I stumbled into the largely lit room, thankful that the possibility of human companionship was now much higher than I had previously thought. My eyes took a moment adjusting to the fluorescent light that beamed down upon the kitchen, the white tile and white walls automatically making my mind click into uncomfortable hospital mode.
Bulma sat, slouched over the kitchen table, one hand on a lukewarm bottle of scotch, and the other one holding an unlit cigarette, perched between her thumb and her pointer finger like a stubby pen. I could tell immediately from the contents of the bottle that she was drunk, though the wavering, unsteady slouch would have been my next clue. Her eyes held that glazed over, sagging look, her hair like a fuzzy, greasy mess plopped right on her head, even as she unsuccessfully tried to run her fingers through it. And still she was beautiful, her lips wet from the liquor and quite possibly an amount of drool, her eyes still shiny, though slightly dulled from the daze she was in.
It took her a few moments simply to realize I was there, as I touched the back of a chair across from her and asked if I could take a seat. She motioned with her hand still holding the bottle, the contents swishing around as she allowed me to do as I wished.
I raised my eyebrow as she held the scotch bottle to her mouth and chugged like an experienced alcoholic, my conscience silently imploring as to whether or not I’d spent enough time with her to recognize the possibility.
“You need to get better security.” I said after a few unsteady moments of silence. “I just walked right in, you know. Anyone could just-”
“And what does that all matter?” She asked sharply, her mind still brilliantly intact despite the massive amount of booze in her system. “If its really the end of the world, let death come all the quicker. Security wont save me.”
Her words stung me, and I realized I was suddenly very disappointed in her, perhaps in my own foolish mind balancing my own sanity upon her always logical and factual opinions. I had depended on her of all people to see through all the theology, the superstitions and the tormenting religious talk. I had wanted her to do as she always did when people got eccentric. To prove it all wrong and to tell me that it was nothing, that it’d go away, that I’d defeat it, and tomorrow would be bright and sunny.
“Do you…….” I didn’t know what to say. I clicked my fingers upon the counter top, watching her swig down another gluttonous mouthful of gut stinging liquor. “Do you…….. truly believe it’s the end?”
Her bright eyes flashed on me and it was only than that I saw her desperation and fear that she was trying so hard to drown out. But as soon as she realized her vulnerable features, she was quick to look down, shrugging her shoulders like she didn’t care. But it was too late. She couldn’t fool me.
“The U.N. has declared Marshall Law against religion.” She said, her eyes focused on the wooden table top. “They blame the chaos on the many different beliefs in the world, thinking that by creating one universal religion that somehow, we’ll all just……get along!” She raised the bottle for drunken emphasis. “When the bible burning started globally, they thought for sure it was all about religion. And so no one is allowed to openly practice their beliefs now. I never knew it could happen so quickly or that people would so easily go along with it.”
“Bulma, I……” I shook my head, cursing the fact that this knowledge had eluded me and that I was so shocked by it. I’ve never been into politics or understood much about human government or power, but her words chilled me. “They really think that its just religion that’s causing all this?”
“A cult.” She whispered, emotions trying to take over her drunken stupor. “They think a ritualistic cult goes into the cities, burning bibles, killing people, making them crazy or something. Its so stupid,” she shook her head. “but they need a scapegoat don’t they? They say that almost all the wars in history were based on religious beliefs. That it’s the root of human differences because it molds people, brainwashes them from birth. They think that one religion will bind people. But they don’t realize how stupid this is, they don’t……. they don’t know how futile it is and…….” she began to sputter the words, her lips sculpting themselves into a sob as she banged the bottle violently into the table and cried out.
I jumped to action, scurrying to be by her side and wrap my arm over her rounded shoulders, trying like any uncomfortable idiot to convince her that it was ok, that it’d be fine, when I was really trying to tell myself that at the same time.
“I cant stand this!” She screamed, so loudly my ears rang and her voice sounded on the borderline of insanity. “Why?! Just tell me why?!”
I didn’t know what she was asking and so I remained respectfully quiet, rubbing my hand on her back. I just watched her sob hysterically, the way women only do when their hearts come to a certain breaking point, bawling as if it were the only thing left for her. She carried on for several minutes, my feeling of awkwardness growing rapidly throughout, until finally her voice simply became too hoarse and her tears began to slow, puddling on her chin before dripping down her throat.
She pulled a lighter out of her pocket, snatching up the cigarette and lighting it. I watched her, staying quiet as she did something she’d always claimed was beyond the boundaries of stupid.
