I leave, and the leaving is so exhilarating I know I can never go back. But then what? Do I just keep leaving places, and leaving them, and leaving them, tramping a perpetual journey? (John Green)

I didn’t like that. Shouting is downright disrespectful and I had never seen anyone disrespect my mother like that before. This man was pissing me off.

“Give what up?” she squeaked. She looked like she was going to cry. I was going to have to step up. I was going to have to be the man. I could feel my courage bubbling.

“Give up this façade! You know Tommy is trouble. You know he’s up to no good. You know he’s going to ruin your life and ruin your child’s life. Would you just stop this, stop covering for him, stop tiptoeing around the fact that he is dangerous?”

My mother sucked in a long breath and just held it in her chest.

“Would you just get out while you still can?”

I stood up.

“Yes, let’s get out while we still can,” I said to my mother and extended my hand to her. She put her hand limply in mine.

“Hallelujah,” rejoiced my grandmother.

“Let’s get the hell out of this place before we give this joke another chance to yell at you and degrade you like that.”

“Now missy,” began my grandfather who was standing now too and trying to intimidate me by leering down. If he thought being a foot and a half taller than me was going to scare me, he obviously didn’t know I had killed a man.

“I’m going to stop you right there,” I said and pushed my free hand outward to halt him like I was directing traffic. I still held my mother’s hand with my other hand. “I don’t know how you do things around here. I don’t even know you. In my father’s house women are treated with a little more respect than that. You can’t just start shouting at my mother and demanding things of her. Before you start with your “now missy” jargon, I’d like to remind you that just because I’m younger than you doesn’t mean you can talk to me like I’m worth less than you are. These are the sort of valuations my grandfather had instilled in me. He’s a very wise man. He’s taught me countless things while I’ve been growing up. He has taught me more about how to treat people already than you will ever know. If you knew anything, you would know yelling at people is no way to get them to do anything. Yelling is no way to do anything. The bottom line is that I deserve your respect and my mother deserves your respect. When you are ready to respect us we will be ready to return to this house. Until then I don’t think we’re welcome here.”

I lead my mother out. It was the single greatest thing I had done up until that point. I was so energized afterward. I felt like a hero. My father wasn’t there to protect my mother so I stepped up and took on his role. I was capable of being her hero.

Of course her parents made an attempt to diffuse my ironclad retort but I didn’t even hear it. I had just dominated a situation with my words. If I could overpower someone like that with my words imagine what I could do with a weapon.