Chips Off The Old Block (FICTOID)

They were tiny little chips, barely larger than specks, almost dust, but they still caught the morning light and glistened brightly.

She kept it in the basement so neither her daughter nor her father would find it.

Her father would scoff and scorn, then throw it away and mock her if she cried; her daughter would try to eat it.

Well, that’s to be expected, right?  After all, she was only one year old.

She glued the tiny amethyst chips to the peanut shell on a whim when she was only ten years old.  They were stuck in a corner of the drawer where her mother kept her jewelry making supplies.  She scooped them out with a torn corner of paper and glued them onto a peanut shell, the only thing she had at hand that morning.

Her father sold the desk soon after that, partially to obliterate memory of her mother, mostly to finance his drinking.

It wasn’t long after that he started abusing her, and it wasn’t long after that she gave birth to her daughter.

“Did you find what you were looking for?” the police woman asked.

“I did,” she said, carefully cupping the shell in her hand as she walked back up the stairs.

Child protective services already took her daughter, the police would take her to juvenile hall, the coroner would spend another couple of hours before carting off what was left of her father.

“How long will they send me to prison?” she asked the police woman.

The police woman glanced over to make sure her sergeant didn’t overhear, then softly said, “Honey, don’t you worry ‘bout that.  After what he done to you, anything you did back is fair game.” 

She glanced over again then whispered, “If it was up to me, I’d give you a medal.”

Clutching her amethyst covered peanut shell carefully in her hand, she said, “I already have one,” then followed the police woman out to her car.

© Buzz Dixon