Twisted Wishes - When Fairytale Dreams Turn Dark

Chapter 2: Silent Echoes of the Madhouse

The dining room is a madhouse. Children shout at each other and throw things and cutlery clatter on plates that make my ears buzz. I clutch my tray in my hands and start walking. The angry looks burn at the back of my head but I raise my chin.

I adjust my breathing to the rhythm of my steps.

They are mad at me.

Everyone is mad at me.

They will someday understand, they will someday know that what I do is all for their good. It made me who I am today.

"Snitch."

"Bully."

I hold my head up and refuse to let their words touch me. The table with the scratches in the corner is my table. No one is sitting here, it's dark and it stinks because of the trash can that's just next to the table.

I swallow and slump down on the wooden bench. My milk carton falls over and the wood immediately sucks up all the white liquid. I count to 10.

At 8 I feel my body relax and I can take the carton. I poke the porridge with the rusted fork, not sure what it should be. I let go of the fork and it stays stiff upright. Sighing, I scoop up some and bring it to my mouth.

Someone comes and stands next to me and hits my hand with the food.

The porridge flies around but most of it ends up on my pants.

I look at my attacker and see Christian cross his arms over his broad chest.

Due to the little food, our bodies tend to save on fats. That's why many kids don't get a growth spurt or curves.

Although my forms have grown well with me, my growth spurt failed to materialize. Now I am a small woman with big breasts.

Not really something to be proud of.

Looks like Christian has been lucky enough to grow in length and width. He can easily knock me down despite his young age.

Christian narrows his eyes. His jaw tightens as he watches me brush the spilled food off my pants.

"Headmaster witch told me we have kitchen chores." I cringe at his nickname. If they hear him, he will be punished again.

After a quick scan of the room to make sure none of the authorities are there, I focus back on Christian.

"Whenever the other kids and I are sure you can't talk at all, you open that mouth of yours against the leadership and another innocent child gets hit. How did it feel to stand by and watch the Headmaster Witch beat me, Freak?"

I shut up. Christian doesn't know what he's saying, his hormones are raging through his body and that makes him more hostile, more aggressive. Nothing I would say would reassure him.

"I bet the Headmistress won't lift a finger at you. Her sweetheart is the queen of the village just like her. You have no idea how happy we are that you are gone tomorrow."

Christian half turns to his table and the guys there all give him a thumbs up and then give me the finger.

I bow my head and bite my tongue. I can't find the right words to tell him that I am being beaten. 

More than anyone here has ever experienced.

I want to tell him that I used to be just like him. Full of fire I threw myself into the things I liked. I danced on the lawn, whipping my dress as I made daisies into a diadem.

Or lying in the grass, with my favorite book open in front of me, engrossed in the stories of Rumpelstiltskin and Beauty and the Beast.

Until the youth was beaten out of me.

Christian grabs my porridge with his bare hand and smears it all over my table. Then he points to the mess. "I don't do kitchen chores. Since you liked snitching on me in charge, you can do my job too. Let's see if you can keep your mouth shut about that."

He turns and starts to walk away, then turn back to me. Tears stream down his cheeks and drip from his chin. I count every tear that rolls down.

"She ripped up my drawings. The only thing I had to distract me from all of thís. And that's your fault."

I wait for everyone to go to their rooms before I start doing my chores. Getting an entire dining room clean before anyone sees it is quite a challenge.

Contrary to what Christian thinks, I didn't tell him off to the Head Mistress. I had to go to her because once again I let the sheets wrinkle while drying. That's why I got punished. We happened to pass Christian in the cleaning shed and because he left the door open he got caught.

But he doesn't know that. He assumes I betrayed him because I was there at the time.

And because I don't correct him.

But how can I? It's better that he thinks it was me than his own clumsiness, his own inattention.

I am his outlet.

I am everyone's outlet.

And no matter how hard it hurts me sometimes, I'm still the eldest of the gang. I have watched those children grow and develop into the little persons they are today.

They are like brothers and sisters to me.

By the time each table is clean, long shadows have crept across the floor and an owl's call is heard outside. I quietly close the door behind me and sneak into our dormitory.

Boys and girls are separated. Each has its own bed and each has a closet.

My fingers stroke one of the empty beds.

They weren't empty at first. There used to be a girl here. A girl full of life and joy. Even the punishments never took her spirits away. She kept coming back with a smile to reassure everyone. Happy Emily I called her. She came back and giggled, she came back and joked.

I admired her.

I was jealous of her.

Until one day she didn't come back at all. The next day we went to her funeral.

The blows had become too much for her, the house had become too much for her.

Happy Emily was never really happy it turns out, because she threw herself off the roof.

I bend over and look under her bed. That's where she always kept her candy.

And because I hadn't eaten, I would even eat old candy that the rats had gnawed on.

My fingers brush around a metal handle and I pull it towards me.

It's hard to see in the dark, but I think it's a knife.

My heart hammers against my ribs and I run to my bed. I open my drawer and take out 2 things.

A flashlight, and my fairytale book.

I roll on the floor, under my bed and click on the flashlight. I hold the knife in my other hand.

I slide the book up a little and write my name in the dust in front of me. I position the flashlight so that it illuminates my name and the book.

My fingers run across the cover, tracing the thick edges of the star with the eye in it. Without realizing it, my other hand does the same with the knife.

Without stopping I speak for the first time in 2 days. "I wish I was in your world." My hoarse voice hurts my throat. Suddenly, a loud thump resounds throughout the room, which startles me. My hand slides over the knife and blood wells up from a cut on my middle finger.

Swearing, I put my finger in my mouth and moan when I see the drop of blood that has fallen on the cover.

It's 12 o'clock.

My birthday.

I swipe my hand over my name and grab the book and flashlight. A sudden dizziness comes over my head and I must have lost my mind because I could have sworn the eye on the cover was winking at me.

Black rims spread across my vision and then I fall.