Broken | Wattys2019

Prologue

Warning: This opening chapter deals with a very heavy topic, rape.  This story will revisit this moment in time on several occasions as Adelaide struggles to heal and relearns to trust.  Also, there will be a sequel.

The room around me felt small as my body trembled and blood ran down the inside of my thighs. My breathing was uneven and labored, with each breath my reality becoming clearer. My mind had found and oasis as my father's closest friend pounded in and out of me against my will. I begged him to stop, begged him for mercy even but my wishes went unanswered. Eventually I just stopped fighting as I drifted into my subconscious in an attempt to be anywhere but the violated safety of my own room.

When he was satisfied, he left my room to have a few more beers with my father on the couch as they watched a hockey game. I know this because while I wept for my innocence, I could hear them cheering for their team. Did my father even realize what had happened? Didn't hear my cries for help? I closed my eyes and drifted into a tainted dream. I knew that night would forever plague my memoires, the feeling of his hands ravishing my body as tears streamed my cheeks.

"Sweetheart," my mother's voice sliced through the cloud that fogged my head. "Sweetheart look at me. What happened?"

"David," I choked up his name, it was a name I would never forget.

Her jaw quivered as she stood to storm out of my room. She yelled at my father and he yelled back. The fog that consumed me kept me from focusing on the argument taking place just outside my door. When I heard a crash, I hurried out of my room. The summer dress I wore allowed the evidence of my rape to be shown.

"Jesus Christ Addy clean yourself up," my father spat my direction when his drunken gaze scanned my exposed skin.

"Get out!" My mother picked a lamp up and threw it across the room. When it connected with the wall behind my father it shattered.

My father swigged another drink from the beer still in his hands before turning to me. "You are nothing and you will always be nothing. Just like your mother. No one will ever want you." His gaze returned to my mother. "I leave with nothing but joy in my heart." He crushed the can in his hands before throwing it my direction allowing the remainder of the beer to soak my dress. "You both disgust me."

I watched in horror as he turned his back on us to retreat from the place we called home. Crumbling to the floor I called out to him, but he never looked back. My heart was shattered and any trust in men I had diminished. I am not nothing, I told myself repeatedly as my chest rattled in heartbreak.