The Taft Family’s Before and After - 4. Steven's Story

Steven Nelson here. My life got fucked up early. I don't remember exactly when it started, probably around twelve, before we moved to Georgia anyway. Mom had locked Nick up in the bathroom again and she came into our room naked. Normally, it'd be cool to see a naked lady. Mom wasn't that skinny. Pretty flabby if I can be honest. She sat down on my bed and told me I was a special little boy. So far, aside from the nudity, almost normal. Then she reached for my penis and told me how big it was. She kept rubbing and it got bigger. I didn't know whether to like it or hate it. After all, she was my mom, and the whole thing seemed wrong. But I gotta be honest, it felt nice.

After that, every so often, she'd come into our bedroom when Nick wasn't around. She'd pull down my pants, or pajamas, as the case may be, and started rubbing me directly. Then came the gross part. She made me lick her privates. I got a beating the first time because I barfed on it. She must have told dad I did something wrong, because later, he came in and whacked me on the back of my head. I'm pretty sure he turned the big ring he wore on that hand around, so I'd feel the full force. I put my hand behind my head after a little while, and it came back all bloody.

I guess, fortunately for the back of my head, I didn't barf on her the next few times she made me do that. Dad hit me enough over seemingly nothing anyway. It was easy to do something wrong that would give me another bump, or scar. She would lick and suck on me before she made me lick her. I guess I was almost thirteen when she made me put it in her for the first time. I'm not sure how good it could have felt for her, but to me, it was like putting it in a bowl of warm ice cream. Not something I wanted to repeat. I didn't get my wish, I had to repeat it a few times, usually with a complaint. Gross. I still feel icky just thinking about it.

She must have said something bad to dad about it, because one day, he threw me around the living room and told me I needed to do what my mother asked. One of his throws made me land crooked against the coffee table and I heard my arm snap. I screamed. When we got to the hospital, I had to say I fell out of a tree. Funny, because the trees in our yard couldn’t support a squirrel more than three feet up.

It was New Year's Eve when things got really freaky. I thought we were all going to watch the ball drop. It seemed like it at first, because we sat in the living room. But then dad asked Jill to take off her clothes. No, told her to. She didn't and he undressed her. I looked away. I didn't think it was right to look at my sister naked. Then mom grabbed my hand and said I needed to go into the kitchen with her. ‘Oh, no, she's going to make me do it again,’ I thought. But I was wrong. She said something like since I didn't know how to fuck right, I would get a lesson. She stripped my clothes off. Dad brought Jill into the kitchen and slammed her hard down on the table. Mom said, “you watch,” but I wasn't about to. I closed my eyes and bent down. All I heard was Jill screaming, dad grunting and groaning, and mom and Aunt Eve saying things like 'give it to her good.' She even said the ‘C’ word. Mom mentioned fucking Jill's ass and I tried to stop listening. Didn't work. When everybody quieted down, mom grabbed me and forced me to look at Jill lying on the table, naked and bloody between her legs. Then she took me to my bedroom. I was curled up in a ball, crying about what just happened when I heard her bring Nick in. He wasn't crying or anything, so I hoped he hadn't seen anything. I closed my eyes tighter and tried to pretend it didn't happen. Started stuttering the next day. Bitch.

Then, one night about six weeks later, I was having a friend sleep over. That seemed like a miracle at the time, we didn't often get that opportunity. Anyway, Joey Keys lived four doors down from us. He was my best friend. Dad set us up on the floor of the family room with sleeping bags. We goofed around, played video games, and ate way too many sweets. It was the most fun I'd had in a long time. Later that night, after we had fallen asleep, mom came in and put some clothes and a coat on me and took me out to the car. I asked what was up but didn't get an answer. When I asked about Joey, she just said that dad was taking care of him and not to worry. Taking care of him, that's so wrong it's almost funny. Yeah, right. Mom came out a little while later, dragging Jill behind her. Jill looked at me, apparently wondering what was happening, but all I could do was shrug my shoulders. I didn't have the foggiest idea what was going on. A little while later, she came out with Nick, told Jill to buckle him in, and we left. We got to a motel after a couple hours and were put to bed. It took a long time, but I finally did fall asleep.

We stayed there about a week, it was boring, and I couldn't keep track of the days too well, so it could have been a little more or less. When we finally left, we pulled up to a new house. Dad mumbled, 'Home, sweet home.' Mom asked, 'Here?' and we went inside. But not before we were told to stay out of the back yard. It wasn't until later before we found out why he wanted to keep us out. Dad said something to mom like we wouldn't be here if she hadn't touched the neighbor's kid. Joey?

Even in the new house, Dad would hit me for no apparent reason. Maybe I answered a question too slowly, or didn't do a chore to his satisfaction. Either way, the back of my head felt it. Then one day after school, I stayed late to try out for the school play. They were doing skits based on Looney Tunes, and I hoped to use my stuttering to land the Porky Pig part. I turned onto our street and saw someone running at the other end. I initially thought it was Nick, but the kid looked heavier, and there'd be no way my parents would let Nick leave the yard. I soon found out how wrong I was.

