by T. M. Meek
Glade was smiling and just arriving home and since Dex's car was down the street at a friend named Roger's house, Glade couldn't see that Dex was actually home. Glade had no idea of what he was about to walk into when he opened the door.
Alex inhaled sharply in fear for Glade and she began to wave her arms wildly behind the closed window to try and get his attention before he walked through the door. But he didn't see her and he walked right into the house. She hoped Dex was in some other part of the house as she ran downstairs as quietly as she could. She wanted to try and find Glade before Dex did. But it was too late. Glade walked into the kitchen and plopped his backpack onto the breakfast table and started digging through the fridge.
Before Alex could get to Glade, Dex had already grabbed Glade forcefully.
"You drank my milk!" Dex yelled at Glade. He then punched at Glade but missed as Glade quickly ducked him.
"No I didn't! Leave me alone!" Glade yelled back..
Fists were flying and items were getting knocked off of nearby counter tops as they wrestled in their fight. Alex ran in and shouted at Dex, "Please stop hitting him Dex! Please!"
"Alex! Call Dad! Get the phone!" Glade quickly commanded Alex while he defended himself.
She grabbed a nearby cordless phone and sped off into another room to call her dad at work. But in her haste to flee from the possibility of Dex's attempt to stop her, she didn't see a large pair of Dex's shoes sprawled out on the floor and she tripped on one of them. She fell hard on the tile floor that led to one of the back doors to the house. Her left knee slammed painfully against the ground and when she tried to get back up to quickly run again, she cried in pain and fell again to the floor.
She hadn't realized how hard and how quickly she had also twisted her ankle when her knee had smashed against the hard floor. She gave up running and simply remained on the floor. Being careful not to trigger anymore intense pain in her leg and ankle, she moved herself over to lean against a nearby wall and began dialing the phone to call her father’s office at the hospital where he worked.
With one final crashing sound the fight ended and Dex angrily announced for all to hear, "I'm going to start writing MY name on MY milk and if ANYBODY ELSE drinks it, I'm going to beat the hell out of them!"
Glade was left sobbing and bleeding on the floor as Alex waited on hold for her dad's secretary, Glenda. Dex walked over to Alex and she looked up at him with a determination to talk to her dad or the secretary or anyone who would listen as she had no intents of giving up the phone.
Dex spoke to Alex in a voice of tired anger, "Hand me the phone."
Alex just sat on the floor, injured, but firm in her resolve. She remained silent as she looked up at him. She was still on hold.
"I said, hand me the phone!" he said more firmly now.
Alex didn't budge.
"Hand me the phone, now, or I will yank you and take it from you."
Just then Glenda answered in a pleasant voice, "Dr. Opalstone's office. How may I help you?"
"Hello? Glenda? It's me, Alex. Is my dad––" Alex was interrupted as Dex forcefully grabbed Alex's arm and yanked her several feet up into the air causing her to drop the phone while she yelled out in extreme pain. Dex then calmly picked the phone up off of the floor as Alex was left crying in agony after she had fallen back to the floor. She didn’t know that her arm had been yanked half-way out of its shoulder socket but she felt excruciating pain in that area and all down her arm.
Dex calmly spoke to Glenda, "Hey, Glenda. It's me. Dex. Could you just tell my dad that I left him his change on his dresser for the money he gave me for the new spark plugs? Thanks." He then hung up the phone. He looked at Alex and gave her a cold look void of any remorse as he said, "The next time I tell you to give me the phone, you do it, or I'll yank you again."
Alex lay on the floor sobbing in pain. Dex didn't realize just how badly injured she was and he certainly didn't care.
After a few quick knocks on the door, Roger let himself in. "Dex! Dex! We're going to be late for work. Hey, Dex! Where are you?" Roger called out as he searched for him. Roger found his way into the kitchen having let himself in from one of the side entries and he saw Glade sitting on the floor, bleeding and quietly crying. The kitchen was a wreck and Roger seemed to know what happened. He then walked into the living room and saw Alex on the floor in tears.
