The Diary Of A Broken Teenage Girl

3 (Nightmares)

One foot in front of the other
Keep breathing like they taught you
You politely asked to take a walk with me
I would have married you there underneath the tree
Is it real? This thing?
When you sleep - Mary Lambert

  She was on laying on the bed, talking on the phone with Zan, when she heard the scream downstairs. She didn't need to be told that her parents were at it again. Dad had come home drunk and Mom had probably made a comment about it and he was hitting her, again, like he always did.
 
   She quickly hung up the phone and ran down stairs.
 
   “Whore!" She heard her father roar, followed by the sound of his hand connecting to her mother's cheek.
 
  She stood silently at the door and stared at her mother.
 
  “Mike, I swear to you, he's just a friend," her mother pleaded tearily, holding her hand on her cheek.
 
  “Just a friend? Just a friend?"
 
  And there it was. Another slap. Harder than the first one. Sent her to the ground.
 
  Chrissy stood there, and watched, in tears. She was supposed to be used to this by now. But she could never get used to it.
 
  She watched her father sit astride her mother and hit her continuously. She watched her mother scream in pain and screamed with her, begging her father to stop.
 
  But he wouldn't stop. He just kept hitting her and she just kept screaming pleas and so did her mother.
 
  She didn't dare call the cops. Or she'd be switching positions with her mother. She'd learnt that the hard way. So, she just stayed there and screamed.
 
  Then her mother stopped screaming. But her father didn't stop hitting her. His fists were covered in blood. But he didn't stop. He just kept hitting her. Continuously. Without stopping.
 
  Chrissy stood there frozen. Not screaming anymore. Mouth agape. She stared at her mother and rage filled father. Tears rolled down her cheeks. She wanted to wipe them off. But she couldn't move. She wanted to scream. But no sound came out.
 
  It was like the world around her had been put in slow motion, and she just stood there, staring, in horror.
 
  Then she heard the sound of sirens. She hadn't called the cops, but sure, the neighbors had heard their screams and called them, but it was too bad the call been made real late.
 
  She heard the banging on the door and wanted so bad to open the door, but she couldn't move. She just stood there and stared. Then the door had been broken down and the cops came trooping in. But that didn't stop her dad. He just kept growling and hitting her. And hitting her and growling.
 
  And her mother just lay there. Lifeless. In the  pool of her own blood.
 
  Then the cops had wrestled him off her and taken him away. And even her mother had been taken away on a stretcher. And she just kept staring in horror. Unable to move.
 
  Then someone had wrapper a blanket around her shoulder and taken her away, muttering comforting words. And only then did she regain consciousness. Then she broke down and bawled her eyes out.
*****

  Chrissy woke up in tears. The night was still vivid in her head. It had been a month, but it still felt like yesterday.
 
  Her psychiatrist had told her that it would go away soon, but it still haunted her. She thought about it when she was awake and dreamt about it when she was asleep.
 
  But then, her psychiatrist had also said that time was going to heal her and she hadn't done much of healing. That's if at all she'd done any healing at all.
 
  And she'd gone to school that morning, with her face covered in makeup, to conceal the dark circles and a whole lot of other stuffs. No one had to know. Not even me and Zan. They didn't have to know. Or as Uncle Max had put it, ‘no one must know'.
 
  Then she'd done what she did best. She'd smiled and lied and pretended that everything was wonderful in her perfect little world.