Welcome to Wednesday One Shots, the bi-weekly series where we share a bonus story with you in the middle of the week.

This time around we have a story by an author named Pilar.

I was around nine years old when this happened, and my parents had been separated for about two years.

Before I get to the main part of the story, here's some context.

My mother, dad,

and I were always very poor. At the time, my parents were trying to build a house in one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in our city. It was overrun by drug trafficking. But it was all that

they could afford. Otherwise, we'd be in the streets.

The house was never really finished. It had half-built rooms, piles of construction material everywhere,

and bare red brick walls with mold and water damage. It was crumbling, much like my parents' relationship

and my childhood.

My father was violent, unfaithful, and never helped with anything.

And then one night out of nowhere, I woke up to my mom shaking me awake, throwing a jacket

over my shoulders and telling me we had to leave.

We moved to another city and stayed with relatives for two years before returning.

This is where the story begins. My mom and I moved into a small place somewhere that my father

didn't know about. We later found out that he had been asking around the city trying to find where we moved.

Eventually he found out. I had been asking around the city trying to find where we moved. Eventually, he found out.

I was still very young, and despite everything, I begged my mom to let me see him.

The court ultimately granted him visitation rights every other weekend, and for about a year,

that's what we did.

By then, he had a new partner, and he still lived in that old

decrepit house. So I spent weekends there. As awful as that place was, my younger brother also

...