I walked in the door to mom and dad talking. Mom asked, "What if he says something?" Dad answered, "We'll say he ran away." I asked "Who ran away?" and they said Nick, now go to your room and do your homework. I couldn't believe Nick was brave enough to take that route. I'd thought of it a hundred times, but never followed through. I silently wished him luck, but was sad to think I might not see him again.

Everything was quiet again for a few days, almost normal you could say, until Sunday morning. I got woken up early by loud voices. I thought mom and dad were arguing about Nick. They'd been doing that since he left. It was summer, and hot, so I shambled out of our bedroom in my tighty-whities, surprised to see four cops and some lady I didn't know. Nobody told me to get dressed, so I stayed and watched. After a short time, one of the policemen took me back to my room, and told me to put some clothes on. After I dressed, he asked me a bunch of questions about mom and dad. At first, I said everything was okay, they didn't do anything bad. I was afraid this would blow over, and when the cops left, I'd get the beating of my life, if not killed, based on mom and dad's previous threats. But the officer told me that my parents were going to be arrested, and I wouldn't have to worry about them. I finally answered his questions, but didn't offer any more than I had to. I talked about the smacking, and mom touching me, but said nothing else happened.

Right after the cops left with mom and dad, another man showed up with Nick. The lady from before was still there, asking the man a lot of questions about taking care of us. At first, I didn't want to go with some stranger, but then decided he HAD to be better than mom and dad. I packed some clothes and my Nintendo Switch(TM) and we all left with him. He took us to a Waffle House, and I found out this stranger was my Uncle.

After breakfast, we went to his house, and then went to look at a couple houses. I was kind of confused, but I didn't say anything. A lot of people were impatient with my stuttering. I didn't want to aggravate someone who we might end up living with. We stayed in a motel for a few nights. But he asked us about the things mom and dad did, and after Jill said dad beat us, I got brave and stuttered about my broken arm. Uncle Brendan didn't even flinch at my stuttering.

We spent almost a week in the motel before we moved into a big house a couple minutes from the old one. It was great. We didn't have to be careful about what we said, Uncle Brendan let us help do things, like suggest things shopping, helping put things away, etc. The house even had a pool. The pool was nice, but it also caused a couple problems.

I had a friend, Lanny Harper, come over after school one Friday for a sleepover. We were changing out of our bathing suits in my room. He was talking about how hot Jill was and when he dropped his bathing suit, I could see he had a boner. He wanted to jerk off. I asked if he could do it in the bathroom, but he wouldn't. He started right in front of me. I don't know why, but I got a boner too. He guilted me to join in. We both came, and I felt really weird afterward. Then he wanted to do it again at bedtime, but I buried my head in a book and told him to do it alone.

The pool caused another problem when Lanny grabbed Jill between the legs. Jill slapped him hard, and Lanny had to leave. His mother came to pick him up, but he'd already left. She accused Uncle Brendan of doing all sorts of naughty things with Lanny because he was gay. The cops were about to search the house because she accused Uncle Brendan of hiding him, but her phone rang and she left, looking like a dog that had its snout shoved into a pile of its own shit. She came back about six weeks later and apologized. I hadn't seen Lanny except in school since the pool incident. That changed after she apologized, we got to be good friends again. Fortunately, nothing bad ever happened again around the pool.

Then, there was one really bad time. Mom’s trial started but didn’t last very long. That first day, they found a dead body in our backyard. Mom and Dad’s house, that is. It was a young boy. When I found out it was my friend Joey, I shut down. So much was going on, nobody noticed. But that was good. I had to come to terms with it on my own, anyway. A week later, Mr. Keys shot mom. She didn’t die though, not right away, anyway. Uncle Brendan brought Jill and me to see her. I didn’t have much to say, she was in a coma. I don’t know if she heard me, but I told her she should have died and I also said, “Fuck you.”

Everything was great after that. We did things like any real family. I wasn't smacked again, Nick wasn't locked in a bathroom, and nobody touched Jill where they shouldn't. A couple years after we started living with Uncle Brendan, he adopted us. The judge let us change our names. I dropped the Taft like a hot potato and took Uncle Brendan's name, Nelson. We all did. I knew Nick was the reason we were able to get away from mom and dad, so I asked Uncle Brendan if we could get a medal made for Nick. I told him I wanted 'The Bravest Boy Ever' on it, and he went and got it. Jill and I gave it to Nick the day Uncle Brendan became Newdad. Jill and I decided calling him Dad would be like calling him fuckhead, or something, so she made up Newdad.

Like anyone else, I grew up, went to college, got married, and had two kids. One of each. My wife and I were corny, naming them Michael and Michelle. Life's been good since Uncle Brendan came into our lives. I shudder to think what might have happened to us if he didn't.

Next Up - “Abel and Kathy's Beginnings”