𝐇𝐞𝐫 𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐬

17- scars that stay 4ever

When i come out of my relaxing and much needed shower, I walk over to the other door in my massive room. I assume it is a walk in closet but I'm not sure. I open the white and golden detailed door and switch on the light. The light illuminates the room and I gasp. The walk in closet is almost half my room and is trice as big as my old room. There are more than 10 shelves attached to the wall, in different shapes and sizes. There are coat racks and cupboard slides, shelves and cupboards, all alighted by bright white lights.

I look around for any clothing lying around by any change. I know I'm new here, and I should've brought my own clothing with me, but maybe they have some clothing lying around? I pull open a slide and notice a small stack of clothes lying in a corner. I pick up something that looks like a big hoodie, underwear and a pair of black sweatpants. The clothes look way too big for me, but I'm glad I have some clothes to wear. I put on the comfy hoodie, which smells like cologne so i assume its one of my brother's, and slide into the sweatpants. Since they're way to big, I have to double over the waistband for it to fit. I look at myself in the mirror standing in the closet. I don't get how Adrian still wanted to take me into his majestic house when he first saw me.

My cheeks are hollow and my skin Is pale. My hair looks like it hasn't been cut in ages, which is the case, and my eyes look dull and empty.

I pull up the sleeves of the hoodie I'm wearing and look at my bare arms. Not only are they unhealthy thin, they are also broken and scarred. I touch the teared skin with my fingers. It doesn't feel like normal skin anymore, and I quickly pull away my fingers. I feel disgusted. Not only by my own body, but also by the fact I did this to myself. And there's now way of stitching the flesh together again anymore. I left a eternal tattoo on my arms, who refuses to go away. Even if the scars eventually fade, and you will see nothing but a normal, bare arm, my
arm will never be healed fully. The scars got to deep and are now hidden right under my flesh, where no one can see them, but only I can feel their presence.

I pull down the sleeves of the hoodie, turn off the light, and close the door of the closet behind me. I walk over to my bed and sit down on it. This bed feels like heaven compared to my last bed. If you can even call It a bed. I was just a filthy mattress on the ground and I could feel the wooden surface of my floor right trough it. There would be times when I'd wake up and my whole spine would be blue and bruised because I moved too much in my sleep and my spine scraped itself over the ground and inflicted pain. I didn't dare to ask my dad for a better bed but I remember I tried once. That day will be forever engraved in my mind. I still don't know how I could've been so stupid.

Everytime I move I feel my back shift and my spine burn. I clearly moved too much in my sleep last night and because my spine basically lays on the wooden floor, it got bruised and now hurts a lot.

I've been good to Miguel lately: I haven't forgotten to make him food for a whole week, I did everything he asked me for without complaining, and I didn't accidentally called him 'dad'. Maybe I could ask for something now? He won't get mad because I've been so good to him lately, right?

I look up to see him sitting on the couch, watching some program playing on the television and drinking a beer. I slowly walk over to him, making sure to keep my head down as much as possible. He doesn't appreciates it if I look him in the eyes.

I walk over to him until I stand next to the couch. I look at my dirty and cheap shoes. I found them on the street, next to a packed trash can. They maybe were too small an they didn't look brand new and beautiful, but atleast I had something to cover up my feet and to make sure I didn't step into any dangerous objects. I wasn't allowed to go to the hospital after all, so I had to make sure I didn't get injured badly.

I stand next to the couch and stay silent until Miguel obeys me to speak.

"I-i um I was wondering if you could m-maybe add an extra mattress to my bedroom." I don't give him a reason why though, he wouldn't care anyways.

He looks at me for a second before he bursts out laughing. Not a enthousiast laugh, but a mocking one.

What's so funny?

When he's cooled down from his laughter he looks at me and says:

"You can't be serious. Are you seriously that spoiled? You get a mattress and it's still not enough? You should be ashamed."

"I-im sorry sir, I-I just thought because I've been a-all good to you t-this week-"

My sentence gets interrupted by a slap to my face making my head whip to the side.

"This? What you did this week? Should be the standard. You're lucky I didn't make you do more for me, you're already too busy doing nothing all day you useless nothing. Now go make me some food, while I rearrange your room. You should be punished for your outrageous behavior, you slut." He stands up and pushes me out of his way. I trip and hit my head against the ground. I start seeing black spots, but force myself to stand up and do what Miguel asked me. I feel a hot liquid dripping into my hair and feel with my finger where it hurts. I pull my finger away from my head and bring it in front of my eyes. On my finger is spreaded a thick dark red liquid. I pray for the wound to stop bleeding and clean my finger with a piece of fabric from my dress.

I walk to the kitchen and start making Miguel's sandwich, thinking about how I won't be able to sleep for the past couple of days without a mattress or any protection to sleep on.

I had to sleep on the wooden floor for maybe a little more than a week. It was cold and hard and especially on the days when it was -5° degrees outside and there was no blanket or mattress to keep myself warm with. I think out of all the punishments I got, that one was the worst. All the ones where blood, pain and tears were involved were bad, but this one was the worst. Not only because it was cold and hard to sleep and function normal like that, but also because I knew it was my own fault and I deserved it.

I look down at the floor and think about the fact that, even if my bed gets taken away here, I would still be more than happy to sleep on the carpeted floor, which is even better than the thin mattress I used to sleep on.

I'm still in my thoughts when I hear someone knocking on the door. I hear Adrian's voice speak through my door.

"Zina dinner's ready" oh wow, is it already dinner time? And do I get to eat with them? "Can you come downstairs? Your other brothers would like to see you again. Also your oldest brother will be present! He also would like to see you."

I stand up and nod following him into the hallway.

Okay, let's just get this over with.

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I'm sorry if I don't update regularly but I have a lot of schoolwork and not much motivation to write.

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