Secrets and Lies | ✔️

Chapter 1 - Conrad

D.S. Jamison © Copyright 2015. All Rights Reserved.
This story contains acts of violence abuse. Reader discretion is advised.

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Ch1 - Conrad Austin

"Conrad, stop! He's just a baby! You're being unreasonable," Elizabeth screamed. She tried to tear the shaking child from his father's arms. "He didn't mean to do it. It was an accident. Please don't do this!"

Conrad stared red-faced into the pleading eyes of his wife and gripped the back of the boy's neck a little tighter. "I don't give a shit if he meant to do it or not. He's three-years-old, for fuck's sake! Too damn old to be pissing in his pants. Isn't that right, Steven?" he demanded, not even phased by the frightened child's tear-soaked face.

"You've made this mess, now you're going to clean it up." He tossed the boy to the moistened spot on the carpet and threw him a dry rag. "And when you're finished cleaning the floor, go clean yourself. You're filthy," he said, his deafening voice filled with disgust. "I don't work my ass off everyday to pay for this house, only to have some brat soil the carpet like a fucking dog!"

Conrad stormed out of the room, leaving the heavy sobs of his wife and child behind. Damn it, what had he done to deserve this? He'd just spent the last ten hours at work, up to his ears in mergers and acquisitions, and when he'd finally been able to come home he had to deal with this annoyance. It just wasn't fair.

Why had he ever agreed to say, "I do" in the first place? What had he been thinking? And how had his head been so far up his ass when he'd allowed his nagging wife to talk him into trying for a baby? He should have known how it would all work out. Hell, his own childhood had been no picnic. He'd watched his parents fight with each other day and night. He saw first-hand how miserable they'd been together. Conrad was a smarter man than his father, he should have seen this coming. It pained him he had not. His father would roll over in his grave if he could see the mess he had made of his life. How he'd become a slave to a beastly wife and lousy, good-for-nothing child.

The reason his own father had hated him so much was because kids were a lot of work. They spent your money and dirtied your house, and never appreciated the struggle to put food on the table or clothes on their back. They were ungrateful little assholes - just like wives. But it was too late now. He'd dug his own grave, and he had no one to blame but himself. Of course, that didn't stop him from taking it out on everyone else. A little stress reliever.

Maybe he'd just married the wrong woman, conceived the wrong child? Conrad released an ill-humored snort. Was there such a thing as the right woman? In his opinion there wasn't. His father had warned him time and time again growing up that women were good for only one thing and that was to bear a male child to carry on the family name. His father had instilled in him a strong sense of tradition and core values that if carefully cultivated would pass on from generation to generation. That's all he was trying to do for Steven. If you wanted to raise a strong man, you needed to start early on. You needed to teach him what it meant to be a man. You needed to plant the seed of discipline, and show them how to take the lead. You needed to make sure they understood the importance of control and why it was imperative to gain it from the very start. In school, at work - with wives...

'At least Elizabeth had done one thing right', he sighed heavily as he reached into the handcrafted mahogany cabinet and pulled out an expensive bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon. He lifted a long-stemmed glass from the wine rack and poured himself a healthy amount. 'Steven might be a whiny, no-good punk, but thank God he's a boy. The Austin name will live on through him, if nothing else.'

If Elizabeth would just stop coddling their son, maybe Steven would man up a little more. There was no reason in the world why a three-year-old child wasn't fully potty-trained. When he was three-years-old, he'd been pouring mixed drinks for his father and tucking his mother into bed after she'd passed out drunk for the night. If he hadn't stepped up and took charge during her intoxicated stupors, no one would have - certainly not his father. He'd all but washed his hands of her.

It had been very difficult as a child to witness his mother's slack expression after finishing off a fifth of vodka, something she did on a regular basis. After all, she had given birth to him, and she'd been his caretaker when sober enough to do so. But in the end, she was still just a woman, unable to control her greed, her incessant desire to self-medicate. His father had been right, women were by far the weaker sex, and his own mother's deficiencies had proven that. Often times, he wondered if he really even loved her, or if it was pity he felt, instead.

Conrad had learned at a very young age that life wasn't always easy, but if you wanted to survive you needed to roll with the punches. His wife should learn to cut the fucking cord already, and stop raising a little pansy-ass mama's-boy who was too afraid to break away from his mother's plump tit. The signs were there from the very beginning, he'd just been too blind to see it. The way Elizabeth had always caressed and spoiled Steven, even as a newborn. The second the baby would cry, she would rush immediately to his side and tend to his every whim. Hadn't she ever heard the phrase "let the baby cry it out"? Everyone knew you weren't supposed to run every time an infant made a noise, you'd just be teaching the baby, much like Pavlov's Dogs, that a certain action always triggered a certain response. Classical Conditioning, that's what it was called. Child cries, mother runs. Steven never really stood a chance - and it was all Elizabeth's fault.

'How embarrassing,' Conrad cringed. No son of his was going to bawl like a whiny, little girl every time he found himself in a little bit of trouble. The time had come. He had no choice but to introduce Steven to the School of Hard Knocks, just as he had been introduced by his father once upon a time.

No matter what his stupid wife thought...

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Hello, and thank you so much for reading Secrets and Lies — and a HUGE thank you for your patience while waiting for its release!!

So, this is Steven's father (his pic is in the media section), and as you can see, the cycle of abuse goes way back. Was Steven a bad guy in the end? YES!! But he didn't exactly have the greatest role models growing up.

Secrets and Lies will bounce back and forth between different points-of-view, just as The Secret did. There will be flashbacks, and you will finally be able to see what life had been like for Steven growing up.

If you liked this chapter, please consider leaving a vote/comment — I sure would appreciate it!

This chapter is dedicated to reader @swarm98. She had some awesome questions about Steven's past, and I hope this new story will clear some of that up.

Thanks so much for reading!! XO