Sorrowfully she watched the glowing embers produce little bits of ash on the tip, brightening as she sucked in the poisonous smoke.
“And to think,” she said quietly. “I always imagined things like this could kill me. Now I almost wish it did work so quickly rather than leave me to linger on in this hell.”
“Bulma, what’s happened?” I asked, trying to tell myself that maybe it was just some dwindling disheartenment, that by tomorrow when she’d sober up, she’d be the fighter I knew she was. “What’s made you feel like this?”
She ignored me for a moment, dreadfully flicking her ashes onto the beautifully glossed table.
“I watched two people die today.” She finally answered in a whisper. “They were out………. Preaching about their beliefs or something. Saying that people needed to turn to religion in this hour before it was too late. They were dressed up in nice suits and ties, comforting people, talking to people. They would go up to groups and try to hustle their beliefs or something. Suddenly people started yelling all kinds of obscene things,” She had a haunted, horrified look on her face, as if seeing it all over again, which I imagine she was, “People started coming out of their houses and out of buildings, screaming at them to stop. I could barely hear what anyone was saying. I was really confused. Yes,” she shook her head in a terrified daze, “yes I didn’t know what was happening.
“The two guys got really scared and started backing away, not really saying anything when people said they had to denounce their religion.” She sobbed just once, covering her eyes for just a second. “People….. People told them…..”
“Bulma,” I said reassuringly. “You don’t have to tell me. Don’t talk about it.”
“People!” She screamed, banging her fist into the wood. “People told them to denounce God! Goku, they told those boys to say that they didn’t believe in God or they’d die! There were children in the crowd! Children! And the when the boys wouldn’t do it, when they wouldn’t say it, some of the men started to hit them, and then to beat them, until everyone was screaming and crying and the men they were killing them with anything they could get their hands on!”
“Bulma stop this!” I pleaded, feeling my throat tighten.
“And when the boys were dead they burned them!” she was hysterical now, shrieking the words. “THEY BURNED THEM!”
She fell off her chair, collapsing to her knees and screaming in horror, her hands shaking. I dropped to her side, pulling her against me and leaning my face into hers to stop the tears.
“They burned them……” she bawled. “They burned their bodies until there was nothing left but pieces of the park bench they’d used to start the fire.”
There was nothing I could do to comfort her I realized and so I just sat there, rocking her slowly, being rocked by her jolts of tears.
“When you hear about things like that,” she said. “you don’t feel it. You don’t…….” she paused, touching her fingers over her heart. “I never knew that war would be the end of us all. War doesn’t happen here. It happens in little dinky countries that you watch on TV. And you pity and you try to sympathize but when you switch it off, you forget and you’re happy to. You don’t want to see it. You want the same boring, uneventful life that promises security and safety. That protects you from the horror everyone else experiences.”
“I know.” I said, without anything else to respond.
“I’m so scared.” She whispered, looking into my eyes. “They said at first to turn to God. Now I cant pray in public places. Where can I find comfort in that?”
“But you can pray.” I murmured. “If it comforts you than do it. No one can see you here. If it helps than pray to God.”
She glared at me suddenly, a violent look springing to her eyes.
“I don’t even know if I believe in Him.” She spat miserably. “And if I do, than I’m certain I hate Him completely.”
I was shocked, pulling away from her suddenly and resenting the fact that she was more and more disappointing me. But then the honesty of her comment struck me and reminded me of my own dwindling faith. It humbled me I suppose.
“I’m sorry,” she said sadly, looking away from me and trying to compose herself. “I’m so sorry to have said that.”
“No Bulma, I………. I understand.”
“And what do you understand?” she whispered to the air. “All I see is death………………….and sadness…………. and pain. I look around and I see despair in the eyes of children. People cry out in the open and no one even looks at them oddly, like they might have done a year ago. The world is black to me. And the one with the power enough to stop it, with the control, and the supposed “abounding” love, watches it like a cinema movie and does nothing. I hate Him.”
I smoothed the hair from her soggy eyes, seeing the rare beauty in her grief stricken face.
“But I suppose I hated Him long before that, didn’t I?” She said softly, almost like it was just a thought she was speaking out loud.
“Don’t say that.” I insisted. “Why would you say that Bulma? You know you don’t mean it.”
“Don’t I?” She snapped suddenly. “Perfect Bulma with the perfect life right? Perfect spoiled little rich girl with everything she’s ever wanted within reach. The perfect family, the perfect everything. What do I know of pain!”
She threw her cigarette across the floor angrily, her eyes blazing with a fury I so seldomly saw that it stunned me into silence.
