Wilting Violet (Part 1)

Prologue

Dedicated to MajenBeos02, Babyalex34, bethansarah, and carmeapple
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Five months ago, on November 26, 2018, at 9:30 pm, Violet's POV
    "Have you heard my screams? Sounds pulsing so deep from my diaphragm that you swear they could deafen me? Have you heard my whimpers? The pathetic sounds rolling through my throat like pleas for help? Have you heard my cries, the ones over you? The tears I shed as I force myself to ignore my pain—the ones that feel as hot and thick as blood. Streaming from me and taking away just as much of my strength. Did you hear them at all... did you even care?" I whisper, sitting so unnaturally straight that my spine trembles under the weight. I am used to being a doll, to cowering under my husband's might.

    "I became so used to you that I have forgotten." I continue seeing that nothing can be taken back. I walk across the room. Faster and faster toward the smiling girl in the picture, who looks so taken with her love. Her strength, her shoulder to cry on, her... person. 'What a stupid girl.'

    "I had forgotten that there was a me before you torched all I was. That though I pleaded for your soul every night, I have forgotten that you never did it for me. I have forgotten that I have a voice. That I can demand retribution, that I can demand to hurt you as you have hurt me. I can demand you be broken, demand you weak, demand you be nothing to me." I lift the framed photo and bring it closer to my face, searching for a glimpse of love in those thoughtless eyes. But there is nothing for me, nothing to hold on to because while I was in forced wedding bliss, he was fighting his Father. The argument was more important than I was. This picture was the last chance—my last chance... to run. And I never thought to take it. I never believed we would roll the die and end up here. But we have...

    "I just need to know...That rolling cry you hear at dusk when you walk into our room. Only to roll over and ignore me. Can you hear me cry?" I ask the man in the picture, and there is no reply. There never is. I wasn't worth an answer. 'Too late to change the rules.' I laugh as my fingers hold the frame tighter. 'The frame is all I regret. My mother gifted it to me. Hers was a voice that called men to bow. She had a voice that could make you shed a tear. She embodied beauty and passed it on to me—the voice of an angel. The curvaceous figure that drove men mad enough to keep as a trophy. And the cocoa complexion that had shaken the French mafia in their boots. Hers was a story that was the embodiment of empowerment. I was supposed to live on that and make a better world. She had held me up to feel her power and look what I've done with it. Look what I've become.

    "ANSWER ME, VICTOR!" I scream at the top of my voice as I whip around to look him in the eye. He watches me seeming helpless on how to fix and revert me to sullen. How to temper the living rage, and if it was so simple as putting me in a box, he could do it. But this rage comes from my mother. This rage demands to be felt.

    "I don't know what you want me to say," Victor says as if speaking to a cornered animal, and I laugh.

    "That must be so hard for you to admit." I mock him with a placating voice fit only for a child. His expression proves how far we have fallen because he moves closer to me instead of becoming upset. His hand is outstretched to pull me closer as the fingers beckon me closer.

    "I want an answer to my question. I want you to admit this was no accident—this was premeditated. You sought to harm me." I say, and he flinches but does not dare lie to me. I take a step forward.