Punishment Halls

Narguile Ashford was only seven years old when he lost both his parents, yet he was still a hard to control rascal even at such young age. While the faces of both his mother and father had faded inside his memory with the passage of time, the psychological and social scars left behind by that fateful night were not as easily erased.

After all, even if he wasn’t meant to bear the consequences of his progenitor’s actions, he was draped in a cloak of silent judgment, a damning shadow cast over him by blood —not of his spilling but undeniably coursing through his veins. He was the child of a murderer, the son of a man who killed his own wife to then disappear from the face of the earth.

The boy's lineage had become a labyrinth of unanswered questions and untimely endings, his father's side remaining an enigma wrapped in the shroud of anonymity. The man who was half responsible for his existence had no kin that society was aware of, or at least none that cared to claim Narguile as their own. On the other hand, Narguile's maternal relatives regarded him with a mix of disdain and superstition, as if he were a living reminder of a cursed lineage they wished to forget.

Society recoiled from him as though he were marred by his father’s sin —a misdeed not his own, yet it seemed to taint his very soul in the eyes of the world. While it wasn’t handled directly by the boy, doors closed one after another; conversations faded into silence as his future was brought into discussion; eyes that should have looked upon him with warmth instead turned away, leaving him adrift in a sea of rejection.

Ultimately, it was within the austere walls of an institutional center where Narguile Ashford ended up being relocated to the Foster Group House that became his unlikely home. The new home was starkly utilitarian, its corridors echoing with faint laughter and muffled sobs of other lost souls similar to himself. Each child there carried their own burdening tale, one that often lay heavy beneath their youthful exteriors, yet even there Narguile was unable to find camaraderie, despite the rest of the children understanding fully well what it meant to be unclaimed and unwanted.

His heart had become far too closed, its ramparts reinforced by the searing betrayal of his father, the very man who should have been the bastion of safety for his family. Age proved irrelevant in Narguile's wounded psyche. He became noxiously overprotective of himself, ever vigilant against the onslaught of pain that threatened to breach his defenses with every potential bond.

The vehement refusal to engage in the customary pursuits of childhood companionship was not merely a passive act of self-preservation; it was an aggressive assertion, perhaps an innate trait already embedded in his personality. Narguile repelled advances with a ferocity that belied his age, as if each overture of friendship concealed the dagger of future treachery. It wasn't just mere shoves in passing or scowls cast across playrooms; he met perceived slights with clenched fists and a fury that left both peers and caretakers equally wary.

It only took a slightest insinuation of hostility or mockery to ignite within him a tempestuous wrath, leading to violent confrontations more often than not. His clashes were indiscriminate —children who mocked him and staff who sought to discipline him found themselves facing equal measures of his unbridled rage.

In his perceived world, where trust equated vulnerability, Narguile clung fervently to one solitary relic from a time before innocence was shattered. A simple red ribbon that mother Tina loved to tie her hair with. This memento was more than a keepsake; it served as both shield and talisman, safeguarding what remnants remained of the love he once knew while warding off the perils he now faced alone in the merciless world around him.

Yet one shadowy figure remained a constant inside those feverish dreams about his childhood. Vitola Ashford, his father. He was unable to muster his face no matter how much his brain seemed to try, but… Why was any of that important now, of all times?

It was as he tried to shake those thoughts off his mind that Narguile groaned back into an awakened state. His face and shoulders were sore from lying on the cold ceramic floor of the bathroom for hours, and not without some effort, he pulled his body upwards into a seating position as he accommodated his legs inside the confined space between the tight four walls.

An effort that perhaps proved to be unwise, as he was immediately faced with an intense recoil that felt like his guts were making a somersault. Everything came back to haunt him at once, the searing sensation of his parted knuckles, the pulsating ache in his head around the area he slammed the doorknob with; and eclipsing both of them, the immense dread that ran through his veins like a wildfire at the potential of facing that revolting ghost once more.

Narguile’s exhausted gray eyes moved across the shadow-laced bathroom in a frantic tempo, scanning his surroundings with rapid line-of-sight shifts that mirrored his rapidly increasing heartbeat, however, he was ultimately met with nothing.

The bloated grim reaper’s oppressive presence had dissipated like a horrid nightmare after waking up, and bit by bit, Narguile’s shoulders began to relax as he sought support in any stable object to lift himself completely upwards.

He questioned if all was nothing but his mind playing tricks on him, disorientated just as much as he was unable to dispel the sickened sensation after remembering the monster’s visage. No, it had been too real, too vivid for a mere dream. Moreover, he had never considered himself to be a particularly imaginative guy, and certainly not enough to come up with something as crazy as that thing was.

