My dad always managed to keep the monsters away. Some of them real and others imagined. I won’t bore you with my fears of vampires and Freddy Krueger. Obviously they don’t exist. Rather I will write of one dark creature that did exist.
This monster’s name was Richard.
He was my mom’s boyfriend for ten plus years. He has other nicknames but they are too vulgar for me to post. He was terribly abusive to my mother and his own children.
The scary thing about him was his tirades were never instigated by an outside source, such as drugs or alcohol. His cruelty existed naturally.
So after spending months living in his hell along with his other captives (my mom and his children), I managed to escape. I was only 8 years old. I had found freedom and had moved in with my dad.
Clyfford Still, "Untitled (Fear)" (1945)
Years went by and my mom would leave Monster every now and then. She would eventually return, and his venom continued to spew.* He made it a point to threaten all of those who he felt were attempting to usurp his power over my mom. He made threatening phone calls to my dad and other family members. Some threats were to beat us all up and other threats were to kill us. He had also threatened to kidnap me and had actually made a physical attempt to do so. I don’t recall the specific details of what really went on. I do, however, remember watching my sweet grandmother cry after speaking to Monster on the phone. God knows what he said to her that day.
Wanting to protect my grandmother and fearing for my safety, my dad and I left grandma’s sanctuary, homeless. That whole summer we lived in either a hotel or in our brown and green station wagon. When the threats died down, we headed north. We pitched our tent in the little town of Yreka, far away from L.A. and from bad memories. He wanted a fresh start for us. He told me he could easily lose me in a big city and preferred a small town so he could keep an eye on me.
Looking back on the events of that summer, I don’t recall one time being afraid of Monster or any other ones for that matter. I always felt safe with my dad. To me he was the strongest man alive. He fought battles that I never knew about until I was much older. He had a way of keeping the scary things of this world at bay.
I wasn’t sheltered but I never lived in fear.
Since that summer, I have come into contact with other types of monsters (luckily, none like Richard (aka “Asshole”)). But it hasn’t been until now that they have found their way in my closet or under my bed. Some are real and some have only been conjured up in my head. My warrior is no longer here to chase them away.
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*My mom did eventually escape Monster for good in 1989.
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