*This chapter contains sensitive material.

His mother was lying naked on the floor.

He didn't like seeing her that way.

His father had stripped her off her bathing suit, ripping it down the middle in his anger. She cowered on the floor before him, trying to cover herself up with her hands as her eyes flitted to her son's blonde hair.

"Please, Zaheer. I'm sorry." She whispered, her voice sounding pained as she kept apologising.

"You enjoyed having them stare at you, didn't you? That's why he almost drowned." His father's voice terrified him. It was low and it was soft yet it held so much of anger and hatred that it seemed to seep right through every syllable he spoke.

"No, I swear I didn't." She let out an anguished gasp as he grabbed her hair roughly, her hands flying up to his, exposing her body once again.

"I hate the ocean." His voice broke what seemed to be an endless silence between them.

She liked his voice. He had a low, smooth voice that seemed to curl around her ears as he spoke... yet his words were so few that she never had enough time to truly dwell upon it.

"Why?"

"It's so huge that it makes you feel small." He admitted, unsure why he was even telling her that.

She looked at him, her breath catching in her throat at the way his green eyes peered at her. "My dad grew up in Cape Town." She said softly. "He lived five minutes from the beach and he loved taking us there." She thought back to a time when she was happy- when she felt the sunshine upon her face without thinking of the darkness that followed it. She thought back to the time when her life was filled with an endless vat of beautiful, warm sunshine that seemed to sing to her soul and caress her heart causing her to feel true, deep, pure happiness. "I used to love the way my dad and my brother would hold my hands and lift me up above all the waves."

There was a time when she had a brother.

He was her brother and her protector and she loved him. She would look for him and seek him out and beg him to play with her and he always did. He could make her laugh as no one ever had and he would wipe away her tears when they seemed to warm her cheeks with their continuous flow.

Then he became the monster hiding beneath her bed. He was an imposter who had sucked the life out of her brother. He was soulless and heartless and not at all like who he used to be. He used to have the biggest heart and the biggest laugh- Now, he never laughed at all.

"Those are my best memories." She smiled up at him, mulling over the truth in her words.

"What happened to your Dad?" He didn't miss the way she referred to him in the past tense as she danced upon happier memories.

"He died when I was 13."

She felt no sadness as she said those words. Her father had become a stranger to her long before he had died. He had become a stranger the day she no longer felt disappointed and angry at his absence. He had ceased to be the moment his son stepped into her room and tasted her tears when she was 12 years old. He had become a figment of her imagination, yet she could never imagine the way he looked nor the way he sounded or smelt. He was a nameless figure that occasionally appeared to her in the dead of the night when she considered how different things might have been had he not walked out of their house.

"Do you miss him?"

Did she miss him?

He never heard her answer as it was drowned out by the shrill scream of the school bell.

"Go ahead." She told him gently, "I think I'll stay here for a little while longer."

She couldn't bear the thought of going in just yet. The sun that was so gentle on her face seemed to befriend the breeze that glided past her- allowing her to feel just a brief moment of peace and she wasn't ready to give it up.

She didn't say a word as he stayed where he was yet he didn't miss the way she moved just an inch closer to him- sharing her brief, beautiful moment of peace with the boy next to her as they sat in the  car park watching the cars drive past them.

...

"I'm sorry, please." She looked over at him, her voice gentle as she tried to smile at him. "Riaz, be a good boy and go to your room."

"But..." The word slipped out of his mouth before he had a chance to stuff it back in. His heart seemed to feel too heavy for his body as his father turned to look at him, his grip tightening in his mother's hair.

"You think you can help your mother?" His father asked.

He didn't reply. He didn't know what to say. He was too small to his father was too big.

"You can't help her." He smiled down at his son before he looked back towards his wife, naked and shivering in his grasp."Who do you belong to, Claire?" He asked as he pushed her roughly towards the floor.

"You." She replied, her hands going up to cover herself again.

"Who owns you?" He asked as he reached for the zip of his pants, pulling it down slowly.

Her breathing deepened rapidly as her eyes flitted between her son and her husband.

"Don't look at him. He can't help you." He knelt down before her, turning her head to face him. "Now, who owns you?"

"You do." Her voice shuddered as he leaned closer to her.

"You're helpless, Riaz. You can't do anything for her her."

Riaz couldn't understand what was happening. He didn't know why his father was hovering over his mother as he had nor did he understand why he had spread her thighs apart with his knee. All he could understand was the shame his mother felt as she told him to close his eyes and cover his ears and to not peak even for a second no matter what he heard.

And he stood there, with his eyes shut tight and his palms held so close to his ears that they had felt as if they would stick. And he could hear every whispered No from his mother and groan and the sick sound of skin against skin as his father raped his mother right in front of him...