And in the very second that he didn’t dismiss it as an illusion, a new fear sunk its teeth to his very core —more visceral than any fear for himself. What if the grotesque bastard had turned its malevolent focus towards his wife and daughter?

The thought sliced through Narguile’s daze like a guillotine; every paternal instinct within him sounding alarms far louder than any ghostly encounter ever could. It propelled him into action despite the lingering pain and the overwhelming desire to drop unconscious for a few more hours. Lieta and Aria’s safety was of paramount importance, above all else.

Whatever guilt he had felt about his actions the night before was swiftly discarded, deemed thoroughly unnecessary, as the protective fury fueling his steps was not unlike a darkness threatening to claim him as an instrument of violence once more. Every fiber of his being screamed alertness at this potential threat lurking unseen; feeling as if his very eyes could deceive him, sheltering the monster under every shadow cast across the home he swore to defend. Be it a monster, hell or heaven itself, if anything dared to harm his family, then…

Lieta was caught off-guard, most likely as a result of his abrupt staggering through the doorway, or maybe because of the way his bloodshot eyes looked under his disheveled face and distraught expression. Regardless of the reason, Narguile’s sudden presence made his wife turn around sharply in his direction, interrupting the sizzling sound of breakfast being cooked with a loud yelp escaping from her lips as she flinched, pushing down a nearby bowl with her elbow as one of her hands flew to her heart, making the glass container succumb to gravity’s call as it crashed onto the tiled floor.

The cacophony of shattering glass served as a jarring symphony that snapped Narguile back into reality —his world of phantoms interrupted by a visage of mundanity, the danger of any hypothetical monster replaced by the one offered by scattered crystal shards.

He felt momentarily stunned, unable to move a single muscle for a couple of seconds, just as Lieta’s gaze swept across him. The soft features of her face and the golden brightness of her yellow eyes tainted by concern… And perhaps a hint of something else.

An expression that spoke volumes to him without uttering a single word.

Even when he was still recovering from the lingering torment that appeared to have rooted itself inside his mind, Narguile compelled himself to move, forcing his feet to bridge the gap between them to then kneel over the broken glass pieces, beginning to pick up the larger shards between his hands before she could manage to get hurt.

But… He knew it wasn’t much more than an escape from her trembling eyes, a subterfuge driven by fear rather than altruism. But he was afraid, how could he not? What if Lieta now harbored fear towards him, after his violent outburst the night before? The idea that she could see him as something monstrous, a figure to recoil rather than be embraced by, sent a fierce pang through his heart, sharper than any piece of glass his shaky fingers picked up.

It was easier to focus on cleaning up the broken remnants than confront the possibility that their relationship might fracture under the weight of his monstrosity.

He busied himself amid debris and uncertainty, desperate for anything that would keep him from staring back into Lieta’s eyes and finding in their reflection his deepest fears confirmed.

“You know… You’ve always done this, ever since we were children.” With a long sigh, Narguile stopped himself once again from movement when the voice of his wife reached his ears, soft-spoken and heavy-handed at the same time. “You burden everything on your own, as if it didn’t matter even a little bit how much pain you’d have to endure, or how hurt you’d end up in the process.”

>> “Don’t you realize how unfair that is, Narguile?”

Unconsciously, his fingers tightened around the gathered glass pieces. Her words reached him yet they were hard to acknowledge. He understood at once that Lieta was right, that she had every reason in the world not only to be mad at him, but also to question the very foundation upon which they had built their union.

And despite how much that possibility tore at Narguile’s already frayed seams, he struggled to maintain composure. There was something excruciating about that realization, crushed under the weight of everything that transpired in the last handful of hours, yet unable to give up that fierce need to keep everything intact for Lieta and Aria’s sake.

He knew that his efforts to cloak his inner disarray were pitiful at best. Attempts of deceiving had never been his forte, anything he ever tried to hide was easily uncovered by Lieta’s discerning gaze. It wasn’t so much ineptitude on his part, or at least, that’s what he wanted to believe; but rather a testament to how deeply she understood him.

“Last night must have been very scary.” Accompanying the soothing tone of her voice, her proximity wrapped around him like a caring embrace. He didn’t exactly know when it was that the crybaby girl he once met had turned into the very lifeline keeping him from despair, but there was no denying it either. Despite their lives being so thoroughly intertwined, she had matured into a really strong woman without him noticing. “It was for me, at least.”

>> “But I’m thankful, Narguile. It’s only thanks to you that it was nothing more than that… Just a scare, a bad dream.”

