In the court of law || h.s.

02

Morgan Wilson.

...

I feel the nerves build up inside of my stomach and I immediately just want to turn around and go back the same way I came. Go back to the apartment on the corner of the street of where I used to feel free, go back to the safety inside the four walls of my so-called home.

Our apartment is not very big. One master bedroom, a small bathroom and a kitchen combined with the living room. The front door is basically in the kitchen, and just around the corner lays the bathroom you have to go through, to get to the bedroom. It is not much, but it is what we can afford. For a while it was all I could ever dream of. It was what I wanted. Just me and Theo growing up and having kids in that tiny, small apartment.

I can see the office now. It is just across the road. Less than a few minutes to go, and I will be one step closer to my dream.

The beating didn't start till I was two years into university. Theo got more drunken as he got fired, and tended to be more aggressive, but he never physically hurt me until years later.

The color of the light changes to green as I cross the road. I can feel myself getting more and more tense for each step I get closer to the office.

He told me he had heard about that boy. I felt my world fall apart as he shouted out the words. I told myself it would be fine, that we would be fine. I don't know what I had imagined. Maybe I thought we would break up, or maybe I thought that he would just scream at me for some more and then everything would go back to normal, and Theo would calm down.

I take a deep breath and walk up to the door.

That time was the first I realized that he would not calm down. He might for a while, but he would blow up in my face again first chance he got. I begged him to calm down, back away. I apologized at least a million times, telling him there was no truth to whatever he had heard. Before I knew anything else the entire room went black, and I felt the world stop. Felt my world stop. My head was pounding, my heart beating rapidly and my breath uncontrollable.

"Hi, I'm Morgan Wilson" I say at the front desk. I look up around the room, a tiny bit confused on who I am supposed to meet there.

"Morgan, hi. Pleasure to meet you." a voice speaks behind me. I turn around facing a red-haired woman wearing a tiger print cardigan with a black dress under. She smiles very politely, and I return the gesture.

"I'm Nina Rash." she continues. She puts out her hand to greet me. I take her hand and we shake. I must be looking completely foolish. This is the chance of my life, of course I am both nervous and excited.

She turns around and indicates with her hand for me to follow her into an office just down the hall. As we get in, she sits down in her chair and points at another chair at the opposite side of her desk for me to sit.

As I calmly take off my coat, she begins to hum. She feels kind, like a nice wholehearted woman. Her humming makes me feel less nervous. It indicates that she is not nervous, and that she probably has tried this at least a dozen times before.

"Morgan, let me ask you a few questions." she begins. I nod and stay quiet.

"According to your application you just graduated from University 3 months ago, that at a pretty young age. How did you manage to do so?"

I meet her eyes. "I skipped a year in kindergarten, plus I was born in December, so I'm two years ahead. I went straight from high school to college at 17, and therefore I finished when I was 20. Then I started university pretty briefly after and finished that this semester."