Crushed!

Oliver

I ran as fast as I could. A drop of rain touched my spectacles and in seconds my glasses were full of droplets, I removed them as I continued to run. The grey of the clouds went violet and more violet, bright lightning followed by a loud thud of thunder, gushed in vibration through all the windows of the houses. The rain grew its pace, it became harsher and heavier while it poured down. I looked back and I could still feel him coming at me. I ran faster and faster until I reached my place. I was soaking wet. I ran up the stairs, almost was about to fall, but somehow I saved myself. I put down my heavier than a usual bag, and it felt like I had saved it from drowning. I dinged my hand in it and kept struggling to find the key. The air felt like it was going thicker and thicker as the distance between him and me kept decreasing. He was so close to trap and clench and suffocate me in life further. In a panic, I tore half my notebook, finally discovered it in some corner of the bag tangled in wet strands of torn paper. I managed to rescue it out. My hand shook and I couldn't stop sobbing as I put the key in the keyhole. The key fell almost and I heard the gate open and close. I quickly picked the key and unlocked the door. As I went in he had started mounting the stairs. I screamed a bit in fear and shut the door behind me and locked it. I saw him banging on the door and I took a knife and stood alert, just in case he managed to enter. After constantly banging and punching and kicking the door he went off and kicked terribly on it and the ground- like as loud as he probably could. I walked towards the door and threw myself at the door and slid down in relief. I cried like a little boy, felt so cold and it felt like an irritation when one cringes as if a bug went all over my body while scratching all over my neck and my arm. But that bug wasn't found. I brought my legs near my body in fear as I ran my hands over my legs and puffed my hair back from my forehead. I bent in the darkness between my knees, I rocked myself to calm and controlled my sobs.

I dared to pick myself up from the floor and just felt like the world's filth was suffocating and twirling all around my body. I took my towel and went inside the bathing room. I felt so cold, I stood underneath the shower and ran the water on me. The hot water seeped through my clothes and the coldness seemed to go away. I realized in a minute that I didn't remove my clothes. I held my zipper. I just didn't feel comfortable enough to remove it. I just rejected hard in my head, twitched my neck like I have lost myself. I wrapped my towel around me and went to my room, I slid my sponge clothes and wore new ones. I picked them up and tossed them in the dryer. I locked the house and laid under the sheets. It kept coming back to me. I couldn't forget it so easily I should have. I just couldn't recollect and process the why and how dare he and how weak am? More than on him I was frustrated with me. It all just faced like I should have either stopped him earlier or should have given myself to him.

My dad comes around 11 PM at night, and the deal is: I should be asleep before his return. He worked at McLeay, he has his meetings and settlement regulations, and all the works usually late till night. Sometimes 12 AM or sometimes 12:30 AM. That night, he came fairly late around 2 AM, I guess. I saw him enter, change to his jammies, but I pretended to close my eyes as he switched on and off the lights. I think he did the message, someone, before coming to bed. Usually, he sleeps in the other room but I don't know, call it a father's instinct, he just comes when I need him. He got into the sheets with me, I still had my eyes closed on my side, he wrapped his arm beneath mine and put his head on mine and pulled himself towards my body & hugged me tighter. He exhaled a comforting sigh like he had returned home after a long time. I turned to him to confide in him. A splinter of tear managed to escape out of my eyes which I kept wrapped in for such a long time. I wrapped my arms around him like it was all going to be fine.

He knew something was wrong but he let it go, and honestly, I also didn't want to talk to him or as a matter of fact to anyone about it.