For Lieta saw beyond the superficial veneers; she was able to perceive the raw anguish and conflict warring within him as clearly as one might see daylight piercing through a rift in curtains. In her eyes lay a mirror reflecting back at Narguile not just his fears but also an unspoken pledge —an assurance that regardless of anything that lay ahead of them, they would face them together, as long as he was able to accept that he didn’t need to do it all on his own.

Narguile truly thought of telling it all, right then and there. From how much tension it brought to him thinking that the cops might knock down on his door at any moment, to how afraid he was of what murdering someone implied to his humanity. How he was lost, unsure of what to do next…

His lips parted only for a brief moment before everything was obscured by the shadow of the creature he saw last night. Indeed, everything came back to that thing. How could he even begin to explain it? There was just no way.

“I’m fine.” Narguile ultimately said, letting a relieved sigh escape from his lips. Whatever was to come, all he needed to know was that Lieta was still on his side. “It’s just exhaustion taking its toll on my head.”

>> “But… Thank you, Lieta. I really needed to hear that.”

The smile he tried to muster did little to appease Lieta. It likely seemed too feeble to stop her growing frown.

“You do realize you’re bleeding out of your hand right now, don’t you?” She soon pointed out, making him notice faint traces of crimson running down from his tightened fingers.

Thankfully, he had a secret weapon at the ready.

“The same way that you notice the smell of burnt eggs?”

A roll of her eyes and a cleaning cloth thrown to his face as she urgently stood up to tend the forgotten frying pan were not sufficient measures to stop him from chuckling lightly. It was truly a mysterious thing how just being around her placated his concerns, and it calcified his determination just as well. All she needed to do was stand beside him, and he could take on anything.

Similarly rising from his kneeling position, Narguile discarded the pieces of the shattered bowl before tending to the superficial wound he had just given himself with the cleaning cloth Lieta ‘handed’ to him. Despite how his complexion had improved significantly after that little chat, he figured he was still in a pretty messed up state, enough so that the cut was barely being registered by his numbed-down palm.

“It really is just like when we were children, isn’t it?” His voice came out softly, but Lieta’s attention fell on him just the same, despite her efforts to salvage the darkened breakfast, her eyes —those striking orbs of golden luminescence, locking onto Narguile momentarily. Her delicate features were reminiscent of that of a painting; platinum strands cascading like soft silver around her face —the very picture of fragile elegance. It was that breathtaking beauty that had once made her vulnerable among those who thrived on preying upon weaknesses. “It’s hard not to reminisce.”

Back when Lieta arrived to the austere confines of the Foster Group Home, even as a child of eleven, she called unwanted attention. Older girls cast envious and scathing glances toward her, while boys, emboldened by juvenile bravado, sought to tease and harass. Little did it help just how easy it was to make her cry.

Two years older, Narguile brought it upon himself to stand between her and the rest of the kids. He had always been a prone-to-fighting loner, but now, with Lieta, he had a reason to do so. He bore the bruises like medals earned in defense of something purer than himself —a kindred spirit found amidst shared misfortune.

After all, the motive as to why she was taken to such an awful place was the fuel of rapidly moving rumors. Abandoned by her father, who ran away after the murder of her mother, a tragedy he could understand too well.

It was a connection he didn’t really make too much of beyond its superficial meaning —something he would come to eventually regret.

“Oh, so you do remember?” Lieta’s voice pulled him out of his daydream. There was the right amount of playful displeasure in her tone so that Narguile couldn’t help but smile, picking up a broom as he proceeded to sweep the remaining smaller shards of glass, navigating around her petite frame. “Then why is it so that you never seem to learn?”

Yes, he figured she was right. The very first time he ever interrupted the bullying against her, he ended up biting way more than he could chew. Older kids beat him to a pulp, and he was left a bloody mess, lying on the ground with an overly sentimental dummy crying right next to him.

Narguile remembered that moment quite vividly, even as she called him stupid while asking why had he butted in throwing punches without reservation; but how could he forget? It was the first time he felt pride, the first time he ever felt like he had won at something. After all, none of them had managed to reach even a single hair of that frail girl whose name he then proceeded to ask.

“Some lessons are just a bit hard to take in.” Narguile answered, discarding the final pieces of the glass bowl. Even as jest carried his words, there lingered an underlying truth —a self-admonishment, perhaps. “I didn’t really understand it all that well back then.”

>> “But it’s likely that you saved me too, just by coming into my life.”

Before Lieta, he was alone and empty. A hollow husk that moved without any reason, carrying out the motions set by his defiant nature —a rage lacking purpose, a gun barrel aimed blindly at the skies.

