Stitched

A little backstory

They say that if you truly love something and you let it go, it will come back to you. What a crock of bullshit. There is no such thing as love. Love turns people into monsters or shells of themselves. The saying should be more like, if you truly fear something and you try to run, it will dig it's claws in so you can't run away. I've tried to run, I've tried to get away and all it did for me was give me bruised ribs and a slight concussion. My friends don't know about the abuse, my mother doesn't even have a clue, and the only person that seams to have any idea is this mystery guy that keeps leaving me letters.

How do I know it's a guy? Well the handwriting is absolutely atrocious and barely legible. Not that it couldn't be a girl, I'm just assuming it's a guy because why would a girl care that the most popular guy in school is abusing his shy nerdy girlfriend? Not only that but what girl doesn't have at least decent handwriting?

That's right it all starts off with your typical cliche story where popular football quarterback falls for nerdy shy emo girl. Our love story was the fairy tale story of my dreams, at least that's what I thought when it started out. Marcus was really good to me in the beginning. Always brought me coffee, walked me to and from classes. Picked me up from home and took me to school and back. But then our junior year, a year into our relationship, I caught him with one of the cheerleaders in his room when I went to surprise him with my own car my mom got me for me passing my driving test.

I broke things off and drove home with my broken heart and cried myself to sleep that night only to walk up the next morning with Marcus in my room. My mom had let him in before going to work.

That was the first time he hit me. He told me if I had giving him my body whenever he wanted he wouldn't have to go to other women. He apologized for slapping me and swore he'd never cheat on me or hurt me again as long as I promised to try to move forward in our relationship. That was also the first time he told me that he loved me. And like the foolish, stupid girl that I was, I believed him.

The second time he hit me was a punch to the ribs a few weeks later when I told him I just couldn't move past him cheating on me and I wanted to breakup. He told me I wasn't aloud to leave him. That I was his and that's when he gave my first of many black eyes, knocking me out.

   Gotta say he was very smart about the way and when he hit me in the face. He always hit me in the face when it was during the weekend so my face had just enough time to heal that makeup would cover the bruises.

The third time, I ended up with a cracked rib and a concussion when he slammed my head into the wall which landed me in the hospital. My mom was in hysterics and demanded to know what happened but Marcus had already handled that. He threatened me with my mother and told me that if I didn't give it up then he'd take it. He told me if I told anyone he could make my mother disappear. He described in detail how he could cut the breaks off her car and she could have simply crashed her car. He explained how with the crime rate these days and the amount of cold cases going on that a thug could simply break in and permanently hurt my mother. He broke it down in such a way I knew he had it in with the sherif of our city. 

You see, not only was he Mr. popular quarterback but his dad was the CEO of the company my mother worked for, and after the death of my father several years ago she had to find a job and the only job that she could land was to be the assistant of the one and only Arthur McKenda, father to Marcus McKenda. My boyfriend. Arthur McKenda wasn't just your average CEO, I didn't know this when I first got with Marcus but he also had his fingers in a lot of illegal pies that I later found out when Marcus got drunk one night only to beat my ass and then laughed at me when I told him I wanted to die. All he did was hand me his switchblade and told me have fun and that nobody would miss me.

I finally bite the bullet one night, not my most shinning moment. I couldn't bring myself to let him defile me while sober, so I found a drug dealer and bought a joint, went home and smoked it on my back porch. I got high and drunk enough to let Marcus fuck me, hoping and thinking that's all he wanted and if he got it then he would leave me alone and forget I existed. Like I said earlier, I was a foolish and stupid girl. He wasn't gentle to say the least. I cried that night and he looked at me with all the disgust in the world and told me I wasn't worth the oxygen used to give me life. That I was disgusting and nobody could ever love me looking the way I did. He told me I should kill myself.

That summer my life changed after Marcus came to my house drunk while my mom was at work and beat me so bad that I had to crawl to the bathroom after walking up on my bedroom floor. I became a vessel to be fucked or beaten whenever Marcus saw fit and that was all. He consistently belittled and degraded me. Telling me I was fat, ugly, disgusting, a whore, and a freak. Reminding me that I needed to kill myself. I became more depressed and tried and failed at suicide that night. I had taken some sleeping pills and laid in the bathtub full of warm water with my wrists cut deep enough to turn the water a dark red. I almost succeeded had my mother been another 15 minutes to the house. I had awoken in the hospital 3 days later with my mom sleeping in the chair next to me. She didn't know what I was going through and from the bags under her eyes and the hours she worked to keep a roof over our heads and food on the table I didn't want to burden her with my life. Even if I wanted to, I couldn't because I didn't know what Marcus would do. She demanded to know what would cause her little girl to try to take her own life. I couldn't answer her without endangering her life. I was terrified of what Marcus would do to her. What he would do to me. That was the day I decided I would keep my mouth shut. I couldn't tell anyone my secrets. This would be temporary. Marcus would leave for collage in a year and I would be free. I just had to survive until then.

   So here I sit at my desk writing a letter to a pen pal I don't even know who calls me kitten. Weird. He's been leaving me letters since the last semester of junior year. I have no idea who he is, he won't reveal himself no matter how many times I ask and yet he keeps me sane. He writes sometimes, other times it poetry or song lyrics, sometimes it's a drawing.

He's very talented and the drawing, letters and poems are kept folded in my diary hidden under my mattress so Marcus doesn't find them. I've tried to figure out who my mystery guy is but to no avail. I'm hoping he reveals himself soon. I'd really like to put a face and name to whoever I tell my darkest secrets to. I haven't spoken with him since the last day of school when he wrote me a letter.

Dear Kitten,
I see what others overlook. I see the disgust in your eyes whenever he's near you. I see the fear in the way your hand trembles when he touches you.

Roses are red, violets are blue, so is the bruise that he gave you.

This year is going to be different. I'm going to find out who it is that's writing me these letters. I'm going to figure out how to get Marcus off my back. My name is Katlyn Barnett and this is my not so fairy tale love story.