Staring at a Mountain

Revalations

The breeze was cold as it whipped against her cheeks, her nose sniffling. The weight of the backpack was almost unbearable on the eleven year olds shoulders. As they walked from the car he haphazardly abandoned at a gas station, her father began picking up stones and placing them in her bag. She wouldn't complain though, frightened of his reaction. He was a cruel man.

"Where are we going, dad?" She shifted uncomfortably on the bridge.
She wasn't even sure if she was supposed to be seeing him right now. She knew her mother had won the custody battle, handily but she was too young to fully understand the limitations.

"I want you to know that what I'm about to do, is to save your soul." She frowned, unsure of the next move. The bridge bustled with cars shooting by like a bullet from a gun, passing people on bikes and on foot shot looks of confusion at the man standing with his daughter at the edge of the Brooklyn bridge.

"God will forgive me." His hazel eyes reflected her own, however a resigned look painted his face instead of the curiosity and fear etching her features.

Before she could understand what was happening, her father wrapped his arms around her and they were falling.

A scream ripped out of her throat before the shock of cold water pierced her skin. Sinking, sinking, deeper into the freezing water-

"Rhiannon, doll, wake u-," a husky voice intruded.

The brunette shot up in a cold sweat, her heart racing.

"Whoa, whoa, hey-," James's warm hands found her shoulders, grounding her back into the present.

"Bad dream?" He asked, a look of worry painting across his handsome features.

"Bad..." she looked down at her trembling hands, "memory."

"Something about your father?" He took her clammy hands into his own, a thumb tracing her knuckles.
She had started mumbling in her sleep, pulling him out of his own unpleasant dreams, "tell me what happened." He urged her.

"When I was eleven, my mom finally divorced my dad. He was normal, allegedly, when they met but something snapped in him after his parents died. He became a religious fanatic, punishing my mother and I anytime we engaged in anything 'ungodly." It felt weird to discuss her deepest childhood trauma with a man who just admitted to being the human embodiment of evil to her just hours before, but comforting in a way. Like he'd understand better.

"He'd lock my mother in the basement if I failed a test or went to a friends birthday party on a Sunday. And then he'd take a belt to me. When they squared away custody, my mom won. I was at home after school doing my homework. He pulled into the driveway and I saw him from the dining room window. He waved to me to come out. I thought it might be my last chance to see him so I grabbed my backpack and went out to his car. Maybe we were going to do my homework together." Rhiannon looked out the window, her eyebrows creasing.

"He drove an hour from Long Island to Brooklyn. I started to feel like something was wrong when he abandoned his car in a gas station parking lot." James felt his heart begin to pick up speed, genuinely interested and nervous for where the story was going.

"As we walked, he started to uh," she cleared her throat, "fill my backpack with rocks. I didn't want to say anything about how heavy it was because I was afraid he would punish me. He always said, 'God doesn't want you to be happy, he wants you to be strong.' There were a lot of people on the bridge seeing as it was a Friday. He told me he was doing what he had to do to save my soul. That God would forgive him. And then he pulled us off the bridge. I sank quickly." James was in complete shock. It was a deeply disturbing story about a deeply disturbed man committing what he considered one of the ultimate sins.