That’s why, as his eyes, a bit sunken under his beaten face, looked upwards at this girl choking in-between sobs; he didn’t mind parting with his sole treasure —the red ribbon he kept as a memento from his mother, at least not after scribbling with some black marker the words ‘DONT CRY’ with his own irregular handwriting.

The very same accessory that now found its residence amidst Lieta’s long hair, tied tenderly to one side. Despite its frayed edges and faded hue testament to time's relentless passage, it held within its threads an intangible essence more potent than mere adornment. Its meaning transcended simple remembrance or attachment. It symbolized an inexorable bond born from loss to then end up sealed by mutual salvation.

“There are many things that I could never do without you.” Narguile added to his previous words, as he moved from the kitchen to take a seat on the only couch they had. “So don’t think I’m trying to shoulder everything on my own. I’m too stupid to even consider trying that.”

Case in point, an example of those claims promptly came barging in with almost the same urgency that he had done so the night before. With a poor grumpy cat who had resigned to his fate being mercilessly shaken, trapped inside the embrace of her tiny arms; Aria stormed outside her room, interrupting the melancholic talk between her parents as if it was no big deal.

“Mom! Why didn’t you wake me up!? I’m going to be late for school!” Yelped the six-year-old, making her dad also realize he had no idea what time it was, making him search through his pockets in a rush and failing to locate his phone in the process.

The realization hit him like a cold splash of water. He too was behind schedule, and the way the winter sun illuminated their humble home probably indicated that it was by quite a considerable margin. He needed to report that he was on his way there, for the risk of losing his job was not a luxury he could take.

"What are you two getting so desperate for?" Perhaps sensing his mounting anxiousness, Lieta's voice cut through the mounting tension with ease, its timbre rich with amusement. As she began laying out breakfast on the table, a focal point in their compact apartment, the absurdity of their fretting unfurled before them. "It's Saturday." She clarified with a knowing smile. "And far too late already to be thinking about any sort of classroom."

In one fell swoop, Narguile’s agitation dissipated into nothingness. He did feel a bit silly, so caught inside his headspace and internal ghosts that even something as simple as the day of the week slipped from his mind. At least he had an excuse for his absentmindedness on last night’s tumultuous events, but what about his young daughter?

“Oh… It is? Really?” Aria answered to her mother’s gentle chiding, sounding drowsy and disorientated despite her previous high energy. “I feel a bit lost, I kept waking up over and over again during the night.” She explained in a groggy voice as she finally allowed the fuzzy hairball to escape, the older black cat staying near her tiny feet anyway. “I didn’t have good dreams.”

>> “It felt like a monster was in my room, but Toast kept it away with angry hisses.”

Despite the dramatic manner in which Aria began imitating meows and cat scratches, Narguile expression soured considerably. He had come to forget about the monster that he also saw last night. It all seemed like a distant nightmare by that point, was his daughter just having regular childish fears, or was it an indicator of something more sinister lurking around?

“But if it is Saturday, then that means…” He couldn’t really keep asking those questions, as the tiny bundle of silly turned around to finally acknowledge his presence on the couch behind her back, speaking in an endearing tone. Their eyes crossed and then locked, with him making an entertained smile as he waved his hand at her before another loud squeal ensued. “Daddy!”

Without wasting one more second, Aria began rushing towards him.

The small whirlwind that was his daughter could easily be dubbed a miniature version of himself. None of Lieta's ethereal features seemed to have claimed residence in Aria's visage; instead, she boasted the same stark black hair as her father —a mane that bore the same untamed spirit as his did whenever he neglected it for more than a couple of weeks, but in her it tumbled around her face and shoulders in charming disarray, another symbol of her carefree essence and infectious joy.

While his smoky gray eyes looked right between exhaustion and restrained, untapped ferocity; Aria’s similarly colored gaze reflected a kindling spark of lively curiosity instead, full of innocence despite the hint of mischievousness hidden inside them.

In the ephemeral stillness that preceded Aria's affectionate embrace, Narguile took a moment to truly observe her —the mirror-image of his younger self, encapsulated in the spirited innocence of his child with Lieta. But then Aria’s youthful exuberance faltered; her feet rooted firmly to the ground as if an unseen force had pressed pause on her impetuous advance.

“Aria?” Narguile called her name, his warm smile replaced with an uncertain expression as he tried and failed to interpret hers. “Is something wrong?”

“No… It’s just…” Her usual torrent of words was now but a trickling brook, timid and uncertain. She lingered there in limbo, barely a whisper away from him on the couch yet worlds apart. “…Are you really daddy?”

>> “Something feels… Different.”

A cold shiver snaked its way down Narguile’s spine as he heard those words. His complexion drained of color, leaving it ghostly pale as the pit of his stomach churned with unease.