The Long Road Ch13b

[lothinielflowermaiden]

~*~

            The darkness was so familiar to Norway, now. But, like always, he knew that there was something dangerous out there in the darkness. There was nothing any there that he could orient himself by, and no place to hide from what he knew would come. So, he merely sat on the ground, with his knees drawn up to his chest, and his arms wrapped around his knees, trying to make himself as small as possible. He hoped that for once he would be overlooked in the seemingly endless darkness.

            But, as Norway had known would happen, he soon felt someone grab onto his arm, and pull him to his feet. There was no gentleness to the motion, and the grip on his arm was too tight. As the darkness began to lift slightly, he could just make out the figure of his father standing in front of him. Once he had ascertained what he already know, he kept his eyes focused on the ground, not wanting to have to look at Scandia.

            “You didn’t think I would let this day pass without visiting,” Scandia said. His grip on Norway’s arm was still painfully tight, but beyond that he had made no move yet to harm his son.

            Norway still kept his eyes averted, and did not reply.

            With his free hand, Scandia reached out and gripped Norway’s chin, forcing his head up.

“Look at me when I’m talking to you. These visits take some effort after all. The least you could do is be polite.”

            “I didn’t ask you to come here,” Norway said, quietly. He wanted to be able to stand up to his father, but any attempts he had made always ended in some kind of punishment. Despite everything that had happened in his life since then, he still could only rarely find the strength to defy his father. The only big act of defiance that he had ever managed was his decision to keep his child–the child who would not even look at him anymore.

            His comment earned him a slap, but at least he was no longer being held in such a way that he was forced to look at his father. And, that slap had hurt a lot less than some of the past ones had. He could be grateful that at least Scandia had to avoid doing anything that would leave a mark.

            “You should have realized by now that what you want doesn’t really matter here,” Scandia commented. “Not that it ever did, of course, but at least back then you had some use.” With his free hand, Scandia reached up and caressed Norway’s face, in a seemingly intimate gesture. “Until you turned out to be a little freak.” There was obvious note of contempt in Scandia’s voice as he spoke that final sentence. “That pretty much ended any use that you ever had.”

            Norway wanted nothing more at that moment than to get away from his father. But he knew from experience that there would be no escape until Scandia let him go. For so many years, when he was a child, he had longed for an escape. Whenever his older brothers had been around, Norway had sometimes hoped that they would notice what Scandia was doing, and take him away. But until the previous summer, Scandia had always been extra careful when they were around. That meant that instead of the longed for escape, all Norway had ever gotten was comments from his brothers about how he was Scandia’s favorite. They had made comments like that right up until they learned the truth.

            Scandia was still talking. “Despite what they might claim, your brothers must have also known that that was all you were good for. They did both marry you, after all. I guess it’s just luck that they never had reason to know what a little freak you really are. Your mother and I should have stopped with two children. Then, she wouldn’t have died, and you wouldn’t have been around to nearly destroy our whole family. The least you could have done was die with her, since you had to be born.”

            As hard as he tried to not listen to Scandia’s words, Norway still heard them. That was the one thing that he knew he would never really be able to find out the truth about. He knew that he had caused his mother’s death, but sometimes he wished he could know whether her feelings would have been the same as Scandia’s. Would she have hated him as well, or had she been glad that he had survived?

            Scandia continued to say things along those lines, and Norway did not attempt to stop him. He knew that the worst part would come after Scandia was done talking.

~*~

            Shortly after midnight, the silence that filled Birger’s house was shattered by a cry. Shortly after the cry sounded, Birger got up and went to Norway’s bedroom, knowing that was where the scream had to have come from. He had known it had been a bad idea to allow Norway to see his family, and had just been waiting for the inevitable fallout.

            The bedroom door was closed, but not locked. (Birger had forbidden Norway to look the bedroom door, just as a precaution. After all, there really was no other explanation for the injury that had led to the hospitalization in January other than that it was the result of a failed suicide attempt. No one seriously believed Norway’s claim that the injury had not been self-inflicted.)

            Another cry sounded, as Birger opened the door, but once he entered the room, he found that Norway still seemed to be sleeping, although apparently caught in the grip of a nightmare. Although he had known that Norway had nightmares somewhat frequently, this was the first time that Birger had actually witnessed one of the nightmares. At first, he wasn’t sure what to do, especially since Norway was not awake yet. After a few moments, though, he approached the bed.

            “Haldor, wake up. You’re safe here,” he said. He didn’t really know if it would work, but he had to something. It was his responsibility to make sure that Norway was safe, after all.

            There was no sign that Norway had heard him, and he still appeared to be lost in the nightmare. Norway had stopped crying out, but he seemed to be struggling against an unseen foe. His face was streaked with tears, and beads of sweat glistened on his forehead.

            “Haldor!”

            This time there was a reaction. Norway suddenly lay still, and his eyes opened. His eyes remained glazed, though; he seemed to be unaware of his surroundings, and there was a look of terror in his eyes. Even once his eyes focused on Birger, he gave no sign of recognition.

