Inner And Outer Demons

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Tris's POV

"I was eight at the time," Tobias says, releasing a shaky breath. And resting my hand comfortingly on his shoulder, he continues. "maybe a bit younger, I'm not quite sure. All those years seemed to bleed together, one into another."

"I can still remember the last moment I saw her before she left. It was nighttime. And it was late, way after my bedtime, but I remember laying in my bed with the covers tucked underneath my chin and my eyes were wide open. I couldn't sleep."

Tobias's voice falls to a tone I haven't ever heard from him before. It's soft and fragile; but shadowed by something dark. It pulls at my heart strings, the story he tells me in a low voice. The story of a boy too young to have gone through what he did.

"The room was dark, pitch blackness. I didn't have a nightlight, my father wouldn't let me. So I was completely shrouded in the darkness, which only made nighttime even worse. It was quiet, unnervingly quiet. It was hardly ever quiet in the house when my father was home, but that night he passed out early in the evening. That was the only reason our house didn't echo with the sound of my mother's screams or my father's shouts."

"My bedroom door creaked open slowly, letting some of the hallway light flood slowly into my room. I know panic swam through me, always fearing that it was my father coming in to do whatever it was he felt I deserved at that moment. But my mother walked in, and I instantly calmed."

Tobias leans back against the church pew, and stares blankly out in front of him. This memory he recounts to me now, is transporting him to a different time and a different place.

"I can still picture the way the light fell over her dark hair, it shimmered almost in the night. And I can still see the faint smile that shadowed against her lips. Smiling at me as she walked in to see me. As if to disguise the darkness about to cloud over me the next day once she left."

"She sat on the edge of my bed, the mattress dipped but I didn't sit up. I laid there under my covers as she gazed downward at me, with that smile still there on her lips. I don't know how she did it," Tobias shares with a shake of his head. "Smiling softly at me the way she did, like it was just another goodnight. When it was really a goodbye."

"She ran her fingers softly through my hair, and leaned down to press a kiss to my forehead. For days after, I could still feel that kiss soaked into my skin. She grasped my hand gently in hers when she sat back up, and brought my hand to her lips. Kissing it motherly, and then pressing it against my cheek. That, I could feel for a month after she left."

"She told me goodnight, and she told me she loved me," Tobias recalls in a soft tone. "and that was the last time I ever saw her."

I swallow the lump in my throat and blink away tears that were beginning to burn in the corners of my eyes. "Until this morning."

Tobias nods his head, running a hand over his face. "Until this morning."

"Did she ever tell you why she left?" I question.

Tobias releases a low and cold chuckle, "My father told me when I woke the next day and every day after that when she never showed up home, that she died. That my mother was dead. That was his answer for me. But my mother, her answer might be worse."

"What was it?"

"She left because my father abused her too. She couldn't go through it any longer, she couldn't stay in that house with him, taking each blow from him every single day. I can see the need to leave, I understand that need... because I had it too. I don't blame her for leaving."

"I blame her for leaving me behind."

"Why is she back? Now, after all this time?" I ask Tobias gently, and his shoulders lift up and back down in a shrug.