jamia

running

" smack".

he back hands me.

the taste of my own blood enter my mouth .

a whimper leaves my lips.

he smiles, and slaps me again. The force spins me to the ground.

I am jamia.

a seventeen year old

who's living with the adopted parent from hell.

My parents died when I was three in an animal attack. Their bodies were found behind our house in the very forest I was told were the reason they brought the house.I don't remember much about them.

I do remember the foster home I ended up in. It was nothing like home. That's why I was glad when this nice couple adopted me.

The women was beautiful, her smile would light up a room and the way her husband looked at her you knew he loved her.

Life was good. My own room again, family dinners together.

The man and women treated me like I was their own child. We had girls day where we would get our nails done and do a little shopping and end the day with dinner just me and my adopted mother.

Christmas was filled with cooking and decorating the tree and house together. I remember one Christmas I got this diary that I had admired when me and bren (my adopted mother) had a girls day out. When we entered the town book store. We were looking for my adopted father Rick this book about ancient prophecies and myths. While bren was asking the saleslady did she have it in, I check out a shelf that is sitting back up against the wall with a sign that read new releases.

I can't explain it but I was drawn to a book that had silver etching all over the cover.

It felt like it was calling out to me. I don't know how long I was standing there touching it but bren had paid for her book and was standing beside me.

The saleslady walked up and picked up the book.

I almost grab it out her hand but stop myself.

saleslady:

I don't know how that got there.

bren:

come on jamia, lets get home before dark.

Leaving that book made me feel like I left a part of me there. I got that diary soon after. Bren was good to me like that.

when I was thirteen the women I had begun to call mother died.

I never understood what happen but when they found her 24 hours after being missing she was completely drain of blood no marks or scars just drain of blood.

but losing her I needed someone to tell my feelings and thoughts to.

Writing in the diary she gave me made me feel like we were still talking.

it was so pretty I never opened it until that night

it had silver etched writing all over it

it was grey with a lovely wolf on the clasp.

when she died it

left her husband rick heartbroken.

He started being gone all night, sleeping all day and bringing weird friends around.

a year after that the beatings started.

imagine being a teenage girl and getting your arm broken by your adopted father.

all because you dropped a glass and broke it.

He got so angryhe twisted my arm until it snapped.

and said.

rick:

since you have a problem holding things making a mess in here that you will clean up

now you have a reason to drop things.

then he left me crying on the floor I ran to my best friend Asia house .

she been my best friend since moving here crying and holding my arm.

her mom took me to the hospital.

after xrays and an hour

the doctor said it was just a sprain not even a bad one.

I couldn't believe it maybe it wasn't as bad as I thought.

but from then on it has been one beating after another.

I guess I heal fast. I stop going to the doctor after the beatings. Rick would come home and take his anger out on me and

I usually just go to my room and sleep it off.

rick:

are you ignoring me ?

then he kicks me in the stomach .I hold in my cry and curl in a ball on the floor.

I learned he likes to hear my cries of pain.

when he hears it he just beats me longer.

so I learn to hold it in.

he pulls me up by my hair and punches me In my face.

I feel my eye begin to close with swelling from where he hit me I curl in a ball on the floor.

rick :

now get up and go to your room.

and like I said Felix will be here to watch over you while I'm gone the next 24 hours. and

do what he says.

understand.

I nod and limp to my room holding my stomach.

I make it to my room and close the door.

I don't know if I can make it living here until I'm 18.

shit I need some ice for my nose.

I think about going downstairs and getting some but I don't want to get hit again no matter how fast I heal.

maybe I can hold a cold rag on it.

I open my door and peek out

the bathroom is down the hall.

I rush to it but stop.

cause I hear voices.

rick:

OK now its up to you.

you have 24 hours.

if its not done in 24 hours it goes to the next man understand.

Felix:

don't worry . you should be happy its me.

I'm a first in my family.

your little girl won't be a virgin when you get back and you will have her out of your hair.

rick:

good

and

she's my wife's little girl.

and she left me.

she died on me.

you can have her little bitch

she's not even ours and

you know I can't touch her.

just get rid of her I don't want to see her again.

Felix:

no problem.

I forgot about my injuries and ran back to my room.

what am I going to do?