In Spades

Prologue-Beginning of an end

I distinctively remember seeing my beaten, broken down reflection surrounding me. The memory of seeing my face conveyed in a jagged portrayal, no matter which direction that I looked. I can still feel the gripping chills that continuously racked my body as I lay in a crimson sea of my own blood. My skin was searing from the tiny cuts invading it. The blood, there was so much blood, running steadily down my body. The thick, red liquid was warming my skin. I thought quietly to myself how it was possible to feel anything warm, when my insides were so cold.

The voices were unwelcome noise in my now ringing ears, steadily growing louder and angrier. I could hear the crying, the screaming. I closed my eyes as they were beginning to burn. My left eye had begun to swell shut after receiving the repeated blows. I had no choice but to take advantage of the use of the right one, opening it slowly, working to get a look at my surroundings. I was trying to figure out how to make my next move. My vision was blurry. I could barely make out the figure progressively stalking toward me. I could smell him before I could even see his features. I was in trouble, big trouble. I hugged the floor with all the energy I could muster, hoping to go unnoticed. He looked like the devil in the flesh, with eyes that glowed red; wasted, in every sense of the word. He was no longer the handsome charmer my mother had fallen in love with. No, that man was long gone, a pit of despair pulling him in. I cannot completely remember the entirety of his face. My mind was constantly trying to block memories of him out. All I can remember are shadows, sharp angles, and those bloodshot eyes.

Sadly, his odor is what I remember most, a horrid mixture of stale vodka and peppermint schnapps. This scent had taken place in most of my childhood memories up until this point and it was a hard one to forget, as much as I'd tried. He laughed menacingly at my torn apart body. I flinched; I could not control any of my movements. Fear overtook me; it gripped me hard and fast. In this moment, I prayed to be swallowed up whole by the floor.

Humiliated and broken to the world around me. The shards of glass that had once been our hallway mirror lay scattered around. I tried to get my left hand to follow the directions my brain was sending it, getting a grip on one of the broken pieces. I didn't know what I was going to do with it, but it wasn't going to be pretty. Thoughts of suicide, murder, and protection all rapidly flooded my mind.

Unfortunately, I couldn't do a damn thing. I dropped the shard just as quickly as I had picked it up. He still stood over me, unmoving. His cold, calculated voice repeating its all too familiar mantra. I would never forget the way the words rolled so easily from his lips, disgust filling his face.

"Look at yourself, Avalynn." He sneered at me, spitting as he spoke.

He held a broken shard of glass up to my face, as close as humanly possible. The jagged edges cutting into his own skin, but he didn't even realize how much of his blood was dripping down.

"I said....get a good look, Avalynn Wright. Get a good look at the pitiful human being that ruined my life! You were a mistake. That's all you will ever be. I'm so glad such a waste of space doesn't hold my last name. Won't continue my legacy. You are worthless. Don't you ever forget that." He slurred the words into each other, a normal person wouldn't have been able to understand him, but I could. I wasn't a normal person; I've never been able to be one.

He threw the broken shard on top of my now broken body and walked out of the room, leaving me to drown in the hurt alone. I would never ever forget his words or the truth lying behind his sunken in eyes. His opinion had always been one that I held to a high standard, even though it killed me in every sense of the word. I couldn't shake it.

As the numbness began to overtake my body and my mother's screams had finally died out, I welcomed the darkness. I welcomed relief that my body and mind had felt. I was shutting down, becoming numb, like I had been for so many years before. I prayed for death. I could see the way out and I was going to take it.

I only came back to this hell for her, my beautiful baby sister whom I never had a chance to know or meet. I had only made things worse for her like I usually did when it came to him. I had felt a compulsion to save her, to take her away from the childhood that I was running from. She was so strikingly beautiful. The last image that crossed my mind was those big blue eyes that perfectly matched mine. I remember her looking up at me from her crib, reaching out her tiny hand to me, and I couldn't get to her. I couldn't save her. He had gotten to me first.