Work Text
Papa is Dead
A familiar stench doused the room, reminding Isaac of a side fatty pork on the grill. He let go of his shimmering-polestar blue bat and observed as the blood it sported continued to flow down from the barrel to the grip, going the wrong way and into Isaac’s spindly fingers, like the blood that flowed down from his biceps to his wrist, like the veins that he and the burning carcass on the floor shared, like the smell that blanketed the air whenever another plate had been thrown at him— and missed his eye. Isaac Lacey’s father’s once lively skin was now a mess of burnt charcoal and wince-inducing black, the kind of black that if you placed a sheet of blacker then black ink to compare, it’d still look darker somehow. Isaac lifted himself up and glanced down at the ever so noticeable shaking of his hands, his digits quivered in fear, and as much as he liked to tell him that this was Beacon Hills, that this was normal for the small town, he couldn’t help the clench in his gut; not the ropes that bounded his bowels as he sat at the dinner table and stared nervously at his thick omelet crunched together with red juicy pandoras, waiting for the dull flash of recognition to wash over his Father’s face as he spoke about another barely-passable grade, no, this was the type of fear that he wasn’t going to live this down in the station. The kind that he’d have to be reassured by the sheriff that everything was going to be okay, that he didn’t do anything wrong. But he did, he killed Daddy in the house and Daddy did nothing wrong because all he ever did was discipline the disturbed son of his that was Isaac.Now he had to go; he had to leave. He had to clean up this mess, clean it up, he had to make it spotless, make it shine for Daddy so he won’t break into another hissy fit. Isaac convinced himself whatever he did was right, and the frigid stiffness of his Father’s corpse was only because he had passed out from rage, raged that the bleach-white that covered the creamy rugs were pieces of the shattered glass he had thrown, pieces of himself that he’d inflicted on Isaac. Isaac couldn’t care less at that moment though, because picking up slack arms and dragging them out through the back door was much more important than worrying about what the fuck was talking in his head, but he seemed to underestimate the cold night, and if that flimsy tank top Lahey wore didn’t smell like an old oiler jacket, didn’t remind him of the basement, then maybe he’d have worn it. The teenager’s arms felt scratchy as goosebumps revealed themselves above the surface of his skin, arms exposed in the bare crispy chill of midnight, Isaac’s face kissed another colder breeze that smelled like brine and salt and wafted on the air Isaac exhaled, like it was coming from the sea; like it was luring him.. into the sea. So, once he had arrived at the old abandoned docks somewhere in the preserves, his face immediately lit up.The lake shone black in the dim of the night, the moonlight reflected off the waters, and Isaac’s upturned lips were shadowed too, once he had caught sight of them though, he’d briskly suspended himself into a depressive state. Why was he smiling? Was the perfect consistency of the river flowing through the wisp waisted artery between the water and his Father’s soles so mesmerizing? Was it the fact that he was going to have to pick Daddy’s dirty calves and pull them down into the uncharismatically murky depths of the river, so he won’t get into trouble, so he won’t be in lockup for the whole night, all alone, observing the boring chalk lines someone dull, bored, and lonely had made of gravel-like bricks that enclosed him in three walls and a dozen bars. Isaac didn’t notice his slowly digging thumbs, but when he did, he suddenly let go; face mortified as red marks of his fingerprints sheathed onto the skin he held, drawn themselves traumatizingly slowly and paling into dead undertones of yellow. Isaac let out a shaky breath; this was terrifying, but it’s not that his Father’s dead, no, what feared him the most, what made beads of sweat dribble from his brow into the lean bridge of his nose was the fact that watching the rotting arm drop like dead weight made him calm. Calmer then he had ever been that night, the tense cramps churning his stomach vanished like trickles of blood underneath his eyes, against his cheeks; on the worst nights.Isaac trudged to the gossamers pined, scary shores of the lake and picked up Daddy’s feet, then he yanked him forward into the water and pushed down, pushed down till he felt that everything inside had calmed down; he didn’t know whether he was talking about his Father, or himself. He flinched as his dipped ankles began to frame themselves into debris from withered leaves and twigs latching onto him like slimy leeches weaving into his skin, it stung a little when he had to drag himself up from the water now that he was sure that the corpse sank like a brick into the seas, the shore was so dirty. Isaac felt something flutter as the realisation that this was an abandoned lake, no one had ever come here to clean up; maybe cap a few bodies but nothing so out of place, like cleaning up the docks. He was sure his heart was beating a lot slower then it was when his fingers reached the shin of his Father’s long trousers, and when he was back home and feet now clean from the formed dirt that made home in his toes, he was home.Isaac picked up the lanky handle of the mop and began to clean the blood from the floor, clean up the oxblood red in-between the ridges of each birch log, clean up the mess he had made; like he always did. Now that everything looked as enthralling as a vomit-green wallpaper was, Isaac, bleached the willowy ropes that reminded him of his arms and made sure to whiten everything else too. In case anyone was smart enough to trace anything left stained back to him, he wasn’t sure how he was going to explain his Father’s disappearance but he could use the fact that he had to work the grave shift that night, yes, no one really knew that he worked no pay at the yard; he could use this excuse, could get a little sympathy. It’d be fine; he’d be fine,Isaac kept reminding himself this till the first signs of daybreak began to hint, and even then; he’d still tell himself, that he’d be fine.