“You think I don’t know sadness?!” She screamed, bolting to her feet and glaring down at me. “You think I’ve never felt sadness or loss, that everything was just flowers and fucking sunshine? FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU GOKU!”
“I didn’t mean that!” I cried, rising to her level, irritated at feeling so helpless with my words. I placed my hands comforting on her shoulders and she violently threw them off, pushing my chest with both her hands and knocking me backwards with incredible strength.
“You just know everything don’t you!” she shrieked in a rage. “Don’t tell ME what to feel! Don’t you tell me what to think! Big tough hero,” she hissed viciously. “You’re so stupid it amazes me sometimes. All these years and you’re still so fucking blind! Dad could do it right in front of you and you’d still be the clueless fucking angel you are!”
“Bulma what are you talking about?!” I cried in horror.
“He hit me!” She screamed. Her hand grabbed a nearby coffee pot. “He fucking hit me!”
I jumped as she hurled the pot into the wall, the glass shattering and bursting with a wretched sound. She screamed out in so much anger that I grabbed her, fearful she’d do something rash. She pounded at my chest, trying to scratch at my face as I held her steady, trying all the while not to crush her with my strength.
“He hit me and you never did anything about it!” she sobbed. “Why didn’t you help me? Why weren’t you there when I needed you? Why? Why didn’t you save me?!” she fell to the floor in exhaustion, burying her face into my stomach. “Why?”
“Your dad.” I said slowly, trying to compose the words that simply could NOT make sense in my mind. “Your dad he……. he used to hit you?”
She nodded into my torso, her tears coming through my shirt and soaking me with their warmth.
“I’m sorry.” I said gravely, my eyebrows knitting together, my lips pursing themselves into my most serious face. “I’m sorry I never knew.”
“Of course you didn’t.” she sniffed, pulling away to look up at my face. “Who would believe it?”
I knelt down to her level, holding the sides of her face in my hands.
“I’m so sorry I didn’t know Bulma.” I said. “I just would never have guessed it. He seems so sweet and……. and so gentle is all. So small and…… almost childlike.”
“I know.” She breathed, tired from her outburst. “No one ever suspected. When he’s around people he’s like another person. He’s so kind and warm. So phony. The actor, as I used to think when you were there. I’ll bet even now you can hardly imagine it.”
“That’s true.” I confessed with a nod. “I just never thought of the possibility. You two always got along great and its……. Well its not like your dad is the biggest man or anything. I hardly think he could intimidate a fly.”
“He used to come home when I was little,” she said in a voice so quiet I had to strain to catch it. “He’d come home from work, really frustrated or something. Some days things would have gone bad and he’d take it out on us. Months would go by and I’d think that everything was fine and well, things would be good, things had changed. And then there’d be that one day that he couldn’t stand me and mom again and hell would break loose.”
“Tell me about it.” I said, knowing that it wasn’t my business but wanting her to say it. To say so I could believe? To say so that I could hear the words that would make me hate a man I’d always looked up to as a father? Or to say because some part of me knew she needed this? Because she needed to tell me?
She glanced at me, reading my features and knowing my intentions were pure, if only for this moment.
“He’s not a bad man Goku.” She breathed, her eyebrows high. “He’s a good man that did bad things.” I nodded for her to continue. “Its happened since I could remember. My father the genius, the man who’s dedicated his life to technology and enhancement of human life, would hit me. Maybe that wasn’t so much the horror of it as the things he’d say to me. The things he’d say to my mom. The way he’d scream and for one split second I’d think he was really going to kill me or something.
“I remember when I was 5, I was rolling around on the kitchen tile in my new roller skates, my little pink Barbie ones that no other girls had because they were too expensive. He’d come in with just………. red eyes. He just stared at me for a second and I said hi to him even when I was scared. And it was like in fast forward he came at me, backhanded me right off my skates. I remember seeing them in front of me as I fell, crashing down on my head. He straddled me on the ground and grabbed my face, telling me that if I ever had skates in the house he’d make me pay. It was so mundane. I never thought he’d be mad about it.
“My mom once told me that when I’d been a baby, my dad used to hit me to make me stop crying. But,” her mouth formed a sob. “But that only made me cry more because…… because I didn’t know any better and…..”
“Go on.” I implored.
“There are so many times.” She said, gazing at the ceiling to clear her tears. “I remember how he’d always call my mom fat, say she was “too fat for that dress” or “too fat for that color.”
“Your mom has never been fat.” I spat angrily.