And he was too small to help her.

"Riaz." Farhana winced as her burnt fingertip came into contact with his shoulder. He woke up to the taste of bile in his mouth. He didn't remember crawling into bed the night before. All he remembered was his father leaving him to find his way out of the darkened basement.

"Wake up or you'll be late for school."

He stood up, feeling as if he would collapse before he even moved his foot. Every joint in his body protested with every step he took yet he paid it no mind.

"Hurry up." She whispered as she reached the door to his room. He didn't even ask her if she was okay. All he could think about was her screams as their father held his lighter to the tips of her fingers every time he tried to give up.

Crunches.

Push ups.

Crunches.

Push ups.

Crunches.

Push ups.

His father didn't let him go even when his stomach gave up and he threw up on the floor.

He had to carry on and every time he stopped, he would burn her again.

All because he had found a moment of serenity when he decided to miss four of his classes to sit with her.

...

"Will you come with me?" He asked her as soon as the bell rang.

She only nodded her head before she followed him out of the class and into the semi-lit auditorium.

He didn't know why it was that he led her there but it was the only place that felt right.

"Will you do something for me?" He asked quietly as they sat down in the back row, watching the younger children rehearse their year-end play.

"What?"

He didn't know what to ask for. All he knew was he wanted that moment with her in the darkened room all those weeks ago.

"Will you close your eyes with me?"

She watched him curiously before she leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes as he did, allowing the mumbled voices to wash over them.

My father raped my mother 12 years ago.

9 months later, my sister was born. That was the day my mother shattered and she had never again been fixed.

Time was relative just then- she didn't know whether a minute had passed or five or ten. They sat silently in their stolen moment before she felt his hand reach for hers. But she never opened her eyes even as he he joined their hands and grasped her short fingers between his.

It would be the first of many times that he would take her hand in his and to him, it felt...

Normal. Perfectly normal.

"Riaz." He didn't know for how long he stood on shaky legs with his eyes closed and his palms pressed against his ears. "Riaz." His mother tapped him again on his shoulder. He opened his eyes to see his mother dressed in her pink robe. It was fastened tightly around her to cover up the many red imprints all over her body but she couldn't cover up the look in her eyes.

His father had stripped her of more than her clothes and her dignity and her power. He had stripped her of her happiness and he had ripped it apart as he ripped apart her bathing suit that lay in tatters on the floor.

"Go to you room, my boy."

"Are you okay?" His small voice sounded odd asking such a grown-up question.

"Just go to your room." She told him kindly before she walked away, favouring her left leg as she tried to quell all the pained whimpers that left her mouth every time she took a step.

His mother didn't come with them to the beach the next day.

He didn't like the way his father held his hand as he dragged him into the water. He was going too far in and he didn't like it. The smaller waves kept rushing past him, spewing salty water into his mouth causing him to splutter and lose his breath.

He had stepped too far... He stopped feeling the sand under his feet. All he felt was water. It was everywhere and he didn't like it. He didn't like knowing his life was in his father's hands. His father never promised to keep him safe like his mother had and deep inside he knew he wouldn't.

"Are you scared?" His father looked down at him, staring impassively at the panicked look etched on his son's face.

"Yes." 

"Don't you ever try coming between your mother and I. You're too small to do anything." He spoke in his ear before he released his hand from his grasp.

The water burned his eyes as and ran into his nose and mouth. He was gasping for air yet all he got was more water and he didn't know how to get back up. The sun peered curiously down at him through the water as he looked up at the glowing white ball. He was going to die. His father was going to let him drown and he was going to die. 

His eyes were still closed as his father grasped his arm and pulled him back up. He didn't even know he had taken a breath till he opened his eyes and saw the sun beating down upon him as it glared at him from its place in the blue sky.

He opened his eyes as the bell rang, still holding her hand in his. It was soft and smooth and she never once tried to pull her hand away. He stood up and looked down to find her staring, fascinated at their enjoined hands.

She felt what he felt as she squeezed his hand just once. 

It felt normal...

 And that was good with her.

"Thank you." He said it too softly for her to hear before they walked out of the auditorium.

 He would only find the note she had slipped into the pocket of his blazer when he was alone in his room, listening to the frantic mutterings of his mother as she tried to clean the table in the passageway just as his father had taught her countless times over.

maggie and millie and molly and may

went down to the beach (to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang

so sweetly she couldn't remember her trouble, and

milly befriended a stranded star

whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing

which raced sideways while blowing bubbles: and

may came home with a smooth round stone

as small as a world and as large as alone

For whatever we lose (like you or me)

it's always ourselves we find in the sea

A/N The poem in this chapter was written by E.E Cummings and it's called Maggie And Milly And Molly And May.