Hidden Truth

Your challenge this week is to use this line as a fourth. It can be used anywhere in the story as long as it is in a 4th position (8th line, 12th line, 16th line, etc). Please be sure the line stands out from the rest of your text by bolding or italicizing or enclosing it within quotes.

Charlie Higgins assumed most grown folks viewed the world cloaked in an aura of thick, murky darkness. His earliest recollections of life manifested in muffled tones of anger capped with fear and dread. It was often those memories which pulled him into troubled slumber.

Charlie barely recalled fleeting images of his birth mother. His young mind didn’t comprehend who she was but he welcomed the warmth her image instilled in the hollowness of his heart. Snippets of a young face twisted with laughter as familiar to him as the uncertainty of his young life. Instinct instructed him to never question the parents raising him.

Until recently, he’d assumed the wrinkled, slightly stooped over lady was his mother. Hadn’t he called her ‘Mama’ for as long as his lips could form the word? The elderly man, permanently scented in stale smoke and whiskey fumes was ‘Papa’; the male half of the puzzle.

It only came through an argument between his ‘Mama’ and ‘Papa” his world became confusingly clearer. They’d consumed their daily “liquid medication” quite early that morning after an unexpected call. Normally, Charlie stayed clear during the morning ritual but the phone call had piqued his curiosity. Conversation peppered with curse words centered around an unknown female. Charlie scanned his memory banks, trying to follow their anger. Whoever she was, there would be hell to pay. “This is Charlie’s mother,” a drunken voice mimicked.

Disbelief swallowed Charlie as the floor gave way. Mouth gasping soundless as the memories of the woman made sense. He stood from behind the chair, ignoring the shocked expressions on ‘Mama’ and ‘Papa’s faces. Things had been much better when he had been hidden. Yes, much better when he’d been hidden from the truth he knew he wouldn’t be able to escape.