Hero & Villain

Calen | 1411w

  I jolt awake after my nightmare, a whimper slipping past my trembling lips. I rub my face tiredly with my small, shaking hands. I dreamed about my parents again. I dream about them almost every night now, and it wouldn't be a bad thing if they were of happy memories, but normally they're not.

  I feel especially shaken this time, even though it's the same exact dream as always. I sniffle and sit up, pulling the neck of my shirt up to wipe my eyes. I can't cry, it might wake them up. I started counting down from eight to calm myself down, like my mom always told me to. Well, she told me ten but I'm eight years old so I do it that way.

  I just turned eight last week, a few days after coming to live here. They knew it was my birthday but they didn't care.

  Despite my counting there are tears slipping down my cheeks. Normally I can control myself, normally I'm tough like my dad, so why can't I control myself now?

  A spike of fear shoots through me when I hear footsteps stomping down the hall outside my room, and I quickly lay back down and hide under the covers to pretend I'm asleep. I smother myself with my shirt sleeve, because I'm unable to hold in a soft whimper. The door doesn't creak when it opens, but I can somehow still hear it over the deafening sound of my breathing and heartbeat.

  I relax my body as the footsteps grow closer, hoping this is just a random check to make sure I'm still here. The footsteps stop right beside me, and I hear Mrs. Davis growl under her breath.

  "I know you woke up," she hisses, and I sense her leaning down until she's practically whispering into my ear "-because you stopped screaming."

  The covers are ripped off of me and she immediately grabs a fistful of my hair. She's done it before, but this time it hurts so much worse than before it rips a pained yelp out of me and my hands fly up as I struggle to get out of her grasp. I kick at her, but my legs are too short to do much, and I'm still weak from my nightmare.

  When she just keeps holding me, not hitting or speaking or doing anything really, I stop struggling and peek up at her. She's staring at me with a look of equal fascination and disgust. She drops me roughly only to grab my arm in a bruising grip the next second.

  Her long nails draw blood as I stumble behind her, the scratch only getting worse when she tosses me into the bathroom right outside my room.

  I think I know why she put me in here, and my suspicions are confirmed when I hear a lock click after the door is slammed shut. As soon as I got here they warned me if I didn't behave I would be staying in here until they deemed my punishment over. The door is now locked from the outside.

  I hear her rough voice through the door as she talks to me. "Don't try to get out. I'll be back with Henry very soon to deal with whatever the hell this is," she snarls, causing me to flinch. I wish my parents were here. They would never hurt me, they would protect me from the foster couple who I'm with now.

  I shakily stand up and glance around the familiar bathroom. There's a small shower, sink, and a toilet. I step closer to the mirror so I can look at my arm, but my eyes drift to my head instead. I gasp in surprise at the two ears I see poking out of my hair. They look like the stray cat I feed sometimes! I have cat ears?

  I pat them to make sure they're real, instantly regretting it when I realize one of them is cut painfully. I whine to myself, then clamp my mouth shut. That sounded weird, probably because I don't normally whine.

  If I have ears, do I have a tail? I quickly turn to look, feeling a bit disappointed when I find that I don't. I pout and continue studying my ears in the mirror as I fiddle with my fingers. I have trouble keeping my hands still, but I've been trying to because a couple days ago I got in trouble for twiddling my thumbs too much. I don't mean to be annoying.

  I flinch when I hear a door slam downstairs, then the tell tale creak of the stairs. Normally I can't hear them, but as I stare at myself I see my new fuzzy ears twitch. They must give me better hearing, that's so cool!

  I smile for half a second at the thought, but it drops when I hear Mr. Davis stop outside the bathroom door. I nervously back into the corner, trembling as I hear the lock click and see the door open.

  He glares at me like he's assessing me, his gaze freezing on my new ears. He starts forward, and even though I only came here recently I know what's going to happen.

  At least, I thought I did.

  "Kneel," he growls, and I hesitantly do so. He's only ever told me to stand with my hands behind my back before, so this is new. "Don't move a single muscle, you hear me you worthless brat?" He spits, and I can only nod as my lip starts to tremble.

  He leaves, and Mrs. Davis takes his place in the doorway. She stalks forward after a moment, and before I can brace myself her hand snaps across my face, no doubt leaving a red mark. The tears in my eyes spill over and make it harder to see her hand closing in on my face again, but on the other cheek.

  I yelp at the second slap, it being harder than the first. She cuffs me on the head, hitting my soft ears hard and ripping another yelp and whimper from me.

  "P-Please stop," I plead, speaking for the first time since I woke up. All I get for it is another cuff on the head.

  "Don't speak unless I tell you, you little shit," she scoffs.

  I tremble and nod, then start sobbing when she slides her thin belt off and steps behind me. When I was at the orphanage for a few days my friend told me his parents would do this to him, and he told me it hurt really bad and that's why he had to leave them. Will I get to leave here?

  At the first crack of her belt, I understand what my friend tried to explain. I don't think she's being as rough as she could be, but it still hurts really, really bad.

  She does it again, harder then, and I can't help but let out a desperate scream. Will Mr. Davis help me?

  I scream again, louder this time, but she clamps a hand roughly over my mouth before stuffing a cloth into it to muffle my scream. I sob in relief when Mr. Davis walks in again. He'll stop her, right?

  The next time I sob, it's not in relief but terror as I see what Mr. Davis is holding.

  He has a grin on his face as he holds a thin chain, and hanging off the chain I see a big metal collar.

***

  I jolt awake after my nightmare, a whimper slipping past my trembling lips. I furiously scrub the tears off my face with my shaking hands. I hate dreaming about my foster parents, there aren't any happy memories for me to dream about.

  I'm mostly under my covers now, but when I hear footsteps outside the room I throw the covers over my head to hide. I cover my face with my sleeve covered hands to keep my tears from falling and to muffle the whimpers that spill from me even though I try to stop them.

  I whimper again and bite my lip hard, but it's too late. The door swishes open, and the footsteps grow closer to me as I start to panic.

  They stop next to me, and I stop breathing.

  It's happening again. Why is it happening again I'm not dreaming anymore!

  The covers are ripped off of me.

  "P-Please not ag-gain..."