Henry

Henry was on a conference call with Patrick. Nakeya wanted to tie up with McLeay. Faruk was also on the call. Patrick wanted them to first put up a press release so that Nakeya couldn't take back their offer. Faruk was a PR intern, he worked under Patrick. He was allowed in most of the calls as he was Henry's favorite intern. Henry was the Chief Executive Officer of McLeay. It was an online shopping company and was one of the first to online produce branded designs of its own. Nakeya was a fading fashion house. McLeay was one of its sore competitors. Nakeya proposed their merger so that Nakeya would pitch in creative ideas for branded designs and McLeay could sell the clothes of both the brands, online. A secret which people of the world didn't know was that McLeay only produced according to the orders placed. The producers of McLeay didn't pre-produce, and Nakeya wanted the marking of clothes to be expanded to stores. This information, if it came out it would have jinxed the reputation of the company, and worst part would have been that not only it would have affected the sales but it would have been a media gossip too.

He was so engrossed with Patrick and Faruk that he forgot that Olivia was to be taken to her obstetrician. Olivia stumbled, almost fell and Henry didn't even lift his eyebrow in concern. She laughed it off and sat on the sofa adjacent to the office where Henry was working. Olivia cleared her throat & loudly signaled him it's getting late. He didn't even look at her but gave a graciously irritating cringe of a gesture to her to shut up while he's working. She ignored the fact what he just indicated and that he doesn't care about his unborn child. She let it go like water off her back and went herself with the driver.

After half an hour Henry finished his chat. Patrick was fully convinced that if they cross the bridge of public scrutiny on media they will surely be able to spin it in a way that will produce no negative effect. Faruk took notes and paid extra attention to how Patrick convinced Henry to take a professional risk. Henry poured himself a drink, while he, drank he noticed a mark on the calendar and realized that hey had to go to the OB/GYN. He completed his drink and went into the bedroom, switched on the television, and got into the sheets. Olivia came after two hours, she put the groceries and snacks in the kitchen. She picked up four packets of chips and chocolate chip ice-cream along with a spoon. She kept the food, got into pajamas, and hopped into the sheets with Henry. They had the food there. Henry coldly asked if everything was fine and she nodded. They sat together, hulled, and snacked chips and watched 101 Dalmatians. The chips were over. Olivia sat back, pulled a spoon out, and started digging in on the ice-cream. Henry looked at her and she smirked and said "What? This is just for me, you want it go take it." He laughed and went to sleep while Olivia patted her stomach and ate her ice-cream.

9 years later…

 Oliver

I walked into the conference office and Faruk was conducting the website comments meeting. Patrick was sitting at the back and observing Faruk closely. The meeting ended and we all started leaving when Patrick said Henry would like to welcome all of us personally once. The 64-year-old owner came in the office occasionally. Dad used to talk about him, it was hard for me to work at a place my dad worked before he died, two years ago. But McLeay and Nakeya were the best in the business. Henry had a talk with all of us and told that the place is an amazing office, it is not a regular clothing company, it was a brand and more than clothes they talked about ideas and strategies. They were on the verge of the publication of their magazine, which will give rise to a whole plethora of job options. The magazine runner will be Patrick and Faruk will take over his present job. Excited we all were and in a few minutes when he told us to get back to our work, a peon whispered in Henry's ear and he told me to stay back. I kind of knew why he asked me to stay back. "You are Samuel's son right! Ah, I hope you are, if not better, at least as good as him. He was a gem of a person, I loved almost all his ideas. I'm really sorry for your loss. If you don't mind me asking, how did it happen?" "Well, Mr. Henry, it was a heart attack and I will try my best to beat his record." I smiled sadly and he gave a pat on my back and told me to resume working.

Months went by, I became more and more comfortable at my work. All of us, after work, jammed back at the bar. Sometimes, we all used to meet at someone's housework, with Faruk and Patrick on call. I sometimes used to take my work to the bar, alone whenever I could not exactly work my writing. You can't always write when ten co-workers are hounding you about the office. But don't like alone rooms. This was all about what happened to me when I was thirteen. It is not the best of the tributes to my father but that night, not saying anything and just being there, no questions asked no nothing. It is a short story, how a man in the dark wearing a jacket, I don't remember seeing his face…

