The Unseen Road

Chapter Three: Beatrice

"Get me another one, Bea, will you?" Beatrice Hunter's father asked in a slurred voice from the living room, over the low drone of the television.

"I'm coming, Dad," Beatrice replied with a bitter sigh, and got up from where she had been perched in the kitchen to catch the only amount of light that filtered through the house; the light hurt her father's eyes, so the house was always dark. She tousled her black-dyed hair, cropped and streaked with red highlights, and went over to the refrigerator for what felt like the hundredth time. She opened it and the light from inside the small fridge lit up her face temporarily as she grabbed another can of beer for her father. She then closed the door again before making her way back to him, who she saw laying sprawled out on a large rocking chair in front of the television. His stained shirt revealed a rather unflattering beer belly that Bea preferred not to look at.

"My, haven't you grown into a fine teenager," he said as Beatrice handed her the can, looking up at her with ogling, bloodshot eyes. The light from the television screen played grotesquely upon his face. "Just like your mother was."

"Yeah, Dad."

"I love you, you know that right?"

Beatrice stayed silent, but her heart did a jump. He only told her that when he was drunk- but then again that was all the time. She resented that. "...Yeah," she said at last, averting her gaze over her shoulder. "I'm going outside."

"Okay, hun'. Have fun." He smiled a yellow-toothed smile at her. A shot of pain jolted through Beatrice and she turned away sharply.

Pent-up anger and sadness bubbled up inside her chest as she ran through the gray, dreary house, bolted outside and closed the door behind her; it had taken everything for her not to slam it. She squinted as she mustered all she could to adjust to the full light that was so cruelly exposed to her on the front porch. But even the burning of her eyes was a comfort.

Although she knew that she was probably just going to end up going on a walk, she wanted to leave and never come back; and despite the various times she had tried drugs and even the one instance when she had almost- almost- given herself to a man on the street for money when her father couldn't pay the water bill, she was still only fourteen.

If only she even had the power to make that kind of choice, to leave and say, "To hell with you, sober up you damn drunk, I liked you better before Mom died of whatever-the-hell-it-was."

The power to force him to tell her he loved her, sober.

She began to kick a few stones down the steps to her porch when she noticed a small leaf of paper flit across her view upon the dusty walkway. Apathetically, she stepped down the stairs, her black skinny jeans growing hot as they absorbed the blazing sun's rays, and pinned it down with her foot before it could tumble any farther away from her and into the overgrown lawn. Her eyes flickered to the open mailbox and she realized that the door must have fallen ajar and released all of its contents. It was probably better that way; she could tell the Home Owners' Association that her father had never gotten any of the notices about their lawn, the paint peeling on their house, or the ripped American flag out front (which was illegal as it was).

But the one that she happened to pick up now, peeling it up from under her shoe, was one regarding the lawn. "The above code violation must be cured within four business days... You will be charged a $50 fine for every day thereafter."

Beatrice grimaced. A feeling of hatred rose from within her, hate that she actually felt obligated to take care of this shit.

"I love you, you know that right?"
She flinched. Her gaze travelled numbly from the old rusty lawnmower by the garage to the forest to the west, where she always went when she needed to "get some air."