I think my mom is cheating on my dad

My parents have a strenuous relationship, to say the very least. My Dad has been a hardcore Christian since he himself was a child. Sunday school, daily Bible study, that whole thing.

He actually met my mom at his Christian school. She had transferred there after being expelled from her previous school for nearly weekly fights, and my Dad’s school was the only one that would take her.

According to him, though, she didn’t show even an ounce of disrespect or rebellion during her time there. No fights, no hooky, hell, apparently she wouldn’t even curse on school grounds.

They met in his science class. She sat in the front row directly beside him, and I guess close proximity created affection between them. Thank God for science, right?

She kept up the whole “innocent school girl” routine all the way up through graduation. From there, the two of them married not even a full month after the ceremony, then boom. They have a me.

I think that’s where the strain really started. A kid in your teens is not something that relaxes you, obviously. Dad actually had to take up another job just to support us.

What did Mom do? She stayed home all day and watched over me. Well, I say watched over me. Really, all I remember from those days is her getting lost inside her books.

The books she read looked ancient, almost. Leather-bound, wrinkled yellow pages, and no matter how often she read them, they seemed to always be covered in dust.

Now, being the 5-year-old I was, I had no idea what she was doing. All I knew was that Mom liked to read a lot. It wasn’t until I hit 12 that my curiosity bubbled over and caused me to actually look at what she had been reading.

She kept most of them hidden. Locked away in her closet and stuffed behind her clothes.

It was almost fate that I stumbled upon them that day. It was late November, and of course, I just had to know what my gifts were gonna be that year. Where better to check than the closet, right?

I was disappointed when I found nothing but clothes and the scent of mothballs, but something told me to dig deeper. That I’d find exactly what I wanted if I just kept looking.

That’s when I found them.

Books on black magic. Demonology. Witchcraft. All manner of darkness.

The air around me felt thick and heavy. Like I was being watched, but I couldn’t see by who.

As I stared at the books, still a little confused as to what I was even looking at, my heart fell into my stomach at the sound of the bedroom door opening.

I clumsily hid away behind some of the clothes, and by some miracle of God, Mom didn’t see me when she stepped into the closet.

She must’ve been blinded by her need for the books, because her hand literally grazed my shoulder as she reached down to grab one.

She shut the closet door behind her, leaving me alone in darkness as I waited. I could feel my heart beating out of my chest, and all I could do was wait for the perfect moment to escape.

As I waited, Mom started to read aloud from the book. Her words made no sense to me, but I could feel the evil in her words as she read.

It sounded like gibberish. A language that was completely incomprehensible to me, but she was chanting it like she’d done this a thousand times.

Suddenly, the light on the other side of the door began to glow brighter and brighter. The room shook, and with each passing second, the entire house got louder and louder with what sounded like thunder.

Mom kept chanting. Repeating the same foreign phrase over and over again. Through the noise, through the blinding light, she just kept chanting.

On a dime, all of the noise stopped. The light on the other side of the door reached a peak before dying out entirely.

For a moment, there was silence. Deep, uncomfortable silence. Until a new voice spoke. The unmistakable voice of a man.

“This is the third time today,” the man spoke. I could feel the bass of his voice in my chest as he continued. “Sooner or later, your husband’s going to catch on.”

“That idiot?” my mom replied. “He’s too busy working to even notice that ‘his son’ looks nothing like him. Now are we gonna do this or not?”

I heard the sound of clothes hitting the floor before my parents’ bed began to rattle violently. Faster. And faster. And faster. Before slowing down to a soft, methodical rock and then dying down completely as the smell of sulfur filled the room.

“Wow,” gasped my mom. “No wonder they call you the prince.”

“Oh, don’t you worry, honey,” responded the man. “Once that son of ours is 18, he’ll be the prince, and me and you will rule for eternity.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Gotta have an heir before you’re king. The rules down there are all so confusing. Anyway, you should go. We were so loud he’s probably gonna come in here at any moment.”

“Fine.”

With another flash of light and whir of thunder, the room fell silent once again.

I remained hidden in that closet for what felt like an eternity before my mom finally went off into the house to look for me.

As sneaky as could be, I made my way to the bathroom where I pretended to be sick so as to not draw suspicion.

I never told Dad about what I heard. What I saw. I just kept living like everything was normal.

However, I’m writing this now because my 18th birthday is in one week…and I have no idea what’s in store for the party.