Chapter 1- The Worst Day

4234 Words
WARNING: this chapter contains themes of s****l abuse I wipe the condensation away from the bathroom mirror. Staring back at me is an average girl at best. Her hair is long but lacks color. It’s a dull, lifeless brown that does nothing to help the ghost-like paleness of her skin. Her hair hangs in tethered ringlets across her shoulders, reaching her mid-back. Most of the time it’s bone straight and no amount of product or heat will change the shape. Her lips aren’t too thin but aren’t big enough to be noticeable. No freckles adorn her face, and her nose is of average beauty. The only feature worth mentioning is her eyes. I stare at my eyes in the mirror, the only good quality about myself. Some people find the color abnormal but freakish to others. It’s in this abnormality I take solace. My eyes hold the same color as an amethyst stone. They hold the same shimmer and luster of the purple gem. Well, they usually do, however, not today. This date every year they are dull, dead inside. I attribute the lifelessness of my eyes to the deep, bruised bags that accompanies the sicken look I feel on the inside. On this day, always this day, I’m a broken shell of a person. Pain radiates throughout my body. It’s not a physical pain. It’s a pain deep within my heart and soul that, no matter what I do, I can’t forget or erase. I sigh and tell myself to put up the wall and start pretending. Nobody cares what I’m going through so I suck it up and get dressed. My outward appearance mimics what I feel deep inside. My trusted faded jeans form perfectly to the curves of my long legs from years of use. My once black knit long-sleeved shirt is grayer in color and the cuffs around the sleeves are frayed from constant abuse. The leather of my combat boots is wrinkled as evidence of my treatment towards them. The only jewelry I adorn is a hoop nose ring and the simple necklace I received from my parents. Thinking of them brings tears to my eyes as I silently mourn their loss once more. My parents, Lilly and Michael, met in college. According to them, it was love at first beer chug. Two years later, they got married and a year after that, I came along. I grew up watching the love they had for each other blossom every day. My mother introduced me to the make-believe world I find comfort in now. She used to read me stories of fantasies and fairytales with happy endings every night before bed. It was then that I began to dream of such things. On my tenth birthday, my father gave me my first journal. He was a creative writing and folklore professor at Windgate University. With this journal, he urged me write my inner most thoughts as an outlet to control my feelings. I still keep a journal now and use it as an escape to my dream world. On my sixteenth birthday, my parents gave me this necklace. On the simple chain is a medium sized pendant with an ancient-looking filigree. The design was delicate and intricate, embellished with amethyst stones. On the back of the silver pendant is an inscription: “Our Dearest Kara, Power comes from the strength you find within yourself” I didn’t know this then, but this would be the last birthday I celebrated with them. Two weeks later, I was at a party with my best friend Katie. We had too much to drink so I called my parents to come pick us up, only they never showed up. An hour later, the police arrived giving me the news that my parents were gone. They had lost control of the car and drove off Old Mill’s Bridge. This day, five years ago, my world shattered. Having no living relatives, I was forced into the foster system. The day I turned eighteen, I left and never looked back. I swore to myself I would never speak a word about what happened to me there. Reliving that pain was more than I could bear. Forcing myself out of my thoughts, I grab my messenger bag and leather jacket and leave my apartment. The brisk cold wind of a February morning bites at my nose and cheeks, but I feel nothing as the numbness inside me exudes throughout my entire being. “Come on Kara, we’re gonna be late.” Katie yells from inside her car. Katie and I grew up in a small town in West Virginia. Kedler is as typical as they come. With a population of only 4,638, everybody knows everybody. After the first week of kindergarten, I was the only kid who sat by themselves at lunch. Katie noticed and sat with me. She shared half of her gushers with me and we’ve been inseparable ever since. After the death of my parents, I had to move to the closest large city which was an hour and a half away. We still talked every day. When I turned 18 and left the foster home I had been living in, I moved in with Katie and her family until we left for college. Though our personalities are very similar, our looks couldn’t be much more different. Katie is short and very thin. At 5’ 10”, I tower over her a good 8 inches. As with most swimmers, her muscles are well toned, giving her an athletic butt, however, leaving very little for her chest. Her summers spent outside in the pool have made her skin warm and tanned, graced with the best the sun has to offer. Her hair is icy blonde, either from years of sun or good genes. The only similarity in our physical looks is our eyes; not in color, but in vibrancy and abnormality. Her eyes are of the palest blues. They shine bright, showing