A tragedy of the worst kind

She sat hunched in on herself, her frame shaking with the weight of her silent tears. She flinched then, as her father’s raised voice reverberated down the corridor. A high pitched peel of angry torrents followed from her mother. You would have thought she would have been used to the regime by now. It was the same every night. She hugged herself tighter as she tried to cope with the onslaught of sound. The abuse, the screaming and the hatred seeped through the house and infected everything with a dismal gloom.

Her head snapped up as a faint pleading cry from the room next door. Maia’s awake she thought. She slowly unclasped her hands from her ears. Her legs trembled as she slowly crept out of her bedroom. One of the loose floorboards creaked as she walked to Maia’s room. The shouts echoed on, “Who the hell do you think you are? You have the responsibility of two daughters…” “IT’S NOT LIKE YOU’RE ANY F*** BETTER.” “Well at least I'm home long enough to spend time with them. And not staying out with your little slut.”
She heard a bang and receding footsteps then the front door was slammed. Her mother’s voice screeched from her bedroom window “You’ll be back here, when you need more money!” A car engine accelerated and she heard it speed down the road.

She leaned over the crib bars and picked Maia up cradling her to her chest. She swayed slowly, murmuring and consoling her little sister. The one year old hiccupped into silence and continued to stare up into her sister’s face. Her bright brown eyes glinted slightly with contentment and the two sisters marvelled in their small calm sanctuary. In each other they found safety and love.

Holding Maia and rocking her gently she leaned back over the crib; the baby began to dose and was asleep when her body was softly lain on the mattress. She tucked the blanket over her sister and straightened up. In the other room she could hear her mother’s broken cries, an empty sadness for her mother consumed her and the tears rolled down her face again.

She slowly walked to her mother’s room and opened the door a creak to peer inside. Her mother was rocking slowly pained by grief, she walked into the room and wrapped her thin arms around her mother’s quivering form. “Anna…Anna….” Her mother sobbed. Her arms pulled her closer and Anna snuggled into her mother chest, feeling her shaky sobs as warm tears fell onto her face. She sat with her mother for a long time. Until her body had stopped shaking and she’d stopped crying. Her eyes were red, swollen and drooping with sleep. Anna helped her mother to bed. She asked thickly “Is Maia still sleeping?” “Yes momma” Anna answered. Her mother smiled very slightly before closing her eyes and falling asleep. Anna left the room switching off the light and walked down the corridor, stopping to check on Maia before walking to her room, climbing into bed and going to sleep.

Than night, like many others her dreams we plagued by nightmares. Dreams of pain and loss woke her constantly, the loss of her mother, her sister. The thought of never seeing her father again made her weep in her sleep. Though she’d never tell her mother she missed him terribly. She missed spending summer afternoons outside in the garden with him, kicking the old football around. And the way he used to swoop down and pick her up to put her on his shoulders when she got passed him. She remembered the times when he would come home from work and take her out for ice-cream because she had been good and helped mum around the house. But things had not been like that for a long time. 2 years ago he lost his job because of cuts in the work place. Then things got bad when he met Mr Duse. He started acting funny and was always taking weird medicine. He also started smoking. I don't like the smell of the smoke. Things got worse when Maia was born, for a while mother took me and Maia to live with their grandmother.

He came back though; he pleaded and begged until finally mother gave in. For a while everything calmed down, that is until last October. He started acting funny and was always taking weird medicine. He also started smoking.Mother was doing the laundry, trying to make use of the last of the warm weather, when she found a thick brown package under some of daddy’s dirty clothes. When she investigated she found what looked like baby powder. She was outraged and slit the package dumping the contents in the toilet. That was one of the worst arguments yet.
Anna shivered, remembering the fight. She had never seen her father and mother so angry. It was so bad the Mrs Quincy the neighbour called the police. Before they got to the house, she snuck in through the back door and took Anna and Maia to her house. Even there they could still hear their parents shouting.

That night the police arrived and the whole family was hauled into the county detention hold.
It was scary in the police station. A nice lady took Anna and Maia to a play area that smelled funny. Maia had fun playing with the toys, but Anna couldn’t sit still she was worried about mommy and daddy. Just after Anna and Maia fell asleep; the lady put Maia in a small play pen with a blanket and pillow and Anna slept on the couch next to the play pen, mommy came in to wake them up. She looked very sad. On the way home in the police car she told me that daddy was not going to be coming home for a while. I was sad and scared, but I didn’t cry, because mommy started crying.

I thought about this as I lay in my bed, I don’t like it when mommy cries, so I now never cry in front of mommy any more.

