{ #5 } Eclipse Of The Moon (MxM || 18+)

Chapter 12 - Locker Room

Eclipse Of The Moon ~ Book 1 of Aaron
Chapter 12
Locker Room

Thursday 26 September 2002

"Aaron!! Your hand!!!" my mother screams suddenly, making me startle and mess one of the last equations I had to do on the Algebra test I must hand in tomorrow.

Fuck!

Thank God, I just started a new sheet of paper and I won't have to do the whole test all over again, but I am still pissed she had to catch me off guard like this. And at the same time, I am mad at myself for not paying more attention. At nearly 17, I know better than to use my left hand at home, even if this is the one I habitually use to write or perform most tasks. I'm a leftie! There's so much I can do about it!

"Ugh, Mom!! Now I have to do this part again!" I grumble, taking another sheet of paper and switching my pen to my right hand.

"Don't you know that you will end up with the goats on God's left if you don't fight this habit of yours, Aaron? Remember Matthew 25: verse 41: Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. Being left-handed is wrong. This is a sign of consorting with the Devil! I don't want my only son to go to hell, I won't let you become a servant of the Devil, so please make this effort, Aaron and use your right hand. Or I will have to teach you how we learned back in the days!"

Will she ever stop annoying me with her bullshit on left-handed and right-handed people? Just thinking that I'll earn the usual speech on leftie people has my fingers ball in and my nails immediately begin to dig into the palms of my hands.

I mean, how can one still believe such myths in the twenty-first century? The left has always been seen as the evil side in Catholicism and my parents deeply believe in this as well. Back in the 15th and 16th centuries, Catholics even used it as evidence to identify women as witches during the hunts.

When I began to show signs of being a left-handed kid, my parents did their best to try and make me change this, but I can't really do anything about it! Well, I have become ambidextrous with time somehow, but I still have a preference for my left hand. I am usually cautious to use the right one when I am at home, but I just forgot tonight.

"I will remind you how the nuns and monks used to deal with those of us who were left-handed in my own childhood," she then adds. Oh please, no!! I have heard these stories hundreds of times ever since I was a kid! "Anyone who would use their left hand got their fingers whacked with a wooden ruler and its steel edge. They had their left arm tied to their torso. Or they were asked to keep their left arm raised so they could only use their right hand."

Well, it's good I am not in a Catholic school then! And wasn't born before the 1940's either... because even in the Catholic schools today, I doubt they still perform this sort of torture!

While I finish my homework, my mother returns to the kitchen, soon joined by Ananie and Noelly. I am packing my stuff back inside my bag when my father arrives, and I just have 10 minutes to go shower upstairs before it is time to pray the rosary in the living room.

Once we have done the Sign of the Cross on the crucifix, we all pray the Apostles' Creed, then the Our Father as fingers move to the next large bead, three Hail Marys on the next smaller beads, a Glory Be To The Father on the chain. My father then announces a Luminous Mystery – since today is Thursday – and he chooses The Transfiguration. We all meditate on this, then pray Our Father on the next large bead, following with ten Hail Mary's and finally, another Glory Be To The Father and the Hail Holy Queen. I swear this ritual to thank God for blessings has become such a torture for me... Even my stomach is protesting because it's hungry!