Rage

Chapter One

            Her anger felt like a soda can on the verge of bubbling over and bursting, sending specks of the aluminum container holding it all over the ground. As prayers were sung around her, Rachel focused her thoughts on what would've happened if she really had caused the silver beverage canister she was drinking from a few minutes earlier to burst. What would've happened if she had managed to squeeze it hard enough to erupt and explode. Hopefully, it would've fired pieces into her sister's face, which was what Rachel imagined she deserved for demanding she'd attend the weekly service at their family church. However, her devilish dreams were broken after her foster-sister took her soda from her and dragged her to the old church down the road.

"Hey, why are you making that weird face?" Emily questioned, snickering quietly as to not alert the attention of the few others sitting near them in the creaky wooden pews. Her baby-blue fingernails traced the lines in the benches, providing her with something much more interesting to do rather than listen to a pastor preach.

Rachel ground her teeth together and sharply inhaled through her nose in an attempt to try and keep her calm. "Thinking, just thinking," she muttered under her breath, her voice filled with a fraction of the rage she felt for the teenaged girl sitting next to her. From the very second Rachel had met her foster sister Emily, an internal fire of fury sparked in her that was kept burning every moment spent around the judgemental, entitled girl. Although Emily's family opened up their home to her, Rachel couldn't bring herself to feel anything other than anger towards them.

Emily made a face of disgust when she heard Rachel's silent comment, rolling her eyes dramatically and letting out a judgemental chuckle. "God, you're so weird," she scoffed as she tucked her greasy black hair behind her earring-riddled ears.

Rachel's eyes quickly darted back toward the speaker as another church-goer leaned over to murmur a quick complaint to Emily. "Dear, don't use the Lord's name in vain, please." The old lady smiled politely before returning to listen to the pastor. Although this was exactly what Rachel hoped her sister had coming to her, she couldn't help but still be stuck in a fit of rage. It was as if she was angry that she didn't undergo more discipline.

"I need to leave," Rachel stated all of a sudden. Her eyes landed on Emily's, whose face was filled with confusion. Her lips twitched ever so slightly as she struggled to conceal the amount of fury she was feeling to the slight inconvenience. The quiet sound of her fingernails tapping on the rotting, paint-chipped seats echoed throughout the small room. Her eyes darted to each face around her, each slight movement of their features causing her teeth to grind together and the taps on the wood to grow louder.

"What? Where would you need to go now? You're obviously too much of a nutcase to have any friends, and we both know you aren't ditching to go smoke because you can't handle being high," Emily sneered while she watched Rachel and her coping tactics. Although this was definitely not the first time she'd witnessed them, they still came off extremely odd to her. "Calm down, girl. Why are you so mad?" She reached out her hand to stop the irritating tapping before being immediately slapped away. "Woah, what's gotten into you?"

Rachel's heaving chest and hunched over shoulders turned to face Emily straight on. "I need to leave," she repeated herself, "I need to go." She gulped strongly and tightened her hands into fists, ignoring the pain of her sharp fingernails digging into her palms.

As her vision became slightly blurred, Rachel's breathing quickened. The rhythm and pattern within the taps of her finger on the wooden bench were lost, transforming to a cluster of loud, angry knocks. She wanted her anger to fade, for happiness, even fear or sadness, to replace it. But she knew that would never happen, that's just how she worked.

Emily raised her eyebrow and pursed her lips as she took in the sight of Rachel fuming with anger. "Yeah, I get that, but my mom and dad would be pretty mad at you if they found out you skipped out on church," she moved a couple inches down the pew to exit a potential punching zone, "again."

Heads were starting to turn from around the room while Rachel used the backrest of the uncomfortable pew in front of her to hoist herself to her feet. "It's not like they would care, they're never around." She breathed heavily and shot furious looks at each of the church members that turned in their seats to see what the ruckus near the front door was about. "I'm not even their kid, either." As she shuffled toward the large doors on the old building, the same old lady she had grown angry at earlier muttered to the small boy she was with, and although Rachel couldn't hear what it was that she said, she snapped back at her, "Shut it old hag!" Even the old pastor at the front of the room adjusted his view to observe the anger-prone girl racing down the aisle.

Splinters of the molding wooden doors snapped and tumbled to the ground, the sound of them hitting the floor being overshadowed by the thunderous creaks of the rusted hinges as Rachel swung them open. Beams of light shone through the single small entrance door, causing particles of dust to be seen swimming and dancing in the air. Rachel forced her way through the narrow doorway and out into the sunlight of the morning. She pulled the door behind her and like a strike of lightning it slammed shut back into its rotting frame.

Pebbles tumbled from the broken steps leading from the church entrance to the moss-infested stone pathway as Rachel thumped down them, flaming. She kept her head hanging low, her loose brown hair falling in her eyes and face. Her feet kicked chips of wood and slightly larger stones in attempt to soothe herself back to sanity. The harsh sun glared down at Rachel, and she tilted her head back to meet its gaze. Its warmth and comfort wrapped around her, but she soon found it suffocating. A stinging yell escaped Rachel's lips as she quickly became smothered and overwhelmed by the heat of the summer morning light. She helplessly searched for shelter from the infuriating rays of sun.

A clearing in the nearby forest opened itself up to Rachel during her frantic hunt. She quickly darted toward the shady woodland area, hiding beneath the canopy that protected her from her most recent rage-inducing incident.

Once hidden from the glaring sun, Rachel noticed a tear in her jeans, most likely caused by the thorn bushes growing along the edges of the clearing. "I can't believe this!" she shrieked, not caring whether or not someone was walking on the nearby trail. Her clammy hands cupped her face, shutting her eyes tightly and taking a deep breath in. "Why does all this stuff happen to me?" she asked the empty space around her, her words slightly muffled by her grasping hands. She slowly lowered her hands from her face, looking down at them as another, better question came to mind. "Why am I so angry?"

For the first time in her life of tantrums and overreactions, Rachel looked up at the thin lines of light peeking through the leaves above her and wondered why it was that they caused her wrath to overcome her. Why did she scream and feel an incredible sense of anger towards something as unimportant as the hot summer sun, or a tear in her jeans?