I was going home from my evening classes when a man from nowhere emerged in front of me and suddenly the full of cars road became an abandoned road. It was unclear what he wanted but he did stop me, I thought he was about to ask his way but instead, he forced himself on me and dragged me behind a tree. He had a mask on his face and all. I screamed like anything but everyone was like deaf and kept walking away. He ran his hands on my face and then rested one on my chest and the other on my left butt cheek. He ran his hand on the chest across my body and was about to go in on the crotch. I shoved my knees into his dick and pushed him with all my strength then ran as fast as I could. As I pushed him away I noticed he was wearing a mask or a rubber cover-up thingy. The weather went grey and purple and thunder followed by the heaviest rain possible. I just cannot remember his face or any detail about him. I only remember he followed me back home and went after trying to break in. He left somehow and it all just ended.

I was writing at the bar and suddenly, I felt a tap or something on my back and it was Faruk. I didn't ever expect him to meet me at a public place and like care enough to say hi to me. With a strange look, I just greeted him back after a chit chat, I never expected him to sit with me and order a drink. I don't know whether I was more surprised than irritated. After a drink or so, he excused himself and went away. I got back to my work and soon out of nowhere he came back and stood behind me and arched on me. I was about to stand and sham him and storm out when I felt something on my waist. It was a gun. I became alert as he said not to utter a word. I nodded and said, "What do you want?" He asked me to just obey him. I said I would do nothing of any sort for him or to him or anything of that sort. He smirked and said "Oh honey! You will follow and don't worry I won't do anything. You have to walk into Room 1720 on Floor 9 and stay there. Henry wants to talk to you or simply, you are literally 'fired'…"

"And if I say I am happy to go rather than 'obey' you."

"Shut up! Move your ass, he just wanna talk genius, the gun is just for clarity."

I took a deep breath and went inside the elevator and I was ready to push in the wrong floor button and then walk down the stairs to go from the fire escape. Room 1720 was on Floor 9, I pushed the Number 7 on the elevator keypad. I decamped the elevator on floor 7, walked away, looked up both my sides and started fleeing to the fire escape. As I opened the door and took a few steps down, the pace of my feet started to increase as something iffy started to feel down my soul. I was in-between floors 6 and 5 when the kitchen door opened suddenly and some gal with a fake chef's apron with the initials of VM, and dismantled chef's hat, saw me up and down. And in a few seconds, as I went barely three steps past her she just flung a stick out of no-where and knocked my head off. She tied my hands at the back and I think I saw Faruk help the VM-lady pick me up and deliver me to the room they wanted me in. They threw me on a one-seated couch. I think it was Henry who told them to take leave. I gained consciousness with a dizzily ditzy sight and the bitch didn't even open my tied hands. "What!" I shouted in the room as Henry was not to be seen. Some kind of shimmy music started to play over the saxophone and Henry entered wearing flair trips of clothes, tucked in his shorts. He walked in vigorously, draping a million colors on him, he pulled the smallest cloth and whipped it on my forearm. He went from behind me dancing like anything and whining like a Cuban and he lifted his flat chest, shimmed twice, and fell for the brightest color of it. I felt so violated and disturbed that I couldn't stop stammering in the fear. I didn't have the privilege of touching my face, in dread. I opened my mouth took an involuntary breath. He shouted the loudest shhh! It was like I was a small kid again. I just felt a whole new kind of fear, and all my attempts to flee away were in vain. The music ended and Henry took a sign of tiredness and as I struggled to stand and flee he slapped hardest and picked his fallen cloth, layered it thrice, and blindfolded me as tight as he could. He dragged me to the bed threw me on my stomach and picked the rest of his wrapping cloths and tried to tie my feet. As I agitated and fiddled for him not to tie them, I kicked him on his face. He held my legs, knees at the edge of the wood bed. He sat on the backside of my calves and jumped on them as a toddler on a new sofa. I held them strong and he just kept hopping with more strength. I heard him walk past and I let go a bit. I heard a couple of ice cubes drop in the glass followed by the rush of liquid, the cubes clinked on the glass. The silence grew bigger and bigger. I could hear him gulp his drink and the sound of a rub of his hands and his cheeks and neck. The silence began, even more, I didn't even hear the air moving. Suddenly, I heard him racing towards me faster and he pounced on me and landed with the feet, swished in-between my hind-thigh. He wildly jammed into my lumbar region. It felt like he pushed my pelvis into the girdle deeper in. Without any mercy, he stood on me and trampolined on my calves. He scalloped the grafts of my tibia and scrapped on them. I screamed as loud as I possibly could and somehow he sounded to like it even more, so I didn't even breathe loudly. I stitched my mouth shut. He dragged my pants down, tore off my shirt from behind, and sprung straight to my neck and mushed it like clay. I was moving like a fish out of water with the tied hands and feet and blindfolded eyes and he took the only control on me that I had left. Henry finally left my neck and he just without even any awareness of pain shoved all of his junk inside of me. I couldn't handle to shut myself anymore as I shouted in pain. He kept shoving inside me without any decency or mercy. While he was entering he kept saying things like he murdered my father and before he died he had a letter addressed to me and he kept mounting inside me. With my legs and hands tied and my eyes blindfolded, he was mounting with such indecency he was peeling the skin off my ankles, as the damn cloth fired against it. He was finished and I kept shouting in terror and fear, he untied and removed my blindfold and un-layered clothes and threw them on me. He wore his 'gentle-man' coat as I lay there dismantled and decapitated. He took an envelope out of his pocket and kept it in front of my eyes. He bent and bought his face to the back of my neck, he sniffed his way from my left ear to right. I tremored and he dug his head in the corner of my neck and whispered in my ear, "I wouldn't even shred a tear if you were to die… and yeah! Not that you care, but I'm the one who was behind the mask, Little boy."

