Draconis' Bane Read Online Free PDF Page A

get up at eight I won’t be done until
eleven…” Tristan stammered.
    “I don’t care…you
have responsibilities. You should have mowed it yesterday.”
    “…but, I had Karate
last night. I…”
    “SHUT UP! I don’t
want excuses. Mow the lawn!”
    Tristan hung his
head, his larger than average ears completely red. Anne smiled
across the table as Paul tried to make Tristan laugh with a couple
jokes as Tristan’s parents started discussing today’s news. When
Anne had friends over Dad never yelled, she always got to leave the
table early and go play. But after supper was over Paul offered to
help Tristan clear the table.
    Depressed and feeling
very self-conscious Tristan led Paul up to his room where they
played board games and listened to the radio for the rest of the
night. Paul never mentioned what happened earlier, probably sensing
that Tristan was too embarrassed to talk about it. Before they went
to sleep, Paul in a sleeping bag on the floor and Tristan in his
bed, Paul offered to help Tristan mow the lawn tomorrow. He was
greeted by silence as Tristan nodded off to sleep.
    The next morning
Tristan was up at seven and finishing mowing the lawn around ten as
a car pulled into the driveway. Sweating and exhausted he looked up
to see Paul getting into his parents car, he smiled and waved and
Tristan returned the wave, his heart sinking as Paul’s parents
backed their car up and left, two hours early.
    For weeks afterward
there was no mention at school about Tristans’ father. Then, on
their way in from recess another friend of Paul’s asked about a
bruise on Tristan’s shoulder.
    “Did you Dad give you
that?” he asked.
    Tristan made eye
contact with Paul and knew as his gaze dropped that Paul had told
his whole class about Tristan’s treatment at home. He had thought
everyone was taking it easy on him because they were starting to
like him; instead it was pity.
    “Nah, that’s from
playing street hockey.”
    “Oh! Cool.” Someone
replied.
    “…ya. It’s almost as
rough as our football games.” Tristan chuckled.
    Everyone laughed, but
inside Tristan was dying a little. He was never very proud of his
home life, but one of the benefits of living so far away from his
classmates was that he could keep it a secret. Now everyone knew,
some decided that his home life was punishment enough; others
decided to use the knowledge as a weapon. Either way, no one else
ever slept over at Tristan’s house again.
    Thus, at the age of
eight, the ‘wall of silence’ was born. The more people knew about
Tristan, the easier they could hurt him. In one of his classroom
day-dreams Tristan decided that ‘The Wall’ as it would later be
simplified, was the only way to keep his heart from breaking.
     
    Finally his mother
came out of the house, his little sister in tow, protesting every
inch of the way. She was put into the car and the two hour drive to
the place where his Grandpa was to be buried began. I’ll save you
the time and point out the obvious, the entire drive was punctuated
by his sister hitting and biting him, Tristan retaliating, his
father yelling at him, Anne’s self satisfied grin as Tristan looked
back out the window, ranting inside at the injustice of it all.
    Arriving an hour
before the funeral was to start Tristan was sent into the church
while his sister got to stand around outside with his parents. He
slowly walked up to the front of the church, where the coffin sat,
turned sideways so that the longest side was exposed to the
assembly. There were four steps that would take the shorter people
up to eye level with what was inside the coffin….Tristan slowly
proceeded up to the front of the church.
    Each step was like
burning agony. He was still unable to cry and his grief and guilt
welled up inside him. He’d overheard his mother and her brother
talking about the arrangements and discussing how horrible Cancer
is to have taken their father. He slowly made his way up the four
steps and peered