flecks of green. I’ve always thought they resembled the stone on the ring her parents gave her for her sixteenth birthday. It’s a plain band with a teardrop cut of aquamarine, her birthstone. I’ve always joked with Katie about how our eyes perfectly match our birthstones. For the second time that morning, I have to shake myself out of my thoughts and get on with my day. For most of the drive, we sit in silence as she drives us to campus. She pulls into the North Hall parking lot and shuts off the engine. Just as I grab my messenger bag and reach for the handle, Katie places her hand over mine and looks at me. “I know you’re not going to talk to me today and I understand how you feel. I promise you one day it won’t hurt so much. You’ll find someone who can take away the pain and make you realize it wasn’t your fault.” Her eyes are filled with sadness because she can’t be that person for me. I know she is only trying to help, but her words cut like a knife deep into my heart. The hurt I had been trying to keep at bay comes flooding through my system. With tears in my eyes I say, “No you don’t understand. You have two very loving, very much alive parents at home so you couldn’t possibly understand how I feel.” I look at her and see how my words affected her. She had been close to my parents too, and I knew the pain of their loss was still with her, but they were my parents that I killed. “I have to go.” I say knowing I hurt her. I didn’t want to hurt her anymore because today I was alone. Today I didn’t have my best friend to put my pieces back together. I was too broken for that. No one would ever be able to fix me. I grab my stuff and rush away from her car. Tears I hadn’t let drop are now in a freefall down my cheeks. Frustrated, I angrily wipe them away. I hurry to the nearest bathroom to, hopefully, salvage what’s left of the little makeup I had put on to make me feel more put together. Screw it, I think to myself and wipe away everything on my face. I don’t care how I look today. Frankly, I should just be lucky to have gotten out of bed. I look at my phone and see I only have a few minutes before class starts. I take a deep breath and head out to endure the day. … The day seemed to drag on. I didn’t pay attention in any of my classes. I sat there with my headphones in, listening to my alternative playlist, and stared out the windows. I found myself thinking about the fight with Katie. As much as today is about mourning the death of my parents, it’s also about mourning the death of my old self. I mourn the life I had and still should have, but the two years in the foster system stripped me of the person I could have been. I had been assigned to the Porters. They were a seemingly happy couple who couldn’t have kids of their own so they fostered as many as they could. When I got there, everything was good. They were comforting and understanding in my grief. They let me rebel in silence. After a few months, I started opening up and immersed myself in their ever-changing family. I had four new brothers: Connor, Steven, Levi, and Oscar. They were much younger than me, but I did what I could to help out. Marshal and Jessica Porter seemed to be what I need at the time. A few weeks before my seventeenth birthday, I was home alone, a rarity at the time. I had decided to pamper myself a bit. I drew myself a bath, put on a face mask, and relaxed with a book. After the water had run cold, I wrapped myself in a towel and headed downstairs to get a glass of water. I went to the living room to grab the family laptop to start on homework when I saw Marshal sitting there on his phone. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize anyone was home.” I had said, clutching the towel tighter around me. “That’s quite alright, Kara.” He said, looking up at me smiling. His smile was unnerving, but I didn’t think much of it at the time. “I just needed the laptop for homework before the boys get home. I’ll grab it and get out of your way.” I explained as I walked around the loveseat to the coffee table. As I reached down for the laptop, Marshal grabbed my arm and pulled me towards him. He was standing then and had me pinned and trapped against his chest. “Now Kara, I’ve thought a lot about you lately. You’ve got such a nice body. It’s a waste to let it go untouched.” He says low against my ear. His hot breath against my bare neck makes me shiver. “Jessica will be home soon. She probably wouldn’t like this.” I tried to calmly reason with him. He had one arm gripping me so hard it started to hurt. His other hand was running up from my hip, touching places he shouldn’t have touched, and knotted his way through my hair. He gave a hard yank on my hair causing me to yelp as pain enveloped my scalp. “I just talked to her and she won’t be home for another hour. Connor has basketball practice. Besides, you won’t tell. Nobody will believe you.” He hissed at me. He grabbed my hair again, pulling me with him as he climbed the stairs. I fell and busted my lip on one of the stairs. He cursed under his breath and grabbed my arm, dragging me the rest of the way to my room. Tears had already been flowing as he roughly threw me on my bed. I tried to crawl away, but he grabbed me and turned me to face him. My towel had long fallen off, leaving me bare and completely exposed. His eyes roamed over my body as