Lessons Unlearned

Chapter 6

The shouts of Jaylinn coming in the house wakes me from my sleep.

"Did she finish her homework?" I hear her shout at Conrad.

Why must she yell all the time?  I think to myself.

I look down on my bed; my backpack is still on it, and my unfinished assignments still sit neatly on my desk.

My clothes are the same ones from yesterday. I must have fallen asleep while working on my homework yesterday.

I immediately pick up one of the assignments and begin working on it. I still have 8 to finish. I can't believe I fell asleep last night before finishing any of them! Jaylinn is gonna kill me!!

The loud bang of my bedroom door being thrown open makes me jump slightly in my seat.

"Why isn't it finished yet? You had plenty of time you should have finished it by now!!" Jaylinn storms up to me. The familiar sting fills the left side of my face. I try not to move, try not to cry. It will make it worse I tell myself.

Jaylinn grabs a fistful of my hair, roughly pulling me out of the chair by it.

I reach my hands around, and hold to her hand. Trying to get her to loosen the grip.

"Please mom, you're hurting me." A tear falls from my eye, before she shoves me harshly down to the floor.

I keep my eyes glued to the floor, not having the courage to look at my captor. I stay down on the ground not being able to muster the energy to pull myself up.

Jaylinn kneels on the floor. She gets as close to my face as she possibly can.

"Get your homework done now. If I have to come up here again you will be wishing you were never born. Do I make myself clear young lady?" She whispers the words to me. The whisper honestly scares me more then her yelling.

"Yes mom. I understand." I muster out 4 words. Jaylinn leaves my room with her hands clutched into tight fist.

I slowly pull myself off the floor. My whole body aches, and I wish that I would have just finished the assignments last night.

I spend the next 2 hours finishing up all of the missing assignments I have. I double check, even triple check that the answers are all correct.

I put all of the papers in my backpack and zip it up so nothing will fall out.

I lay down on my bed not wanting to go downstairs where the evil witch is lurking. My room is safer then downstairs.

William comes into my room normally I'd be upset that he didn't knock but right now he's what I need.

I hug him and let the tears fall from my eyes. A few of the tears fall on his shirt leaving tiny wet droplets on the right shoulder.

"We need to get out of here." He whispers in my ear, quietly too avoid anyone else hearing.

"I don't know how to escape. Plus if she catches us while escaping she will kill us William." The tears  burning through my eyes, almost as if acid is being thrown at my face.

"Well we need to figure something out Annalise. We can't stay here. She is horrible to you. She is gonna kill you if we stay." William pulls me into a hug again. I breathe in the scent of his cologne, feeling safe for once. I have missed this. Missed his touch, missed his smell. The hug doesn't seem to last long enough but we have to break out of it much to my dismay.

William goes over to my window, he slides it open. He pushes the screen out and looks down at the drop. It's not too far of a drop, but there is no way our instruments will survive the drop.