The Intersection
The mundane walls reflected on each other, the colour draining, the sun fading. I allowed myself to peer outside, and as I watched the green grass move and swindle in the wind. I dreamt of feeling it. The soft and vibrant grass underneath my fingers; cleaning the dirt in my nails and healing the cuts which surrounded them.
"Mary!" a voice boomed from the stairs which echoed in my room.
He was angry.
I closed my eyes and took one last look outside.
I knew what was going to happen next.
Once he was done with me he left me on the floor as always; a continuous ritual since the day he took me from my home. I would cling onto my arms, scratching them, but not to hurt myself; more to hold onto something real; something warm, something he couldn't take away from me.
I counted the seconde which passed until I was fed; sometimes I would prefer to starve; to hear something else roar at me instead of him. But fasting was never my strongest quality, so I took the food, taking the beating that came with it.
The food was usually just leftovers and was often mixed with uncontrollable tears. I would pray and wish every night for an escape, for something that I could kill him with.
I would pound on the walls, scream, stomp my feet and throw my bucket at the walls.
But no one would come.
No one could hear me.
The stairs thumped and vibrated the floor beneath my feet. He was coming.
"Mary, come one." Three words. Three words was all it took for me to follow him like a slave to her master.
He walked with me up the stairs into a house; it was his home.
I had dreamt of a tool, even something sharp for eight years and now I was surrounded by them. Every inch of myself, or what I had left, urged me to go; to reach forward and commit the act of my dreams. But I didn't, I couldn't, I wouldn't.
A forceful push behind my back forced me out the door, the direct ray of sunlight burning my eyes and tingling my skin.
"Now, go and find a young girl and bring her back here..." he whispered viciously in my ear.
Another girl. Another person who was going to go through the same hell I did and he wanted me to help?
Something deep within me snapped and it seemed as if my memories came streaming back. Years and years of assault didn't compare to this moment. I thought of my little brother, my family and the gap in my life. I had never dared to look back, to look into the past, except today.
This was my escape and I wasn't going to let it go.
I ran, I ran to nowhere and I ran with nothing. I was dirty, smelly, eight years older, and hungry, but I didn't care.
I was free.
A complacent smile widened my face until a brick wall smacked into me. Where was I going?
My speed slowed and suddenly my legs felt like dripping honey. I found my surroundings different, each side of me a reflection of each other.
I was confused and found only one way out. Go back.
I was standing at an intersection, cars streaming around us like thick plasma. They would honk and yell but I couldn't move. I would turn and turn until I was dizzy but all I saw was brick. Only one road was clear in my smoggy vision; the road back to him.
The world was no longer a ball of grass and rays of white; it was a spike of danger, and it seemed as if the only person who could protect me was him.
I stood at the intersection, my choice was clear.