he licked his lips. “Please, you don’t have to do this. I…I won’t…tell anyone.” I begged. His hand raises and strikes me hard. A searing pain erupted over my cheek as my head was jerked to the side from the force of his slap. “Shut up, stupid b***h. The more you fight, the worse I’ll make this on you.” He turned me around as he took off his pants. He forced himself into me as my cries for help went unanswered. He finished and left me there. I sat there for hours crying silently to myself. For the next year, he would do this to me. He came into my room at night and gagged me so no one would hear me. As time went on, he got more abusive, hitting me with closed fists or kicks to any part of me that could be covered. I wore long sleeves year round to cover the evidence of my assaults. Once I had tried to tell Jessica when she asked how I had gotten a bruise. Marshal had walked in then and gave me a warning look. I had lied saying it happened in gym class. That night, he threatened to go after Katie the next time she visited. I couldn’t let him touch Katie the way he touched me. I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself if she were hurt because of me. After that, I didn’t let her come over. Since that night, I haven’t been the same. How could I be? My innocence was stripped away in the worst way possible. All because I killed my parents. So no, Katie could not possibly understand what I had lost. People moving around me broke me out of my trance. With my headphones still blaring in my ears, I grab my bag and head out. I send Katie a quick text letting her know I was going to walk back to the apartment. I step outside and let the midday warmth of the sun seep into my pores. For a second, I allow the warmth to relax me and will myself to forget. Then the bone-chilling wind slaps me in the face, efficiently ending my blissful second. As the seconds turn to minutes on my walk home, I silently curse myself for deciding to walk in the middle of February. I wrap my jacket tighter around me and bury my chin to my chest to escape the wind. I focus on the lyrics being poured into me to try to forget the cold. I let the words from Linkin Park take over my mind. “What I’ve become…I’ll face myself…to cross out what I’ve become…erase myself…and let go of what I’ve become” Smack. I hit something hard, lose my balance, and land hard on my arm. Pain radiates up to my elbow. I squeeze my eyes shut and roll over to hold it carefully to my chest. I wince. Yep, I think it’s broken, I think to myself. I lay there in the wet, cold grass as I will the pain away. “Oh no, are you okay miss?” I hear and realize I didn’t run into someTHING but someONE. I open my eyes to find the most obscured colored eyes I have ever seen looking at me. They are creamy white, only slightly milkier than the whites of his eyes. But even stranger than the color is the way they shine. They gleam with an iridescence I have never seen in a color before. It’s almost as if they glowed and the milkiness comes from the hues, not the eyes themselves. They remind me of pearls. “I must have hit you harder than I thought. Did you hit your head? Oh I’m so sorry.” The stranger babbles on as I stare into his eyes. “Umm yes…I mean…uh no. Yes I was hit hard, no I didn’t hit my head. My arm…” I stammer as I break eye contact and look at my arm. I can already see the bruises settling in underneath the blood and scratches from the sidewalk. “s**t, I think I broke my arm,” I say as I try to test movements with it. Pain erupts as I yelp. “Ow, dammit, yep I think it’s broken.” “Here, let me take a look at it.” The stranger says as his gentle hands take a hold of my injured arm. I take this chance to look at my attacker. He is knelt down wearing boots, faded jeans, and a heavy coat. He has dark black, shaggy hair that hangs just above his eyes and curls at its ends. His skin is sun-kissed in warm tones. His hands are slightly rough and calloused. He moves my wrist and I inhale sharply through my nose at the pain. My senses are immediately flooded with the scent of woods and cinnamon. I find myself sighing in content at the odd pairing of smells, but it smells good. His face scrunches and his thick brows knit together as he scowls. “I think you fractured your arm. I can walk you to the hospital. It’s only a few minutes away and one of the doctors can set it for you.” He stands to his full height, lowering his hand to help me up. As I take his hand with my good one, I feel a jolt of warmth run through me. I gasp as he pulls me up. My legs give out and I stumble into him. His arms catch me, bringing me into his chest. “Woah, are you okay?” he asks while looking me over, searching for any other injuries. “I’m fine,” I try to brush it off, “I probably stood up too fast.” “Do you need to sit back down for a bit? Are you squeamish at all?” He asks, looking genuinely concerned for my well-being. Hah! Squeamish. If only he knew about my past. “Yeah, no. Definitely not squeamish. I’ve seen a lot of blood. I’ve dealt with my fair share of stitches and broken bones. Being squeamish is not the issue.” I ramble as I try to detangle myself from him. That little bit of contact is the most I’ve let a man touch me in four years. The stranger looks almost hurt by my sudden need to get out of his arms. “Oh? Do you make it a habit to run into people on