Across town at the same time, Brian walked into Mr Duse’s apartment. His hands shook slightly, the man he was working for scared him, and he was still atoning for the mistake with his wife and the heroin he was keeping five months ago.
“Brian there seems to be trouble, Eddie needs you, to help with a heist tonight. Meet him at Brook street and 3rd in twenty minutes.” The plump man blew out a small blast of smoke from his thick cigar. Brian nodded jerkily, just as he turned to leave, the boss called him back.
“Oh I almost forgot you will need this.” He threw over a cloth wrapped object. It was heavy and Brian gasped when he un-wrapped it. It was a gun. The loaded pistol felt heavy and alien in his hand, and he recoiled from the idea of its use. Whatever he may be he knew he was not a killer.

But he was also a weak man, and doing this would get him paid and out of debt. He needed the money to put away in the bank for the girls, although he thought to himself, that is not where the money ends up. Yes he was a weak man who only thought in the moment and looked after himself.

He met up with Eddie that evening and they began the heist. It was routine, just an ordinary drugstore; their job was to get drugs that can be crushed and used in mixes to make speed. Just a normal heist, but what they didn’t expect was the pharmacist, who had decided to work late that evening. Mark Hatch needed the overtime to get all his paperwork done, so he decided to stay late that evening and work in peace and quiet in the office. He was startled by the sound of breaking glass, instantly he was alert. He reached under the desk and felt for the baseball bat that the store owner always kept under there in case of break ins. He also pressed the panic button that alerted the police that here was a possible hostile situation. All the stores in that area had been equipped with one of these buttons, in light of a recent string of burglaries. This button sent off a signal warning the police that there was a break in in motion and that the offenders were still in the building. Also the emergency cameras which are completely hidden from view go online to catch the thieves without them realising what has happened.

Brian and Eddie made their way deeper into the drug store, grabbing box after box of medicine that would be useful to Mr Duse. Neither of them heard the pharmacist as he creped around the corner until it was too late. He swung the bat and it cracked against the first assailant. Eddie crashed to the floor unconscious. Brian started and shocked reached for the gun in the back of his jeans. The pharmacist yelled as he rushed towards Brian not realising that he was pointing a gun towards his heart. Brian shot three times. The bullets hit the pharmacist three times in the chest. But the momentum of his run caused him to collide with Brian, and both me fell to the floor. The man twitched as he died, lying on top of Brian, who quickly pushed him off. Brian looked down at his body, the man’s blood still warm covered his shirt front and his hands were stained crimson. Brian shocked into silence, almost petrified with fear and guilt was jolted back to reality when the sound of sirens pierced the night. Still clutching the gun he bolted to the door and began running down the street. He felt lost and confused, and he only had one desire, to be home with his family, is beautiful girls, whom he’d let down so many times.

Twenty minutes later he crashed into his front room, all the lights were off and the house was quiet. He just caught his breath when the light flicked on and he stared at the face of his daughter Anna.
Her eyes widened as she looked at him. “What happened daddy? Why have you got blood all over you.” Her eyes filled with tears as she looked at him and he felt a gut wrenching pang of pain and guilt looking into her trusting and loving eyes. He stepped towards her and she flinched. He grabbed her up and hugged her tight crying into her shoulder. He rubbed her hair and whispered broken words into her ear.
“I’m sorry… I’m so sorry baby. Daddy loves you, daddy loves you so much.”

Moments later his wife Joyce hurried into the room, wrapping on a dressing gown. She saw the scene in front of her. Anna, Brian together, then she spotted the shiny black gun and the blood all over Brian’s hands. She screamed and ripped Anna away from Brian.
“What the fuck did you do?” Joyce knelt down in front of Anna and patted her down, looking for any sign of injury. When she found none she leapt up and pushed Anna behind her, half protecting her with her body. Brian who had recovered was on his feet shaking with distress.
Joyce began shouting again, and grabbed Brian’s wrist. He was shocked and angered. What did this woman want from him, why was she attacking him? He fought back, they tangled and twisted both their body’s moving as they fought for the gun. The trigger clicked and the gun shot. Moments later a body fell to the ground. Joyce and Brian both turned and saw their beloved daughter, jerking in a growing pool of blood. The bullet had hit her in her heart and had passed through her small body to implant itself in the wall where she had been standing; a spray of blood also coated the wall and pooled before it as Anna lay there dying in the arms of her mother.
“It hurts…” she said with a quavering voice. Her mother’s tears and hers ran down her cheeks, that grew ever paler as the blood seeped out of her chest.
“Don’t cry momma. I’m going to see grandpa.” Joyce shook with wails of pain as he little baby girl slowly died in her arms.
“Night….” Anna breathed with her final breath; she closed her eyes and passed off to sleep.