“I know.” She nodded. “I know that. But she didn’t. And when she’d start to cry he’d say that she had to stop. I don’t know if maybe it made him feel bad or something. I don’t know if he felt anything at all. But he’d tell her to stop that crying or he’d give her something to cry about. And if she didn’t………” she sniffed. “If she didn’t stop crying he’d grab her by the back of the neck and slap her in the face. He was always too careful to leave bruises. He knew better than to give us some sort of proof that we could take to child services, not that we would ever have been brave enough.
“That’s what he was good at. Intimidation. Control. Maybe it was the only time in his life he felt better than someone. Bigger. Sometimes, after he’d really hurt me, he’d take me to the candy store and get me whatever I wanted, telling me that he’d had to do it. That I made him. He would always say that he hated it just as much as I did. But I don’t think I ever really believed that. Not even when I was really young. I think he enjoyed it. It made him feel in control. It made him feel big.
“But I always forgave him. I was so stupid.” She shook her head looking at the floor. “So stupid to think it was the last time. That he’d really felt sorry. He was a workaholic who’d always been teased for being too smart, too short. And me and mom were the only ones there he could take out his misery on.
“When I was twelve was the last time I forgave him. I remember it perfectly.” She smiled wistfully, painfully. “The girl down the street had a party. I don’t even know what her name was come to think of it. But I’d actually been invited. Bulma Briefs, the girl no one talked to at school because she was so smart, so rich, so snobby. Things everyone strived so hard to be isolated me. But I’d actually been invited and in my excitement, I guess I forgot to ask dad’s permission. Now that I think of it, he would have probably said no just to hurt me. Just to have that much more control over me. He didn’t really care that I was gone. But it’d been a direct attack on his headship over me. Or so it was in his mind.
“I walked into the kitchen in my little bright blue dress I was so proud of because it had made me look older, seeing him sitting there with his arms crossed and his eyes with that dull, almost black look. I tried to choke something out but at the time I hadn’t even known what I’d done wrong.
“He threw me into the wall telling me how stupid I was, how bad I was, how I’d deliberately not asked him. Saying that I was worthless, that I had snuck out. I couldn’t even say anything because he had his elbow up against my throat. I think I was choking out a thousand “I’m sorry’s” a minute, crying. Than he’d grabbed me by the hair and yanked me onto the ground, holding his hand over my mouth so that I could barely breathe, the back of my head grinding into the tile.
“ ‘You’re never gonna do that again Bulma.” He said. “If you ever do that again, I swear to God. I swear I’ll kill you if you ever do that again.”
“Finally he got off me, and sobbing, I climbed to my feet, hardly able to stand because I was so scared. And when I looked up, he punched me right in the face, for the first time in my life, he hit me so hard that it actually left a mark, my nose and mouth bleeding all over my pretty blue dress.
“Then he went out into his laboratory and I’d crawled into my room, little droplets of blood trailing behind me on the white tile. I remember just sitting there, my knees pulled up against my chest, backed into my little corner with the lights turned off, praying to God like I always had that he wouldn’t do it again. Praying just like mom always told me to do.
“I was praying out loud when she came in, a fresh bruise on the side of her mouth, probably from earlier that night. Probably because she’d let me go. But for once, I didn’t feel guilty because I knew that I hadn’t done anything wrong. That HE had the problem. That HE was the one that hit her. That HE was the one who was wrong and always had been.
“ ‘He had a long day.” Mom said. She just said that like it was an excuse. Like I should pity him or something. She was such chicken shit.
“ ‘I had a long day and I wouldn’t hit you.” I said coldly, realizing suddenly how angry I was with her. That she took it. That she let it happen.
“ ‘Don’t disobey your father.” She said in a tired voice. “Be a good girl and he won't have to do it.”
“And that was the first time I knew that I hated my mother almost as much as I hated my dad. The first people I’d ever love were the first people I’d ever hate. She said other things. Things to excuse him. Things to pity and exult him. But I ignored her, completely soaked in my hate. I’d never hated anything so much in my life. I’d never let it consume me like that. I’d always been the happy girl. The one who never stuck up for herself. The one who saw the best in everyone and thought that there really was no such thing as pure evil. But there was. And for a few split seconds, I’d seen it in my father. I still have that stained blue dress.
“Sixteen years it took me to stand up to my father. Sixteen years of being scared when I’d hear his footsteps by my door. Sixteen years of wasted prayers to a God who didn’t care. Sixteen years of rotting faith. But I knew. Damn it I knew I was not going to be like my mother. I knew that I’d never let some man treat me like that. I knew I was never going to marry someone and stick by them just because they were financially secure and because I was too lazy to work.