As Dex walked in with a change of clothes in his hands, Roger gave him a stern look and said, "You hurt your sister? What the hell's wrong with you man?!"
Dex ignored him and walked back into the kitchen and said to Glade, "You remember what I said, freak!"
Roger shook his head in disbelief but did nothing to help Glade or Alex as he was still Dex's friend and he didn't want to be late for work. Roger was a coward. Glade wasn't sure if Roger's disbelief was over Dex's temper or from Dex’s lies that Glade might be gay.
After they left, Glade got up and began cleaning up his blood off of the floor with a soapy washcloth. But he suddenly stopped and said angrily but quietly through his tears, "I'm so tired of this sh--!" as he threw the wet and bloody washcloth against the refrigerator door.
He then stood up. Tired, he leaned back against the kitchen counter top and wiped away more tears. He then noticed something on the kitchen counter that grabbed his attention. His facial expression became more confident as a small smile slowly crept across his face. With a calm look in his eyes of purposeful determination, he walked over and grabbed a large chef's knife. He held it firmly in his right hand in a ready-to-stab grip and walked slowly up the curved staircase.
Alex was still sobbing on the floor in the other room but more softly now despite her extreme pain. She listened to see if she could hear where Glade might be and if he was okay. She knew she heard movement in the kitchen, and she knew she heard someone walk up the stairs. Was it Glade? Was her mom awake? Had Dex returned after forgetting to bring something else to work? She listened intently and tried to ignore her pain as the whole left side of her body seemed to throb in torturous agony.
She then heard several short, successive sounds like a large paper cutter slicing several sheets of paper. One slice after another.
Glade had let himself into Dex's room and had used the large chef's knife to slice with one firm stab into each of the top surface heads of the drum toms of Dex's precious $5,000 custom made drum set. Nothing was spared as Glade continued to slice the snare drum and both bass drums. He targeted every drum surface. Every top tom, every drum head––everything that required a pristine surface tension for emitting the sounds of a drum as its surface was struck in rhythm to a beat––was destroyed. Glade stopped momentarily and looked at the damage. He soaked in the satisfaction of his revenge as another calm smile crept across his face.
With the destruction of Dex's prized drum set now complete, Glade knew he could never cross paths with Dexter ever again because after this, the next confrontation with him could prove fatal for Glade. It was time for Glade to pack up and leave as quickly as possible.
Glade ran into his room and grabbed a large duffel bag. He began throwing together various shirts, pants, magazines, books, and other things. He would grab his backpack on his way out since it had his laptop, cell phone, charger and other things he needed and used regularly. After he shoved his clothing and other gear into his duffel bag, he quickly zipped it up and headed back down the stairs.
As he ran into the kitchen to return the knife and get his backpack, he stopped and listened. He could hear Alex crying quietly. He put away the knife, dropped his bag and followed the sounds of her whimpering.
After finding Alex in pain and still crying on the floor, he knelt down by her and said empathetically, "Oh, Alex. I'm so sorry. I didn't know where you were." He wiped away a couple of her tears and then moved in closer to comfort her with a hug.
"No!" she cried out in fear of his accidentally hurting her more and she shrieked again in sudden pain as he tried to hug her. Glade stopped h
ugging her and gave her some space. He began to look her over to figure out where she was injured.
"I'm so sorry, Alex. Did he hurt you? What did Dex do? Can you tell me, sweetie?"
She tried to talk in between sobs. "He...he yanked…my arm."
Glade listened closely and wiped away more of her tears. He began to get teary again as he saw her in pain.
"I tried to call Dad, but..." Alex couldn't finish her sentence and she began to weep more openly with the thought of the same disappointing story: she couldn't reach Dad. Not that it would've made any difference anyway. What would Glenda have done? It's not like she could pull their dad out of a major lifesaving surgery or some sad, doom-and-gloom patient consultation. Besides, Dad was all talk and no action. He would often say he would punish Dex but nothing ever happened to Dex and if he was ever punished, it sure wasn't working since Dex continued to be violent at home.