Henry

He walked out of the room and left Oliver there. He could hear him talk to Faruk outside, he said not to enter till Oliver was in his senses and then he left the building. He walked out of the hotel, the bartender gave him a respectful nod, and walked past the lady with VM initials, she was the door-woman. She looked at him, Henry patted on her back and walked into his car. He instructed his driver to take him home, he checked his phone and he had two messages. One from Olivia, who had gone out into the city to attend a meeting, she was telling him that she had landed. The other was from Patrick, which said to check his mail as he had sent him a mock-up for the first edition of the opening of the magazine.

He reached his home, stepped out of the car. He walked up the stairs, unlocked the door, and Bella sat there typing on her phone. He looked at her and nodded, she stood up and spoke fast, "Okay, so I put down Joe on time, he was a bit cranky so I allowed him to eat ice-cream before sleeping. Honestly speaking he is like the most well-behaved 9-year-old. He didn't ask any questions or tried for extra game time, he didn't even ask me a second time for ice-cream."

"Thank you, Bella, Olivia will clear your dues. And would you like a cup of coffee or something before you leave." He smirked.

"Oh no, actually I had a planned movie tonight until you disrupted my plans with your emergency, so I am gonna go try and catch that movie with my partner. And just for your information, babysitters also have a life, so I'm sure you must have some people you know, so ask them next time perve." She walked off with anger and quickly texted Olivia that next time she isn't doing emergencies.

Henry changed into his pajamas and instead of sleeping in his room he went to Joe's room, he went under his quilt and put his arm under his, Joe instinctively opened his eyes in despair of alert. He pulled him near to his body and kept his head above the little boy's. He sighed heavily and slept like a baby where Joe was so scared that he didn't even blink the rest of the night, as he could feel Henry sleep.

Oliver

Henry wore his clothes and went out. He kept an envelope and whispered something nasty. I lay there on my stomach, violated, struggling for my own identity. The things I could have done- ran, or hit back. I am just not ready to believe that I had to go through such a thing. I couldn't feel anything in me. My insides were torn. And the once which weren't were fighting to reach out of spasm. The muscles of my internals fought not to bruise and bleed out. I was still confused about my father's death. I somehow extended my arm out and held the envelope and tore it open.