the sidewalk and break your arm?” He chuckles, revealing a lopsided grin accompanied by a dimple. Words escape me and I find myself staring at him, like really staring: eyes fixed, jaw dropped, mouth wide open, not breathing staring at him. His half smile is actually kind of hot, combined with his glowing eyes, it makes his face light up. I wonder if he has a matching dimple on the other side. Hot? What am I saying? I don’t talk to guys, let alone stand there, mouth agape, full-on staring at them. “Umm, no. I’ve just had a few injuries in the past.” I mumble slightly harsh. I wince inwardly as my response causes his smile to fall. “Well, I still think you should have that x-rayed. Come on, I was on my way there anyway. I’ll walk with you.” He says as he bends over to grab my stuff. When he stands back up, I take notice of his form. He is tall and that’s saying something. Even with my height at 5’10”, I only reach his chin. From what I can see, he is built. His jeans are slightly stretched around his thighs, but loose around his shins, revealing his toned legs. His jacket seems tight around his arms and chest but hangs comfortably around his abdomen. He has a little stubble on his face. I wonder what that would feel like. “My name is Daniel, by the way.” He holds his hand out to me. “Kara.” Is all I say, still enamored by him. As I shake his hand, the warm jolt hits me again. I look into his eyes, hoping he felt what I did. If he did, his face didn’t show it. “Kara. I like that.” When he says my name, I want to melt into his voice. I’ve never heard someone say my name like that, with such longing and hopefulness. I feel my cheeks warm as I’m sure they are bright red. Daniel chuckles, I think, at my blush. We walk a few minutes in silence when I notice he is still carrying all of my stuff. “Oh, I’m sorry. You don’t have to hold my stuff. Let me take that.” I try to grab my bag and phone with my good hand only to find air. “Nuhuh. It’s only fair I carry your stuff after brutally attacking you and breaking your arm.” He spouts while wearing that boyish half grin. “So why were you going to the hospital? Do you have a sick relative there?” I ask, not wanting to walk in silence. “No, I work there.” “Are you a doctor?” “No,” he says quickly. “I work as an EMT.” “That’s cool. Why did you want to do that?” “I’ve always wanted to help people. I thought about being a doctor, even got as far as interning when I realized it wasn’t for me. I like working in fast-paced settings. I’m not one for monotonous labor, things need to be always changing, always evolving or I get too bored. Being an EMT does this for me, it feels…right.” He explains. He chuckles to himself as his eyes grow distant. “I was a surgical intern in the oncology department at the hospital. I lost my mom to pancreatic cancer when I was 12.” I stay quiet because I know, better than most, that sorry won’t bring her back. Losing a parent is something no child should have to go through at such a young age. “One summer, my mom had lost a lot of weight. She had never been really big, but the change was good for her. She seemed happy and healthy, so we didn’t worry about it. By the end of the summer, she had been nauseous and vomiting and complaining about back and stomach pain. She took a pregnancy test and it came out positive. My parents were ecstatic. They had been trying to have a baby for years, but it never seemed to happen. They went to the OBGYN with the never-ending possibilities in their minds, but it wasn’t a baby they found. It was already stage four when they found out. She fought…but it wasn’t enough. She…died four months later. Daniel choked out that last sentence. We had stopped walking at some point. I could see his eyes brimmed with tears, obscuring the glow of his gorgeous eyes. I reach up a hand to his shoulder, willing the pain from his loss away. He relaxes a little at my touch and clears his throat. “Sorry. I don’t usually spill my secrets to pretty girls I attack.” He chuckles half-heartedly. “It’s okay. I understand.” I say as the memories I had temporarily forgotten are now at the front of my mind. “the pain from the loss of a parent never goes away.” My voice exudes sadness. He looks at me with a new understanding. “You lost one of your parents?” Daniel asks. I shake my head. Realization hits him when he looks into my eyes. “Both of them?” My vision blurs as I will the tears to subside. I don’t cry in front of people, let alone a stranger. One rogue tear escapes, sliding down my cheek. I turn my head and look at anything but him has I wipe the evidence away from my face. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you cry.” He says in anguish. The silence grows as tension fills the space between us. I find myself longing to be comforted in his arms, something I haven’t even let Katie do. He puts a comforting hand on my arm, right above my elbow. The touch sends a fresh wave of memories and the emotions that accompany them over me. I shudder and quickly pull away from the sudden contact. A strong gust of wind cuts through us and I’m reminded of how cold it has gotten. “Come on, let me get you out of this cold before a broken arm is the least of your worries.” He says as I let this handsome stranger lead me the rest of the way to the hospital.
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