This story does not appear to be in the archive although I am sure it was included once among your list of newly submitted stories. So as to keep the archive up to date could you insert it there. It would not appear to be appropriate to treat it as a new story
Nicky's new Dad
Brian had always known it would be difficult but this was far worse than he expected. Nicky was white and trembling with rage.
"We don't need you. We don't want you. Mum and I are managing all right without you." The words came out in a furious rush with all the conviction and certainty that a strong willed twelve year old could muster.
Brian looked at the boy and regretted yet again that he had not managed to win his trust. He had tried but all his approaches had been firmly repulsed. Nicky did not want to see Derby City play Newcastle, he was not interested in ice hockey, he did not want to go swimming. The roller blades that Mary assured him her son had set his heart on and which Brian had given him as a Christmas present remained in their box unopened.
It was all the sadder because Brian liked what he knew of Nicky. It could not have been easy for the boy when his father had been killed in that car crash but he had behaved very well. Mary had told him how the requests for new clothes and trainers and computer games and everything else dear to the heart of a twelve year old had stopped on the instant. That the first she knew that Nicky had got a job as a newspaper boy was when he got up in the morning for the first time at half past six to start his round and then insisted on her taking his earnings as a contribution to their straightened house keeping budget . How since then he had not once let Mr Patel down and still won first class reports from school. She had also said she suspected that Nicky had lied about his age to get the job but she did not have the heart to tell on him.
Brian had had a few disasters in his life and he appreciated spirit in others. He was sure that in normal circumstances he would have had little trouble in getting on well with Nicky. The problem was
that they both loved the same woman. And now he was going to have to tell the boy that he was going to marry her.
Well there was no point in hanging around. He had tried to work round to the point gently but that hadn't worked. He glanced across the small sitting room to where Mary stood and taking strength from her smile ploughed resolutely. on.
"I can see you're managing very well Nicky and you've been a great help to your Mum and I know you will continue to be and to me as well."
"I don't want to help you", the concentrated hate in the boy's voice was frightening.
"Oh God here goes", thought Brian.
"I hope you will once your Mum and I are married."
The colour drained from the boy's face. He turned away and caught hold of the mantelpiece to steady himself. He stood there for a long moment and then very deliberately reached out and picked up the bone china Doulton figure that held pride of place in the centre of the shelve . It had been Nicky's father's last birthday present to Mary before the accident. He opened his hand and the figure crashed to the floor breaking into fragments.
There was a moment of silence. Mary began to cry. Nicky horrified by what he had done fled from the room.
Brian's patience snapped. He forgot his sympathy for the boy and his admiration for the way he had faced up to the consequences of his father's death. Anger at the wanton destruction of the figurine and at the distress caused Mary consumed him. Memories of the rebuffs suffered at Nicky's hands welled up within him. Unbuckling his belt he thundered up the stairs in pursuit of the boy.
Nicky made it to his bedroom just in front of him. He slammed the door shut but there was no key. He made a desperate effort to hold the door shut against the man but Brian was too strong for him. The door crashed open hurling Nicky across the room and sending him tumbling over the bed. The boys jeans stretched tight across his backside offered a tempting target and Brian brought his belt cracking down across them.
Nicky scrambled to his feet and made a dart for the door. Brian grabbed him by the collar. The boy twisted round and bit his wrist as hard as he could. Brian swore and back handed him viciously across the mouth. Nicky tasted blood as he was sent tumbling back upon the bed. Brian grasped him once again by the shirt collar, this time taking care to push his head into the mattress. Nicky felt the man's hand yank at the waste band of his jeans. Buttons popped and the boy felt cold air against his bare thighs and bottom.
"I mustn't cry. I'm not going to cry. He can only do this to me because he is stronger and bigger than me. He won't make me cry." Nicky was desperate but resolute.
Brian pulled the boys shirt up over his shoulders baring his body to the strap. He stepped back measured his distance with care and brought the belt cracking down across the boy's defenceless rump. Nicky's body jerked convulsively as the pain coursed through it driving the air from his lungs.
Nicky fought for breath and then desperately bit down on the duvet cover to try to stop himself crying out.
He heard the hiss of the strap above him. He braced himself for the blow.
Crack.
He wouldn't be able to take much more.
Crack.
"I mustn't cry. Imusn't. I MUSN'T"
Crack
Nicky's resolve broke and he howled
"Mum. Please Mum"
Crack
"Oww. Mum please stop him. Please."
Crack
Brian worked methodically as the boy's body writhed and twisted under the lash. Nicky ceased to feel the individual blows. All he was conscious of was a terrible pain that was tearing his whole body apart and vaguely as if at a great distance the sound of his own screams.
Brian became conscious of Mary hanging onto his arm and shouting at him to stop. Impatiently he pushed her away. It was only when she forced herself between him and her son that he stopped.
Looking over her shoulder he could see the boy, his body racked with sobs, the bruised flesh of his bottom darkening now to deep purple laced with livid weals. He was making a high pitched keening noise more like a small animal in pain than a human being.
He dropped the belt and turned away. Mary heard him blunder down the stairs and the slam of the front door as he left the house.
She sat down on the bed and began to gently stroke her sons head.
"My poor boy, my poor baby," she murmured over and over again.
After a time she rose and fetched the duvet from the double bed in her room and spread it gently over Nicky's bruised body.
It was only when he was well away from the house that Brian remembered that he and Mary had planned to stay the night together and that his over night case together with his coat, his credit cards and his house keys were in her bedroom. He couldn't go back for them now. He would go back the next day. He ought anyway to face up to what he had done.
Nicky woke the next day to find his mother still sitting on the bed beside him. He looked up at her and saw she had been crying.
"You stay where you are Nicky," she said gently. "Brian's just come back to collect his case and then he'll be gone and we will never see him again."
Looking up at her Nicky felt very small and very humble. He had done his best and it had not been easy. It had not been pleasant to wear old clothes and do without things when the other boys he knew had so much. It had been grim some mornings especially when it was raining and cold to do the paper deliveries and then go on to school. He had done these things but they had not been enough. There were things he realised that a boy could do and things that were beyond a boy's power. He knew he had to do one more thing that was more difficult than anything else he had faced up to so far but do it he would.
Painfully he levered himself out of the bed He whimpered slightly as he did so for his bottom was still raw and painful.
"Where are you going?" Mary asked anxiously.
Nicky did not reply. Mary watched him leave the room and make his way across the landing his shirt tails flapping against his bare thighs.
Nicky stopped outside his mother's room. The door was open. Through it he could see Brian his back to him packing his case. That was the man his mother loved. The man whom he...... Nicky knew he had to say something; something to turn back the clock and to make everything right. It wasn't easy to know what to say and anyway he had a lump in his throat that some how made talking difficult. He took a deep breath.
"Dad," he said.
Brian turned and found the boy's arms tight around him the boy's head resting against his chest. Looking past him he saw the boy's mother. He held out his arms. She hesitated and then walked towards him.