[b]Floyd - The House - Jess[/b]

Floyd said nothing in response to everything Jess had said. He felt like an idiot because his actions caused her to bring forth her past, the one thing he did not intend to have happen. There were many similarities between them, something Floyd just now learned. Throughout her speech, Floyd could not find a way to make eye contact with her. He just stared at the table before them, biting the inside of his bottom lip. 

It seemed that all her experiences played a huge toll on her. That emotion, that fear she felt was due to everything that has happened to her. She's been drowning in the attempt to have a man, a male person accept her. Acceptance was also a big issue Floyd dealt with as well. He wasn't nor is the nicest person someone had to deal with. His entire life he struggled, trying to prevent himself from turning into the one man he hated, his father. And now that Jess' words were coming to an end, he'd tell her about it. For the first time he felt comfortable around her, like the entire room became warm in unity. 

"My father was also a drunk" he started, pausing for a second before continuing further along. "I didn't think anythin of it until I was about nine or ten. Behind my back he would hit my mother when things didn't go his way. I once saw him do it and confronted him. He put me down too, slapping me across the face like I was sumbody's bitch. From that day on, he would hit me instead of my mother. For sum reason I was relieved by that. I didn't want my mother to get hit, she was a gud woman, always supportin me" he recollected, feeling those bruises from more than a decade ago. 

"The fighting continued for years. I would come to school to find my mother crying. She'd always try and hide it from me, but it was always obvious. She'd ask "How was ur day? Did u make any friends today?", but the answers were always the same. It was okay, and no. I didn't make friends cuz I like u know, I ain't the nicest person. I took that anger, that rage I had for my father and would apply it towards my classmates. In third grade I got expelled about five times for fighting. I tried to find other ways to shun those emotions but I couldn't. I was weak and I still am" he said, getting up from his chair and laying on the wall behind him, still facing her. 

"One day my father came home drunk as hell. I can still picture it. His staggered walk, that f*ckin drool spillin from his lip. He came home talkin bout sum stupid horse race, sayin he lost or sum shit. He said he bet, what, twenty dollars. I tried to get em out the house, pushing him back towards the door. He takes me by the neck and pushes me to the ground. He goes to the kitchen, gets the fryin pan and starts hitting me with it, nobody there to stop him, not even my mother. The woman just watched and cry as I got hit. But what could she do anyway right? Call the cops? Right, that never happened. Three days later or so my father just vanishes from sight. Finally, the man I hate finally leaves. But what happens then? Were stuck with the house bills. Were the ones that have to pay off everythin!" he urged, sitting back down. 

He paused for a second to breathe, his eyes as wide as they could get "I get a couple gigs after that. I start fightin for money when I was still in school. Ya might not believe it but I've got a high school diploma. Yeah, I ain't no idiot. Anyhow, my mother passed away about a year later. Those rich folk come in and take everythin from me. The house is gone, her possessions, everythin. Apparently it all went to my father. They told me I had to go live with him because I was under aged still. I was what, seventeen? yeah, that's right. Moved in with my punk ass old man and once again got beat for showin up. Every damn day he would beat me, maybe once a day, maybe even five times a day, it all depended on how he felt. The f*cker died three months after my nineteenth birthday. I figured everythin will go to me, the farm, everythin, but that's not how it turned out. Tax collectors came, said I couldn't fund paying rent or sum shit, so they took everythin. I was forced to live on the streets until Eli helped me out. Guess one could say he truly was my only friend. Whoda thought right? Friends with a slave distributor" he huffed. 

"From then on I did what I do best, I fend for my self. Then I found you on that train yard" he paused yet again, this pause longer than the others. "I'm angry that I keep failin you and failin you. Over and over I question why I can't get it right, why I continue to push away when I see ya tryin to get closer and it enrages me. I turn to anger for an escape route...........im sorry. I'm sorry that I couldn't save you from Bruce. I'm sorry I couldn't save you from Tyler. I'm sorry I couldn't save Lynn" he said, his voice breaking down as he once again stood up from his seat. 

"The more I try to be less like him the more I turn out [b]just[/b] like him. Believe me, I am tryin. I am" he said, starting to break down. "I'm tired of failin, I'm tired of......of bein so distant from people, I don't want that anymore Jess, I don't. I don't want that" he repeated, falling to the ground, sitting in the cold lumbering floor. His teeth started to grind against each other as his eyes shut in attempt to prevent his tears from showing, but failed. A tear ran down his cheek, quickly he wiped it away with his forearm, but they continued. "I wont leave ya, I........I wont. Not again. No-" he finished, his own tears preventing him from speaking any longer. Finally she got to him. This was the true Floyd, a broken man in the shadow of his father's wrath. A man trying to get away from what he hates yet becoming it. But this outbreak helped him surpass that, it helped him understand his true purpose. He no longer had to take care of Jess because he wanted to prove his father he was not like him, he had to take care of Jess because he felt for her the same way she felt for him.