July 13, 2009
Hershey, PA, USA
Part 9
Chad's POV
"Sarah, honey, are you okay?" I ask my daughter as I get ready to go on stage and she nods, wiping away tears and that's when I see that she's bleeding on her arms.
"Baby, what did you do?" I ask as I pull her sleeves up and see that they're not accidental scrapes, but cuts up her arms.
"I don't want to be here anymore!" She cries and I hold her close as she sobs when I see my fifteen year old son come in and he scoffs when he sees Sarah crying.
"Stop being a baby, Sarah." He mumbles and she pulls away from me and jerks her sleeves down before grabbing a jacket and going into the arena. She's been watching Brad to become Ryan's secondary tech the past few months.
"You need to ease up on Sarah, Ty. You know ASD makes it harder on her." I say and he scoffs at me.
"Well you're not helping her by letting that shit slide, Dad! She needs to be put in a ward until she can learn that the shit she did today is unacceptable!" Tyler yells and I sigh.
"I am not putting my daughter in a fucking psychiatric ward unless she downright needs it! She doesn't understand that the way she's coping is wrong and you need to apologize to her now, mister!" I say and he scoffs.
"Well she needs to apologize to Lax for trying to come onto him, so I'll apologize when she does." He says and I scoff.
"She is thirteen, Tyler! She doesn't even know what sex is, unlike you obviously do! Let me guess, it's Nora Bessemer, ain't it?" I ask and he rolls his eyes.
"You don't know shit do you? I'm fifteen, Dad! I'm old enough to have a girlfriend and do said things with her too!" He yells and I scoff.
"You will apologize to your sister or you're grounded until further notice, understand?" I ask and he scoffs, but nods.
I walk out of my bus and into the arena, seeing my daughter and Brad tuning Ryan's guitars and walk over to Timmy who smiles.
"She's following in your footsteps man." He says and I smile as I nod, watching as she asks Brad how to play the keyboard he plays for a couple songs.
"Did you hear what happened while we were setting up?" He asks and I shake my head.
"No, but I have an educated guess. Tyler and his friends ganged up on Sarah." I say and he nods.
"Yeah, Mike and Daniel broke it up and Sarah ran off and locked herself in the private bathroom for over an hour. You and Ryan were in soundcheck and your cells were off." He says and I sigh.
"She's cutting. Tyler won't lay off and it's hurting her. I don't know why he has so much anger towards Sarah. I mean, I raised them as equal as possible. Yeah there were times when Sarah needed a little more attention that him, but I always made up for it." I say and he shrugs.
"Don't know, maybe you should take him to a psychologist and put them both into therapy." Timmy says and I nod as Sarah plays the opening lines to If Everyone Cared on Brad's keyboard and I smile.
"I need to fix her arms before the show, I'll be back in a few." I say and get up and walk to Sarah.
"Let me fix your arms honey." I say and and she nods as I get the first aid kit and she pulls her sleeves up so I can fix the wounds.
I clean them up with water, then use some peroxide on them to get any infection out before putting Neosporin and triple antibiotic ointment on them and placing gauze on them and wrapping them in ace wraps.
"Baby, look at me. You know I'm always her if you want to talk right?" I ask her and she nods.
"Tyler doesn't want me around. He said I belong in an institution. That mom should have aborted me." She says and I feel my heart snap in half as I hug her tight.
"Ignore what Tyler says, baby. I want you here, your mom wanted you here. I love you,and Mom did too. I don't like it when you do this to yourself baby, in fact it hurts me too when I see that you're doing it. You don't belong in an institution, Sarah, you are where you belong." I say and she begins to sob as Ryan comes around the corner.
"What's going on? Chad, Tyler just got yelled at by security for tying a kids shoelaces together." He says and I sigh as Sarah runs to Ryan and he hugs her.
"Sarah, go play with Damien, okay?" I say and she runs off to go play with her cousin.
"Tyler won't lay off and she's cutting. She's depressed. Tyler thinks she should be institutionalized and that Lily should have aborted her." I say and he sighs as I watch his son and my daughter play.
Sadly, little Alissa didn't survive her the NICU and passed three days after her birth.
"Chad, you know she needs help. I'm not saying institutionalize her or anything, but get her the help she needs before something bad happens." He says and I nod as I see Tyler come over and he sees Sarah and Damien playing and scoffs as he takes the chalk from Sarah and breaks it and that is when it boils over.
"Tyler Robert Corey Kroeger! Apologize to your cousin and sister this minute!" I yell and he scoffs.
"She's thirteen and he's ten! They don't need to be playing with kids toys!" He yells back and I glare at him as I push him into a wall.
"I have had it with the way you treat your sister! What the hell has she ever done to you?! She didn't ask to be born with ASD, Tyler! All she wants from you is a caring big brother, nothing else!" I yell and he scoffs.
"Had she not pushed Mom away, she wouldn't have ever taken that damn job in Boston to getaway from her! She killed Mom!" He yells and that's when Sarah speaks.
"I didn't kill Mommy. Those terror guys did, Tyler. We learned about it in school." She says softly and Tyler rolls his eyes.
"They were the one who technically killed Mom, but you pushed her away! You made it so she took that job in Boston to get away from you! You killed her and you can't lie to me!" He yells and I see Sarah drop to the ground in tears and let the prick of a son I got go so I can comfort my daughter.
"Come here baby." I whisper as she cries these horrible gut wrenching sobs as Ryan talks to Tyler.
"I killed Mommy didn't I? She left because of me, didn't she?" She asks and I shake my head as I hold her close.
"Mommy loved you baby, she didn't leave because of you. She took the job to find help for you. She thought that there might have been help in Boston." I say and she shakes her head.
"Then Tyler is right. I killed her. She left to do something for me." She says and I start to sob as I see Tyler leaving the arena and heading to the busses.