 

"Hey, kid,

I never wanted you to find out through a letter but, it is better this way, it is just easier to write and let you find out after my death. I mean what if you don't wanna talk to me after knowing the truth. So anyway, once I die you will find this somewhere shoved in my closet and will know the truth…

So here it is love! So I don't know how to start and explain everything to you. Let's start with my history.

You know your grandmother, Veronica died years after my birth and I was brought up by your great-grandmother. I want to tell you about my birth father. I never knew who he was or anything, granny never wanted me to know, but after reaching a stage her opinion legally isn't into consideration, so when I turned 24 I came to know he was 41. I finally decided to find my biological father. I mean even if I am that unlikable how dare he abandoned me. So after like a million tests and all one name came up Henry Tyler, the owner of McLeay. At that time it wasn't such famous, but owning a flourishing company is also a big thing. So, I didn't expose my identity to my dad, and I don't know how he knew when he first saw me. I know he is the worst person you can ever meet baby. He is a vulture. I don't care about what the world has to say about him but the amount of pain he has given me, the pain to my soul he gave is unbearable.

So that person calls me in his office, I thought he didn't know about me, but he called me to talk about this. I still remember Oli, it was a hotel with a fancy bar at the bottom and some mega-floors. He had a room on Floor 7, Room 1720. I went in. He told me everything about my birth. So in his words, 'well I was 17 at the time I first met Veronica. And well I'm not gonna sugar-coat it you are no one to me. So, let's cut the crap, I raped her and then she got pregnant and then after some years, I found out that she had kept the baby. She was really like this unpredictable. I thought she aborted for good, but there you are standing. So I found out that she had kept the baby, you! I tracked her and she told me that she has to keep her mouth shut, the poor woman was so clueless she never planned to tell the world that I was generous enough to do it with her. Well, I didn't want any trouble so I had her killed. And you boy, Samuel, you have to shut up about all of it you will meet your dear mommy, and to make sure of that you will work for me so that if you choose to be this clever I will kill you.' I took a breather and parted my mouth to say something and he just lifted his hand and said "that's all, get lost."

I worked for him, I was provided with shelter and I did hate the presence of the murderer of my mother who was a man who impregnated her. At 26, two years later, I finally gained courage and after a year or so to flee and live in hiding than living in a paper town or something. Just when I did decide, I came back to the office to keep my keycard and to steal some of the money I deserved. I found the bastard molesting another woman. I didn't do anything at that time, because I did know that he would have killed me and Patricia, the intern he was on top of. I didn't tell her that I knew about what he did to her, but I did keep tabs on her. She was also pregnant. But unfortunately, she died in childbirth, and I'm sorry for you to find it this way, but any other way would have been even crueler. I lied about my age to you I'm four years younger than I told you. He doesn't know about you yet. And if he does he will try to hurt you. I have tried to protect you all my life Oliver and now that I'm dead you need to know the sad facts to protect yourself. I am actually your brother, but you tell me. Does DNA actually mean that he is our father? I don't think so. Biologically I'm your brother, but trust me. I am your father, DNA doesn't say so but…

That's not all actually when you turned 13 he actually was about 56 and he had a child with his wife, Olivia. His name I'm not sure if it's Joseph or Joe. Now, I want you to know that I love you more than anything in the world son. And I kept all these things for your protection.

I'm sorry child if you feel I have hurt you in any way by keeping the truth form you, but I hope you forgive me. And if you want to forgive me, ask yourself that in this case at least, is it harder to speak or to die?

I am extremely sorry,

Your FATHER (believe it or not, I am the real one, not the biological one),

Samuel."

Tears rushed out of my eyes as I read that. I stopped feeling my muscles below the waist, I had absolutely no words.

Suddenly Oliver felt gushes of blood rising in his body. He gained the taste of it in his mouth and he internally bled rapidly. As blood increased to flow from the body, out of his torn tissues, he could feel going into the water. He felt floating in the water and he found Samuel. He held his father's hand in the dead rotten water, as they floated into eternity.