LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE

A series of loud bangs awake me from my bed abruptly. “Police, open up.” I hear the voices of three men yelling. My mother is yelling at my father. The words sound like a long phrase of noises, as she uncontrollably sobs in fear. When I finally get to the bottom of the stairs, I see my mother helplessly pulling my father’s arm, like when a baby grabs a parent’s finger for the first time. That tight grip, as he yells at her sternly to get off, and apologizes.

“Daddy what’s going on?”

            “Not now son, I Love you, I will be home soon.” He says

            “Where are you going dad, I don’t understand?”

            “Nancy, please take him away. He doesn’t need to see this.”

These, I learned, would be the last words I would hear from him, for years. I fight my mother’s restraint and run up the stairs to my window to see him leave. He is being taken away in handcuffs. The fear and confusion I feel at this moment is unbearable, and I know will never fully leave my mind.

I awake in a cold sweat. My body shivers a little as a breeze from the open window hits my moist skin. This nightmare continues to haunt me, night after night. Constantly hoping that just once I will wake up and a nightmare is all it will be.

            I sit in my room looking out the window. It’s snowy, and chilly out. Like the exact weather it was this night ten years ago. The date is January 24, 2001. Today marks the tenth year my father has been in jail. I was 11 years old.

The white powdered snow covered the grass slightly. It was a beautiful, still and calm night, which I learned soon, would turn into the worst night of my life. A cold breeze blew through my window as I was awaken by the banging. This night I recollect often.

My father is a murderer, I think. The words cut through my chest like a knife. The man that I have been looking up to my entire life is a monster. My father always had a bit of a temper, but I never thought he was capable of killing another man. He just snapped.

As I am told, this event started at a bar. My father had a very long day of work, and did not get the promotion he had been working for, for years. I remember the look on his face that evening when he came home. His eyes were bloodshot, his face red. He tried to tell my mother but couldn’t get all the words out. All she wanted was to console him, but in this moment, nothing she could do was right. The loud jingling of the keys as he nervously, but quickly grabbed them, still rings in my ears. Very sternly, almost yelling, he says, “I need to go clear my head Nancy.”

            The tears began to roll down her face, and her trembling hands tried to reach out, trying to stop him from leaving. If only he could have seen the look in her eyes, maybe she could have saved him.

            “Whiskey on the rocks,” my father said to the bar tender, again and again.

A man sat on the barstool next to him. He was largely built, standing at about 6 foot 4 inches, and weighing 220 lbs. My father was also a big man. He was slightly shorter, but weighed about the same, with more muscle. They were both intoxicated. A woman near them approached my father, maybe she was flirting with him, or she just wanted to talk, but being so angry he just shrugged her off. This man next to my father didn’t feel the same way and saw this as his opportunity, and swooped in on this beautiful woman. She was 5’9, with long blonde curly hair, and a petite waist. The man was very rough with her, touching, and pushing her almost immediately. It was clear he wasn’t taking no for an answer. This infuriated my father even more.

            “Hey back off man, can’t you see she isn’t interested.” He said projecting his voice as he rose from his bar stool.

            “I don’t see how this is any of your business man, you had your chance.”

            “When you put your hands on a woman in my presence, you make it my business.” My father said, always being very protective. This is one of the many reason he was a man I looked up to.

            A few minutes later, both the men were outside in a dark alley yelling profanities at each other. The sound of the music from inside the bar was muffled with their yelling, and the occasional honk of a horn, as cars drove by. Within seconds, my father had wrestled this big man to the ground. It could have been the adrenaline, or the alcohol. The man held my father’s neck trying to hurt him, and push him off, but my father could not stop hitting him. The anger, and fear, and his blood alcohol level took control. He did not stop hitting him for what seemed like a long time. Finally, after one last punch, he took a breath. The man’s hands had fallen to the ground some time ago and had stopped moving. Oh my god, I killed him, I killed a man, my father thought. 

            It shocks me that he didn’t also kill himself, when he then ran to his car and sped home. How he kept the car on the road, and managed to stay alive, and not kill another person, is a question that also haunts me daily.

He came stumbling in the front door, while I was asleep. My mother sitting at the kitchen, waiting up for him worried. She immediately smelled the alcohol, and saw the look on his face and knew something bad had happened.

            The words come pouring out of his mouth, with no control. The whole night is relived in horrific detail. The tears begin to role down her face, and she looks like a helpless, terrified puppy. I hear the bang of his head hitting the table as he collapses in disappointment and fear. This is followed by those three loud bangs at our front door. My mother’s eyes widen, and my father’s head rises slowly, and their eyes meet, both sets of eyes are screaming with fear and helplessness when they hear the words,

 “Police. Open up.”