The Easiest Target

Me For Me

He's happy. He thinks he won. He thinks my silence as he takes me into his apartment by the wrist means he's won something. Meaning my whole existence is just a game he's playing against Toki. 

It doesn't matter. There's nothing he can do that will mend this relationship. There's nothing he has that I can ever want. There's nothing to do but wait this out.

He gives me a change of pajamas and tells me to go shower until the food comes. I take the lacy underwear and bra, shorts and tank top and look at him, barely able to conceal the hatred bubbling in me towards him. I drop them to the floor. He picks them up, offering them to me.

I take them and drop them in the trash. "What're you doing?" he snaps, taking them out. "These are for you. Go put them on."

"Why?"

"Didn't you say you liked them? You were wearing something like them last time."

My brows furrow, a ravenous whirlpool of emotions draining my energy as though trying to suck my soul into the pit of my body. "When did I say that? Didn't you freak out last time I tried something like this on?"

"Yeah, but now you've got the boobs and hips for it," he smiles. "You've been a bitch about it but hormone therapy's doing you wonders," he shrugs, nonchalantly taking his belt and watch off.

My knees quiver before my vision does. "Hormone ... therapy?"

His head snaps up at the realization: he let the truth slip in a moment of joy. "Your vitamin pills," he says. "They must've balanced out your hormones. You even got taller," he pats my head with a smile.

I dump the clothes in the trash again and walk out to the living room, flipping through channels without paying attention to anything on the tv. It's like I'm floating behind a screen, watching an cartoon character get toyed with. The vitamin pills were hormones? I've been on hormones for three months and never even suspected it? Is this for real? 

He joins me a few moments later, squats in front of me. "Hadeel, I can't give you what you want from me if you don't tell me what it is."

I want you dead. Plain and simple. Him and his uncle. So me, his mother, and all the other women in the family these two psychos are terrorizing can be free.

"Tell me the truth of why I'm here," I say in a low voice.

He takes my hands gently and kisses my knuckles. "I already told you: it's because I like you and I wanted to take care of you."

Liar. "Are we here because your mom kicked you out?" I ask.

He looks confused. "You said you wanted to come here."

I don't mention that I wanted to be alone. "Why did you say all those nasty things about me at school?"

He rubs his thumbs over my knuckles, his eyes avoiding me. "They ... asked me... how you are...."

"Would you have said that about your mom?"

His head shoots up, his eyebrows knitting with anger. Whatever he was going to say does on his tongue because he gets it now. He grinds his teeth. "What do you want me to do, Hadeel?"

I sit forward, his eyes widening with hope. "I want you to leave me alone," I whisper.

He chuckles mirthlessly and lets go. "You're such a bitch, you know that? I'm done trying to make you into something. If you want a divorce, I'll sign the papers and you can go, Hadeel. Be with that emo loser."