Glade seemed to sense her thoughts as he said, "I know. It probably wouldn't have done any good anyway." He then sat down on the floor and tried not to seem like he was in a rush to leave in case Dex returned home early for any reason. "Look. Alex. You have to tell me where it hurts."
"My arm …my shoulder,” she sniffled, “and my leg."
"Can you move your arm? Just a little bit?" She tried to move her arm but trying only made her cry out in more pain.
Glade sighed. "We have to get you to the hospital. I'll go see if Mom will take us again."
He ran quickly over to their parent’s bedroom and quietly knocked on the door. Part of him wanted to burst open the door and shake their mom awake as he felt his very life hung in the balance if Dex came back home before Glade could leave since he destroyed his drums. But Glade knew he couldn't show his fear and alarm to his mom so he began gently pushing his mom’s shoulder to try and wake her.
"Mom? Mom? Can you hear me? Alex needs to be taken to the hospital." No response. She snoozed on. Glade pushed a little harder and got a little louder. "Mom! Alex needs to go to the hospital! You need to drive."
She rolled over in a fog of sleepiness and mumbled, "Don't bother me. I'm sleeping."
Just before he got louder, he stopped himself and cursed quietly, "Crap!" He realized that even if he woke her, she'd be angry, then she'd bicker a bit with him and who knew if she'd even be alert enough to drive anyway.
He decided he'd have to drive since there were clearly no other options. He didn't want to waste time trying to find a neighbor who could drive and then they'd know more of the family problems, which, of course, would bother Dad as the Opalstone family image must at all times be perfect in the eyes of his upper-class friends.
Glade began to search for his mom's purse. He quickly found it and began to dig through it to get her car keys. He then remembered to grab some emergency cash from his dad's dresser drawer. He opened the drawer and stuffed several hundreds and fifties into his pocket. He hoped the money would be enough to get him a safe place to stay and last long enough for him to find a job. With car keys in hand and cash in pocket, he quietly shut his parent’s bedroom door and ran back over to Alex.
"Let's go," he said to her. He was eager to leave.
Glade helped Alex to stand and then he gently picked her up to get her off of her feet and carried her over to his mom's luxury sedan. He sat Alex up on the hood, opened the front passenger side door, and then picked her back up to gently seat her as comfortably as he could inside. Alex winced in pain much of the way.
Once she was seated inside, he said to her, "I'll be right back." He then closed her car door. He quickly ran back into the house, grabbed his duffel bag, picked up his backpack and returned to the car. He popped open the trunk and tossed in both the duffel bag and backpack, closed it and got into the drivers seat of the car.
"I take it that Mom's not driving us," Alex said, wincing a little more in pain.
"Mom's not driving us," Glade affirmed.
"I didn't know you could drive," Alex said curiously. "Who taught you?"
"No one," he lied. He then pushed the button on the garage remote.
"So then you don't know how to drive?"
"You just keep thinking that," He replied as the garage door opened behind them. As Glade backed the car out, Alex suddenly had a look of real worry over the safety issues of Glade's supposed inexperience with driving. Glade got them out of the garage and down the driveway safely much to Alex's confused amazement.
"But you're not supposed to know how to drive," she said.
"Then don't tell anyone," he replied.
Glade made sure to obey all of the speed limits and stop at all stop signals as well as obeying all the other rules of the road. He was making good time and he was now nearly three quarters of the way to the hospital where their dad worked.
"What's the duffel bag in the trunk for?" Alex asked curiously.
"For later."
"What happens later?" She sniffled.
"Dex sees his drum set," Glade smiled.
"What's your duffel bag have to do with it?"
"It's gonna help me disappear," he replied with a mysterious smirk.
"Why?"
"Because I slashed all the drums in Dex's drum set," he smiled mischievously.
"Cool," Alex said slowly with a matching mischievous smile as she wiped away another tear from her face.
As they drove up into the parking lot of the emergency room, Glade found a spot close to the entrance and parked. He got out and picked Alex up as gently as he could and carried her into the ER.