            Birger was relieved that Norway was awake and no longer crying out. He took that as a sign that the situation had been resolved. “I know it was a bad idea to let you see your family yesterday,” he said, as he turned to go. “They must have done something to upset you again.”

            When no reply came, Birger turned back to look at Norway, who still seemed unaware of his surroundings and who was breathing rapidly and obviously frightened.

            “Haldor, calm down,” Birger said, taking a few steps closer to the bed. “You’re not strong enough to be this upset. You need to calm down. You just had a nightmare, probably because of something that your family did to upset you.”

            “Stop treating me like a child!” Although some fear still remained in Norway’s expression, it had mostly been replaced by anger.

            “It is my responsibility to make sure that you are kept safe until you recover,” Birger told him. “And my job would be a lot easier of I didn’t have to keep making sure you didn’t have contact with people who obviously aren’t good for you. Look at what happens after you get permission to spend a day with them. Now, if you’re all right, I will leave you to get some rest. We can talk more when you’re capable of responding rationally.”

            “I’m not a child. You don’t need to talk to like I am.” Norway had reached the end of his tolerance, and the after effects of the nightmare and that brief panic attack had destroyed the tight control he had been keeping over himself whenever he was around Birger. He started struggling to get up, despite the extent to which the nightmares and panic attacks always drained his strength. He was determined not to be a disadvantage for this conversation.

            Birger reached out to put a hand on his shoulder, to force him to lie back down. “I can see how weak you are, right now. You need to rest.”

            Norway shook himself free of Birger’s grip, and this time succeeded in rising, although he stayed near the bed, needing at least that much support. “Don’t touch me again. I know the truth now. I know that you’ve lied to me since January. You said that my family didn’t care, but instead, you never even gave them my phone number. And you’ve been erasing messages. They spoke to someone else from the department, and no one else has any idea what you’ve been doing.”

            “I don’t know what lies your family has been making up about this situation, but I was doing what was best for you,” Birger said. Although he was concerned about Norway’s condition, his main worry at the moment was the fact that he could lose his job if Norway repeated these accusations to anyone else. Somehow, Birger had to convince Norway that he really had done the right thing. “You wouldn’t tell anyone who hurt you, and they were only ones with the opportunity. And, even if they weren’t responsible for that, there is still the issue of the number of years that two of them controlled you for. As weak as you are right now, I don’t want to take the risk of you falling back under their control.”

            “They weren’t the ones that hurt me,” Norway replied. “Do you want to know what really happened? Do you want to hear about the fact that my father hated me for having been born? Do you want to hear about all things he did to me, for as far back as I can remember. Even, when I thought I was finally free of him, that he had finally left, I discovered that he could still show up my dreams. I never know when he might show up, and there is never anything I can do to stop him. He was the one that hurt me, but I couldn’t tell anyone, because you don’t even know that he existed. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

            For a few moments, Birger just looked at Norway. He couldn’t believe what he had just been told, and took it as more proof that Norway was not rational at the moment. At least it allowed him to not have to worry about his job. If Norway reported him to someone, Birger would just bring up the other things that Norway had just said, as proof that he wasn’t in his right mind. Apparently, Norway’s problems were worse than any of the ones involved in trying to help him suspected.

            “Haldor, like I said before, you can continue this conversation when you’re capable of giving me a rational answer. And, you don’t need to worry about going into work tomorrow. I think you need to take some time off, until you’re thinking rationally again.” With that, Birger left the room, closing the door behind him.

~*~

            The next morning, when Birger went to check on Norway, the found the room empty. The bed looked exactly the way it had after Norway had gotten up during their confrontation, showing that he had never gone back to bed. Birger did know exactly what possessions Norway had been keeping in that room, but he thought at least one change of clothes was missing. However, when he checked the drawer that he kept Norway’s phone, and some other things locked up in, he found that the phone was still there, along with Norway’s ID, for his human name. Birger also know that Norway could not have taken any money with him. Birger also noticed that the front door was unlocked.

            Quickly, Birger went to the phone, to report what had happened. At the moment, he had bigger concerns than whether or not he could keep his job. Norway was apparently out there somewhere, with no identification, no (or very little money), and possibly not in his right mind. It was vital that he be found as soon as possible.

Author’s notes:

 I would like to share something the fact that today (September 16^th) is the anniversary of my two stories. A year ago today, after a particular stressful day, I went to the store and bought a notebook. I planned to use the notebook to plan for the fanfic that I was planning to write for NaNoWriMo in November, and as part of that planning, I fooled around with coming up with different family trees for all the nations. One of those family trees I came up with eventually became “Family Secrets”, and that story was actually written last September and October. (It took me a few months to get the courage to post it.) I started writing “The Long Road” at the beginning of December, having put it off during the November, because I didn’t think it could possibly reach 50,000 words. Ironically, the same chapter where I’m sharing this little bit of story history, is the same chapter where this story passes 50,000 words. I don’t really expect anyone to care about how my stories came to be to written, but I thought I’d share this little tidbit, just in case some of my readers are interested in where this story came from.

In closing, I will state that I hope to have the next chapter up sometime in early October.