Someone like You

She was the epitome of art, she realized as she faced the mirror unclothed, and saw her body divided in an aberrant white and tan, her natural skin color. She traced her fingers along her shoulders to her neck where the edges of white remained, the scars of the past that didn’t want to be forgotten and would continue to swathe her body in the years yet to come, like a reminder of her old house, and of the fire that devoured it whole. Her scars would serve as a memory of her mother and her valiant deed.

You’re beautiful, her mother had always told her when she brushed her hair at night. You’ve got to believe in yourself before anyone else will.

It hurt quite literally, her resemblance to her late mother, and the way they both had raven black hair curling down to the middle of their backs, the way their full eyebrows sat over their seemingly golden eyes, the way the corners of their lips always seemed to curl upwards. It felt like looking into the past, watching her reflection.

She wanted to believe she was beautiful, but her father kept on telling her otherwise.

Blotches of dark blue and purple painted her cheeks, her neck and her arms. Her father might have mistaken his hand for the brush, and she for the canvas. He might have wanted to capture the eight o’clock night sky and forever keep it within reach.

Didn’t he know? Time heals everything.

He wouldn’t know, she thought as she quickly dressed up at the sound of her father’s old truck pulling into the garage, the engine wheezing to life before facing its death with just a turn of a key.He wouldn’t know when he’s drunk over alcohol as his fists meet me, crying over how beautiful I am he feels the need to stain me.

The thud of the truck door closing shattered her quiet, and cue, the play had started.

“Maria!” Her father’s call was a signal that he had gotten into the door. His hungry grumbles would follow as he’d call for her name once more, asking her to set the table. She’d think inwardly, Oh, he could sure use the time to prepare his meal himself.

If she’d take too long to fix his meal and if he’d be in a bad mood (which was almost all the time) his forceful hand would grab her collar and drag her up, heavy footsteps would climb the flight of stairs, and throw her into her room to paint the sky on the canvas. She’d be left for dead, and sometimes, she’d wish her body would just give up so it would all be over. Her door would be locked from outside then, as if Maria would have enough strength to even scheme a getaway.

Her window would be her taste of freedom, and the passing wind wouldn’t fail to keep her on her toes, waiting for a signal to leave.

Except the play wouldn’t see its end.

When she didn’t hear anything else aside from ‘You’re ugly’, it became a custom. She waited for his father’s disdains as though it was food, necessary, and for almost two weeks, it really sucked her in. She believed she was ugly.

It wasn’t until her father threw her into the shower after he beat her up, asking her to chafe her skin so her ugliness would decrease a layer that she realized, no, I’m not ugly. Mother said I’m beautiful.

She realized that she didn’t need any form of mistreatment because she didn’t deserve it. She could be free from her father’s heavy hand. She could be free from his shackles on her feet when he should be the one to let her fly, and not be the one to step on her wings. It was wrong in all kinds of wrong. Maria deserved heaven.

The sound of clinking keys was gone. Maria was done counting to ten, and it was her turn to suspend the length of blankets, bed sheets, and curtains combined, only to realize that the escape down to the ground had never seemed so improbable. She was suddenly afraid to flee.

“Maria, dinner!” Her father’s pressured call made her climb on the ledge of the huge window pane that once offered her a taste of freedom. Tonight, it would become her door.

Her father’s grumbles resonated through the thin walls, and so did his heavy footsteps claiming the second floor wooden planks his own.

Maria had always been afraid, afraid of his violent hands that wanted to paint her black, afraid of his sharp tongue that never failed to wound her.

She wanted to believe there was heaven. She wanted to believe her mother’s words.

Believe in yourself, Maria.

She took one last look at the bedroom that was once her prison cell, at the white sheets on her bed that were once her comfort, at the wooden floor that would sometimes be her pillow, at the wooden door that never opened for her, at her late mother’s only portrait hanging on the wall, and Maria was gone.

When Maria’s father disengaged the chains locking her door, it was already too late. He could only look at the blanket tied to the leg of Maria’s bed flowing down through the open window in which cold wind passed through.

She was gone, he knew, and he didn’t have plans on running after her. He was tired, tired of looking at Maria and remembering all the things he had lost, tired of corrupting her perfection with his dirty hands, tired of clinging to things that weren’t anymore there. He didn’t realize sooner that it was time to let go of his angel who passed years ago until the miniature of that angel left.

He could only wish that Maria would be safe wherever she’d go, even though she most probably didn’t feel safe in her own home. He was sorry, and he realized that being sober once in a while could put things into perspective.

When he looked at Maria’s mirror, he saw a hideous man who he didn’t believe was him. He saw a dead man up on his feet, dark circles under his eyes, eyes too cloudy to see , bushy eyebrows that were always furrowed together, chapped lips that forgot how to smile, ‘miserable’ written all over his face as though it was his name; that, and the note that Maria left:

Dear dad, why’d you raise someone like you? –Your ugly daughter