Chapter 2 - The House of Terrors
The next morning felt like waking up inside a nightmare that Leo could not escape.
Every muscle in his body ached from the hard fall, but his emotional pain was far more paralyzing.
He woke up early to scrub the kitchen floor again, terrified that Mark would find a single spot of dried tomato sauce.
Mark emerged from his bedroom around noon, nursing a hangover and looking for a target for his rage.
"Get me some coffee, and make sure it is black," Mark barked from the living room couch.
Leo rushed to the coffee maker, his hands shaking so badly that he spilled a few drops of water on the counter.
He quickly wiped it up, his heart pounding in his chest like a trapped bird.
When he handed the mug to his uncle, Mark purposely bumped Leo's wrist, causing the hot liquid to splash onto the boy's hand.
Leo gasped in pain but bit his lip to stop himself from crying out.
"You are so incredibly clumsy," Mark sneered, taking a slow sip from the mug without a hint of remorse.
"It is a miracle you manage to survive without Sarah holding your hand every single second of the day."
Leo retreated to his bedroom, closing the door softly and pressing his back against the cool wood.
He looked at his red, blistered hand and let the tears fall silently down his cheeks.
He wanted to call his mother, to hear her comforting voice through the phone speaker.
But Mark had confiscated Leo's cell phone the night before, claiming the boy needed to learn discipline.
Leo was entirely trapped in his own home, isolated from the only person who truly loved him.
Over the next three days, the psychological torture escalated into a daily routine of misery.
Mark forced Leo to do grueling, unnecessary chores, like scrubbing the bathroom grout with a tiny toothbrush.
Whenever Leo finished a task, Mark would intentionally dirty the area again just to watch the boy suffer.
"You missed a spot, genius," Mark would laugh, dumping dirt onto the freshly mopped floor.
Leo swallowed his pride and his tears, scrubbing the floor until his fingers bled and his knees bruised.
He lived in constant, agonizing fear of his uncle's unpredictable temper.
Every creak of the floorboards made Leo flinch, anticipating another wave of verbal or physical abuse.
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The bright, cheerful boy that Sarah loved had been temporarily extinguished, replaced by a hollow, terrified shell.
He counted the hours until his mother’s scheduled return, praying silently that he could survive until she walked through the front door.