“So I began to educate myself. I was always smart, I’m not going to be absurdly humble and pretend I wasn’t. But I threw myself into books of geometry, of mathematics, of accounting, algebra, physics, chemistry, science. I disregarded most history and literature books because like my father, I somehow felt that in the long run, these would never take me as far as I wanted to go. I taught myself how to learn, how to absorb, and how to use what I knew.
“I found a job at a local hospital, not a high paying one mind you, but it was what I would need to get away from my father for so many hours of the day. When I found enough courage to inform my mother, knowing at the time that she’d soon run to my father and confess it, I hid out in my room, just knowing, just dreading that he’d come up there with the fire of the devil in his eyes.
“And sure enough he did, though much calmer than I imagined and told me in a cold, chilling voice that I would not be going to work. That I was going to stay at home. And in that second it finally dawned on me just how sick he was. My mom hadn’t worked a day in their marriage because he wouldn’t let her. He hired people to shop for her so she wouldn’t have a reason to leave the Capsule Corp. She was like a slave, trapped in this house and trapped in a marriage.
“Quite frankly I informed him that I most certainly WOULD be going to work. I still remember his face,” She laughed. “I’ve never seen him so surprised. He didn’t even try to hide it or anything. He just gapped at me like some sort of fish. When he asked what I’d just said, I told him that he knew damn well what I’d just said and I didn’t need to repeat myself.
“ ‘I’m sixteen,” I said in a stern, grown up voice. “I’m old enough and I’m strong enough to do what I want. You’re not going to keep me cooped up in this house and you’re certainly not going to scare me into staying with you. I’m going and that’s that.”
“My mom let out a gasp, holding her hand over her mouth, her big eyes wide as my father just shook in anger. When he managed to speak it was along the lines of a very threatening “how dare you?” But I wasn’t about to stop. No, I meant what I’d said. I was going to work. I was going to college. I was going away from here and my love for my mother, my fear of my father, my guilt at abandoning them, was never going to stop me. Sure, I worried about my mom. But I couldn’t live my life that way. If she didn’t have the strength to get away from him than nothing I could do would save her. And I’ll admit to you Goku, I have and always will have a very special hatred for my mother in that she never even tried to give me something better.
“No, my mom was perfectly happy to be the punching bag that scurried around in fear, blaming herself for his flying fists and promising herself that prayers would carry her and her daughter through to the next day with smiles. She let it happen Goku. She let it go on and she never left him and for that I will always resent her.
“ ‘Bulma honey!” she’d cried as my dad just stood there dumbfounded. “Don’t go to work. Your father’s right. He’s just looking out for you. He doesn’t want you to get hurt! What if something happened to you? He wants what’s best for you is all! He doesn’t want you to get raped, or shot or…….. or….”
“ ‘No mom.” I said as coldly as I could. “He doesn’t want me to live. And I’d rather be behind bars than be trapped here like you.”
“ ‘Who would take you in if I didn’t?” Dad said between his teeth.
“ ‘Someone.” I shrugged. “Unlike you, people actually like me.’.”
“You said that?!” I asked her suddenly. Bulma nodded.
“You have to realize Goku, I was seeing my dad for who he was for the first time. I saw him now as I should have. A little sad, insecure man. I had no real fear of him. And I certainly had no respect.
“ ‘What did you say?!” Dad screamed in fury, my mom squeaking at me to be quiet for my own sake. But I wasn’t about to stop there. No, if I did, I knew I’d never have the courage to leave. This was it and for the first time, little sunshine girl Bulma was going to stand up for herself. We all have to face our demons sometime they say.
“ ‘You’re scared aren’t you?” I asked him suddenly as he came up to stare right into my face, trying to intimidate me. “You don’t want me to go because you wont be able to control me.” He just made some small choking noise and it was all I needed.
“ ‘And here it is,” I said in a cool voice. “You’re just a sad, lonely little man that everyone hates. You’re alone and you’re miserable and you make everyone around you that way. You’re depressed and everyone knows you should be on medication and you’re not.” I got real close to him, using the fact that by now I was taller than him, gazing down to see him for the little monster he was. “You must hate yourself more than I hate you. I want you to know that I’ll go away from here and that you’ll be nothing to me. I want you to know that I’ll never let anyone treat me the way that you have and that I’m going to dedicate my life to putting people like you away. And I want you to know one thing else,” I moved in so close that I could see every wrinkle by his eyes, until my nose was in his hair.
“ ‘God save you if you are EVER helpless around me.”
