"All parents damage their children. It cannot be helped. Youth, like pristine glass, absorbs the prints of its handlers. Some parents smudge, others crack, a few shatter childhoods completely into jagged little pieces, beyond repair."
-Mitch Albom, The Five People You Meet in Heaven
I am six years old, and my dad is on top of me, his knees pinning my scrawny arms down, defenseless against his weight. I am silent, my tears burning my cheekbones, rolling down and gathering around my ears, the wetness tickling. He is pushing the toothbrush through my pursed lips, jabbing the hard plastic tip into my cheek, into the back of my jaw. I can taste blood as he drags the bristles across my gums, scrubbing them raw.
That is the earliest memory I have from when 'things changed'. I remember that at some point, I heard the garage door open and my mom walked in. The silence was broken as she bolted towards my dad, screaming. After that, big, black, nothingness.
