I still remember the night I prayed. I prayed like I never had prayed before. Not for any of the things for which any other ten year old girl would pray. But I prayed with all my heart, just hoping there might be some one out there. I hoped there was some one who was listening, someone who knew all of my secrets, some one who understood.
I laid still in my bed. There was a spring forcing itself through the surface of the mattress. But I didn’t move, not tonight. I had a feeling. I felt that if I moved, even the slightest, I would set off some unknown reaction. The floor would crack and before I could even hope I hadn’t made a sound, the world would shatter. My whole world would shatter. If I stayed silent, maybe time would stop. No ticking clocks, just the empty black space in front of me. If I couldn’t see the walls or the leering doorway, then maybe I could be some where else.
Then, when I awoke in the morning the sunlight would touch my innocent face. I would lay there completely comforted until my father walked in. Already in his business suit, hair slicked back and cleanly shaven. He would lean over me and whisper, “Your mother says it’s time to get up and ready for school.” I would roll over and smile at him, because I was Daddy’s little girl. “Five more minutes,” he would say as he rustled my hair and walked out the door.
A smile began to form on my lips and then disintegrated when I opened my eyes and felt that spring on the left, upper part of my back, slowly making its way into my flesh, warning me that I wouldn’t be safe for much longer. I tried to take comfort in the silence, only to become more nervous. I knew that the silence would be broken. And so soon that darkness would reveal what I already knew was there.
I adjusted myself slightly. A chill shot up my spine as I broke the silence with the rustle of my blanket. The feeling of the rough fabric moving across my arm resonated. It was telling me, “You’re stupid! Why did you do that? You almost stopped time but you couldn’t keep quiet. You’re worthless! You deserve everything that’s coming to you!”
The spring hurt much more now, but there was no way I was about to move again. Maybe I still had a chance. Tonight was the night he was going to go over the top. I had done something wrong. My mother had done something wrong. I didn’t know what it was yet, but he would find out. He always did. I inhaled a deep breath and held it, another vain attempt to stop time. I lay with my eyes wide, staring at the ceiling, though I could not see it. But I liked it that way. Then, just as I expected, I heard the door knob turn. This is it, I thought.
I took another deep breath, held it. It was him. He flicked on the light and it traveled through the doorway, revealing the ceiling. I just kept on staring. I could do it, I could stop time, I wouldn’t breathe, I wouldn’t move, I wouldn’t make a sound. I wouldn’t even blink my eyes. He opened his mouth. The Horror was about to begin. I could tell, I couldn’t see him, but the smell on his breath traveled into my room as quickly as the light had. That chill, those goose bumps on my arms, they were replaced by a churning in my stomach. I could feel my dinner. I could taste the stomach acid in my mouth. But I could stop it. I could stop breathing, I could stop blinking, and I could hold on to my insides.
It wasn’t words that came from his mouth. It was his fist across my mother’s face. A cry escaped her mouth. When his voice scraped my ears, the rest of my insides jumped out, all that I had eaten the past three days. But I kept my eyes open and took another deep breath. I heard my mother hit the floor, heard his voice batter her almost as much as his fist. I tried to hear what he was saying. Maybe if I figured out what made him mad I could stop it, I could stop this from happening again. But I couldn’t understand him. I felt so light headed. It could have been from the vibration of his voice on my eardrums or the smell of the vomit on my chest.
My eyelids were too heavy. I let them close. My breathing became quick. Rhythmic sobs that sounded just like a clock. The clock that reminded me that time was not going to stop. I couldn’t cry, though. If I couldn’t control anything else, I would not let myself cry. “Crying doesn’t get you anywhere,” my mother would say. “Don’t let him see you cry,” she would say, “Don’t let him hear you.”
I had nothing else I could think to do. I smoothly raised both hands up to the top of my chest and pressed them together, just like I had seen the women do at church on Sundays. I had never really prayed before. I never believed in God. If there was a God like everyone said, then he wouldn’t allow this to happen to me. I still wasn’t sure if I believed, but it was all I had left.
I prayed he would die. I prayed that someone would cut him up into a million little pieces and bury him all around the back yard just as he had threatened he would do to us. No one would ever find him and no one would care. I prayed his hands would fall off and his mouth would shrivel up and this would travel down his throat. I prayed his skin would burn for hours before he died. I wanted him to suffer for what he had done. He wasn’t going to get out of this easy and just die, that wasn’t enough. It had to be a terrible death, one that was so horrible, even the worst criminals wouldn’t think to commit it. I hated him, hated him, and hated him again for forcing me to feel this way. I hated him for making me think these awful thoughts. I hated him for, if only for an instant, making me think the way he did, violent thoughts that scared me.
The bed room door slammed. I knew this scene so well. He passed out on his bed and my mother pressed her hand against the floor to raise herself onto the couch. I opened my eyes and mechanically got out of bed. I rolled up my vomit-stained blanket. I tiptoed out to the back porch and set it outside. I took the extra blanket out of the hall closet, unfolded it and laid it across my mother’s delicate and bruised body. I did this all silently. There was no way that he would awake and hear me speak. But I didn’t speak. There was nothing to say.
I climbed back into my bed and closed my eyes. I lay on my back with my arms crossed over my chest, clutching my shoulders. I shivered and my arms tingled from the cold air. A single tear escaped under my eyelid. I wasn’t going to let myself cry, but I had been defeated. Night 87, opponent undefeated, seven years, three months, and ten days left in the game. I turned over on my side, directly on top of the spring. The cold tip of the metal pierced through my shirt and touched my skin. “Go ahead,” I told it, “No one is stopping you.” I loved that feeling, metal scraping my skin, getting closer and closer to my ribs. I hoped it would continue through my back and come out on the other side. I hoped the chill on my arms would overpower the chill traveling menacingly up my spine and the turning of my stomach. I hoped I could focus on the pain in my side and not the pain in my heart.
**This story is based on a truth about my mother (not myself) and is an account of her childhood.
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