“And Beauty and The Beast lived happily ever after together,” finished Zack’s mother swiftly.
“Another story, another!” the toddler pleaded.

“No more tonight.  Mommy is tired,”sighed the mother.  “Goodnight Zachary, I love you,” she said as she slowly leaned down to gently kiss her son’s peachy forehead with her eyes fixed on the door.  Nervously, she got up from the rocking chair, moved her son’s wheelchair to the side, and began to make her way to the opposite end of the pastel orange room.  She carefully rotated the door handle, stepped into the dark hallway, and then glanced back behind her to make sure her son was unaware of her uneasy demeanor.  The fear of the abuse she had been anticipating since dusk could not be hid under the translucent facade meant to shield Zachary from the harsh realities of life:  her reality.

At the same time that the closing door clicked shut, she overheard a man’s loud grunt and the clink of glass bottles.  The unmistakable odor of a burning Cuban cigar could be detected from the ground floor while the addict smoking it was in the basement.

“Astilbe,” said a raspy voice, the syllables of the name being slurred together.  The woman did not respond out of fear of attracting the attention of her son.  “Astilbe?” he questioned, quite louder than before and much more impatiently.  Astilbe, however, did not acknowledge the voice, but still proceeded to venture through the hallway and down the stairs that creaked with every shift of the her gaunt body.  As she was approaching the room of the questioner, the thickening, gray smoke pouring out of his room caught the only light in the house that was being shined in by the moon.  Against the pitch black surroundings, the smoke was the only visible entity.  It seemed to wrap itself around Astilbe like a net and stop her in her tracks.  She could not decide whether she should try to struggle out of the net and get herself even more engulfed in the process, or just remain still and accept the fact that it was inescapable, and it would be useless to try.  

The booming voice pierced through the net, tearing it open and forcing her to either face the abuse now, or suffer worse later.  “Astilbe!” shouted Burdock, “I thought you would have learned by now!”

Astilbe was shaking.  She was all too familiar with her husband’s abuse.  It was the worst when he was intoxicated because Burdock will forget why he is mad at her and then take his frustration out even more.  She walked into the musty basement with a straight face.  If she was crying or fake smirking, the punches would only be worse. 

Empty bottles filled a dark stained table.  Everything from cheap beer to strong scotch and whisky to vodka and red wine bottles were on the table, next to the table, and under it.  The wall opposite the table had holes in it and shattered glass on the ground from when Burdock would become enraged or too drunk to hit his wife with the bottles and he missed.  A small ashtray was on the edge of the table, next to several Zippo lighters and a box of cigars.  The room was lit by a flickering clap activated lamp in one of the corners of the room.  A tan, worn down armchair sat in the middle of the bottles.  An even more worn down man sat in the chair.

Burdock had semi-tan, oily skin with brown (turning gray) hair and black eyes that could see through the soul of anyone who dared to look into them.  He was not muscular, but still a rather monstrous and burly man.  Burdock was slumped back in his chair with his stained shirt unbuttoned from his swollen adam’s apple to his mid-chest which was covered in coarse hair.  In his left hand was a fat, a smouldering Cuban cigar, an almost empty bottle of Hennessy in his right.  Burdock was wearing thick, old, working boots which still had some mud on them since he was out earlier that day.

"Ah, you finally came," he said smoothly, "Do you know what happens when you disappoint me?  Come closer, tell me what happens."
"I get punished," Astilbe timidly replied, staring down at the old, wooden floor.
"What happens?" Burdock replies smirking. "It's okay, we are friends,  You can be specific."
"I get beat-"

"You get beat!" he loudly repeats, cutting off her last thoughts.  "Oh, don't cry about it now sweetie.  Don't act like you don't deserve everything coming at you.  You need to be here right after I call for you.  You need to do whatever I say without question.  You need to do what I tell you to do the exact way I tell you to do it.  Do I make myself clear?"

"I'm sorry, Burdock," Astilbe replied.
"I know you're sorry!" Burdock snapped back,  "you're sorry because you don't want to be punished again like last time!  That was not what I was asking!  I was asking if you understand what I'm telling you to do!"

"I'm sor- I understand, Burdock. It won't happen again.  I promise"

"You shouldn't make promises that you can't keep.  But since you did promise, I will hold you to your word.  Don't hesitate to come to my aid next time. For all you know, I was having a heart attack, or there was a robber, or I fell down and could not get up.  You don't deserve mercy," said Burdock, emotionless.

And then it happened the same way it has happened hundreds of times before.  Astilbe was used to it by now.  Burdock says how everything is always her fault. And then he hits her.  There was no hesitation before he wound back his blistered fist and hit her across her already bruised and beaten face.  Astilbe took the punch, thinking that she deserved it because that is what she has been told for three years already.

After Burdock finished beating her identically to how he did several days ago, he downed a fifth of the bottle of Hennessey and took some long puffs from his shrinking cigar.

Astilbe stared down at the ground as she left the room to go upstairs to clean her face and try to get some sleep.  She turned on the bathroom light and looked at her bloodied nose and eye in the dusty mirror.  She wiped the salty tears off her face and cleaned the metallic tasting blood that was dripping into her mouth.  She went to bed in the room next to her son's and cried herself to sleep; not because of the pain, but because during the abuse she was thinking about how her son could one day be suffering through the same thing.

The next morning, Zack woke up earlier than usual.  He pulled his wheelchair closer to his bed to get into it.  He was anxious about his doctor's appointment today at the hospital.  They were supposed to discuss treatment for his worsening state of leukemia.  After Zack got dressed, he rolled his wheelchair through the dimly lit hallway and past the bathroom with the door slightly ajar.

Astilbe was trying to cover her scars, bruises, and pus filled blisters with layers of foundation and concealer.  It was a process she was all too familiar with.
"Mommy?" asked Zack with a shaking quiver in his voice.  "Mommy what happened?  Why are you hurt?"
"Zack!  Uh, I just fell," replied Astilbe.  "We can talk about this later.  Please, just get the papers on the counter in the kitchen and get ready to go to the hospital."  So Zack did as he was asked, now even more nervous about what happened to his mother and his leukemia treatment.
   
"I do not know how to say this simply, but your cancer has worsened much more since I have last saw you," the doctor told Zack and his mother.  "I am afraid that we have to start chemotherapy right away.  Astilbe, ma'am, may I have a word with you in the hallway?  It is very important.  Is your husband here also?  We would like to have a word with the parents of the patient."
"He wasn't able to make it.  He's a very busy man, I love him very much."  It was a mechanical response that she was used to repeating to many people.

"Your insurance is not able to cover the treatments that your son needs," said the doctor.  "The hospital can try to do everything that we can to fund the chemotherapy, but it most likely will be a very limited amount of money.  The children's hospital has many patients in need of financial assistance."

This was the straw that broke the camel's back in Astilbe's mind.  She returned to the side of her son's bed to comfort him.

"Mommy, are you crying because you are hurt?  Why is your face bruised?" asked Zack.

Astilbe replied, "Honey, not all stories have happy endings."