spent the whole time screaming."

A rough hand grabbed my upper arm and tried to pull me up. I heard a sigh, then felt a sharp smack against my face. "C'mon, I went through the trouble saving yer ass, you might as well get up."

I sat up and looked up. A vagrant, the kind that my father often told me wasn't worth a second look. Filthy and, in his words, choosing to live homeless, in his opinion, they should have all been rounded up and put on a farm or something so they could at least contribute to society.

"You look like you need a fuckin' drink." He said.

"I don't drink..." I started.

He laughed. Well, it was more like a guffaw, I'd always wondered what one actually sounded like, and the onomatopoeia wasn't inaccurate. He looked me over and said, "Yer tryin' to kill yerself by train and you're worried about a little booze? Yer priorities need a little rearrangin'."

He pulled me up to a standing position. "C'mon, I've got somethin' that'll help." I just stood there staring at him. "If I wanted to kill you, I wouldn't have bothered savin' you." He pointed out.

"Considering I'll probably be thrown out to the streets anyway, might as well make new friends." I remarked pessimistically.

He took me to a spot in town that was considered too dangerous to be caught in with anything resembling something that could be pawned off, and while I did get some glares from a few people we passed by, ultimately, nobody bothered us.

The man took two bottles of beer out from a hiding spot and handed one to me.

"I, uh..." I started.

"Don't be picky." He said. "Drink up."

Wordlessly, I obliged. I'd always hated the taste of beer, it was too bitter and I'd always had a hard time swallowing it, but considering the situation, spitting it out would only have people yelling at me, and I'd already had my fill of that for the day.

We drank in silence, with me grimacing after every swallow. About halfway through the bottle, the man asked, "So, what's yer story? What's got a white kid like you trying to go out by train?"

It hadn't even registered in my brain the man's skin color, nor had I really been paying attention. Most of the time, I got in trouble calling someone 'black', and I'd had enough instances of calling a Jamaican American an African American to never really know what was the right terminology to use. For me, they were just another kind of Human.

"I just... gave up." I said. "Every time I try, I fail. I've been living with my parents for years and I haven't had a single job, nor have I really gotten anything notable done since I graduated high school. Today, my father laid into me, and when he went to smack me, I punched him and-" I took another drink. "-and I ran. I punched my own father in the face, and now I'm pretty sure that he's going to kick me out, and I'm just going to die on the street because I have absolutely no skill to survive and nobody else to turn to." I looked at the bottle. "I guess, I figured that since there was nothing else, I might as well..."

"What, kill yerself?" He asked. "You stand up to your dad and you think to yerself, 'Well, guess I'll die'?" He shook his head. "Sounds like you've finally put your foot down, that's no reason to end it."

"You don't understand-" I started.

"Bullshit." He said. "I'm forty-nine, I live off the street doing odd jobs because nobody wants to hire a bum off the street. Most people look at me and they think to themselves, 'Gotta stay away from the scary black homeless man'. The few people who give me charity only do it to make themselves feel better. You know why I keep goin'?"

"Why?" I asked.

"It's simple. It's not my time. God put me on this Earth to do somethin' even if that's just to be someone else's test, or maybe it was to save yer life. D'you believe?"

I shook my head. "No. I only go to church because otherwise my Mom would be by herself."

"Faith ain't about church." He said. "It's about livin' yer best for whatever it is you believe in. You believe in doin' right by others?"

I nodded. "Yeah." I said.

"You believe in lovin' your neighbor?"

"Depends on if they're being a decent human being or not." I said. "But yeah, for the most part."

"Then keep livin' so you can inspire them to be better people." He said. "I've seen you around town, y'know? You don't look down on us, you ain't afraid to give us a hug, you ain't afraid to give a dollar or two, and you say you can't get a job? Let me tell you, there are people with amazin' jobs out there who wouldn't give a dime if another man's life depended on it. Hell, there's billionaires who are the reason the economy's so shit. They got so much money they could burn a hundred thousand a day and still have more than two million by the end of a year. They could go up to each and every homeless man and give them enough money to buy a house and keep it for more than a year and still have enough left over to buy themselves a yacht or two. You, you give what you can to those in need, even if you don't believe, you do good in this world and it'd be a damn shame if you killed yourself."

"Thanks." I said. "But, that doesn't change the fact that right now I'm completely fucking boned as far as my living situation is concerned."

The street was filled with light as a car turned onto it. I wondered who the hell would turn onto a dead-end road full of homeless men and derelicts, and was immediately answered by, "Ryan?!"

"Mom?" I asked softly.

The man beside me nudged me with his elbow. "Sounds like someone's lookin' for you." He said. "Go on, I don't think you're out on the street yet."

I stood up and approached the car, the driver door opened and Mom came running over to me. She hugged me and thanked God she found me.

"S'cuse me, Ma'am." The man spoke up from behind me. "Yer son's a lucky man."

Mom thanked him for keeping me relatively safe, and before long, I was in the passenger seat on the way home.

"Your father told me you punched him, you left a bruise." She said.

"He was going to hit me." I said.

"Good." She said. "I told him I wasn't going to tolerate it if he hit you kids, and if he pitches a fit, I'll tell him I'll knock his block off I swear to God."

"Mom, I-" My voice broke and I broke down sobbing. She pulled over to the side of the road and hugged me as best as she could, soothing me and telling me she was there and that she would never let anything happen to me.

"How can you tolerate him?" I asked. "What exactly do you see in him? He's never home, he never cleans up after himself, and he never admits when he's done something wrong. Never once has he apologized for insulting someone, never once has he made any effort to actually be a decent father. Why the hell do you put up with his bullshit?"

She didn't have an answer, at least, not at that moment. She hugged me, and when I calmed down, we drove home.

Willis glared at me, Alex was nowhere to be seen, likely avoiding the aftermath of my father's anger, but Mom stood behind me and said firmly, "Ryan may be your son, but he is my son too. If you ever push him to this point again, it won't be him punching you. I do not want to hear about you hitting him, I don't want to hear about you yelling at him, if you want him to get a job, if you want him to get off his butt to clean, you'd better be helping him. Understood?"

He didn't say anything at that time, but Mom never let it drop...