Journey Toward Me (Not Yet Edited)

Chapter 17: Life or Death?

Camille's POV

I wanted to cry. But my eyes wouldn't let me anymore.

I wanted to die. The pain in my soul had reached its breaking point.

I could end it. I could end all the agony I experienced with two cuts to the wrists. I could be no longer.

Cut.

Cut.

No more Camille Bradshaw.

No more of the baby I carried.

The baby.

My father's baby. I still couldn't fucking believe it.

He touched me, impregnated me my own fucking father! How could he?

I wanted to cry. I strained to but my eyes were dry.

I wanted to die. I was so tired.

I had to end it.

)**°°°[ 'Cami baby. Mommy loves you.' My mama's smiling face appeared as she pushed me on the swing at my favorite park.

'Why'd you leave me Mommy? You told me you'd never.' I replied in the same innocent voice I possessed so many years ago when innocence still existed in my mind. But I looked how I look now. Innocence engulfed by curves and a full figure.

'I'm so sorry,' She began to cry. 'I'm sorry you have to deal with that man. But you're so strong and you're beautiful. You can handle anything.'

'But I can't handle this Mama. I'm tired. I tried. I don't wanna live anymore!'

'You can't give up now. You've got so much to live for. Be better than me. Show your daddy you are greater. Honey believe that you are greater.' Her eyes pleaded with me while her hands gripped the sides of my face.

I stared into her honey colored eyes with a dead expression. 'Why should I believe you of all people?'

She sighed heavily. 'Because I took that route. I was a coward and I killed myself because of him. He had that much power over me. I'm sorry I left you baby but you were way too strong to come with. I was weak.'

'Mommy what am I supposed to do now?' I sobbed.

She kissed my forehead softly. 'Live. Live not for him or me but for you...' Slowly my mother began to fade away.

'Mommy wait! Don't leave me again! Please!' I begged but she continued to be fragmented as she whispered 'live'. )***°°°]

I gasped for air as I awakened from the enlightening dream. It was freezing in the house because they probably turned our electricity off yet I was sweating like the desert lived inside of me.

Memory of the dream rushed me in a second and I felt like I couldn't breathe. It was too much to take in. This was all too much to handle.

My hand stung. I looked down and remembered I had fell asleep with a butcher knife tight in my grip. I stared at it contemplating its usefulness in my demise.

Did I want to die? My mother's timely presence made me question that. She told me to live.

I squeezed the knife. Did I want to live? She said I had a reason to.

There was a tug of war in my brain as I contemplated life or death. I teeter-tottered on the cliff of insanity.

What did I have to lose?

I thought about what my mother said about her disappearance. All these years I had no idea where

she went; why she left. She came to me in a dream to tell me the truth, at least some of it and give me some closure. That's what I needed. I was so tired of living in fear. Maybe all of this meant something. God was trying to tell me something. All I had to do was listen.

I stood and walked to the bathroom with the knife still in my hand slowly losing its hold on me. Looking in the mirror, I watched the story of my life unfold in the glass. I saw the recent pain my father put on me and I saw my future. Slowly I stripped to the essence of my being. I was so scarred and bruised but my future was not. It would take some time but I would be OK. I would be OK. Me and my baby would be OK.

I looked at myself and didn't see a tragic story. This was my complicated story full of highs and lows. This was it. The answer to my final question.

Life or Death?... I knew what I had to do.

"Today I choose life." I recited to myself until I shed my last tear. I heared the knife fall to the floor, the clammer of steel echoing my mother's words.: 'Live!'.....