[Many Years Ago.]
[Weeping]
[I did a lot of that.]
[Sat on the edge of my bed with an ice pack held against my forearm. My mom sits with me, her head lowered. She weeps too.]
“I don’t know what to do.” [Mom says quietly so that he can’t hear.]
[I look up at her with tear filled eyes.]
“I don’t like how it feels.” [I say, removing the ice pack.] “It hurts.”
[Present.]
[Felix sits on the edge of a bed, looking at the scars on his forearm.]
“I know a little about what it’s like…”
[His eyes fill with tears.]
“But I couldn’t imagine how it felt for you, Max. When my father took his cigarettes to my arm, the searing pain was unlike anything I’d ever felt. I’d taken beatings – black and blue. I’d been terrorised and made to feel fear on a level that no child ever should.”
“But those cigarettes…”
“I’ll never forget those.”
“I have tiny burn marks on my arm from where he did it. It was slow, agonising, and relentless. It was searing hot and the smell, somewhere between cigarette ash, smoke, and flesh – it still fills my nostrils to this day.”
[Foley looks up.]
“The day your home burned and you with it, I can only imagine how much worse for you it was. The stench of your flesh melting from your skin must still be with you, even to this day. It must be horrible. I don’t envy you, Max. I feel sorry for you. I feel like I have even the tiniest experience of what you went through and even now, I can feel it like it was yesterday.”
“What does that mean for you? These tiny scars on my arms are a reminder of the pain and you have that all over your body. Your entire being is a reminder of the worst day of your life and there’s nothing you can do to escape it. There’s no way out. There’s no end to it.”
[Foley stands up and puts his hands on his hips.]
“Whilst I have limited experience of what you’ve suffered, what I do have is experience of abuse. I know what it’s like to be a child conquered by terror and fear. I know what it’s like to suffer.”
“And you think I’d do that to a child?”
“To your child?”
“Are you mad, Max?”
“I’ve dedicated my life to helping teach the children of Arcadia and the last thing I’d ever do is torment one of them. I wouldn’t kidnap one. I’m not that kind of guy.”
“You see, whilst I have a little experience of burning, you have no experience of child abuse and neglect. None.”
“What does that mean for our match?”
“Well, I guess you’ll just have to wait and find out.”