No Matter What

Chapter 2

I can feel my heart racing in my chest. I know it wasn't real, but...her face, the pain in her eyes.

"No!" I say to myself. I can't be thinking about her. Not right now.

It takes me a few minutes to organize my thoughts enough to get out of bed. Shifting my wait, I put my feet on the cold ground. I grip the side of my bed."Here we go." I say allowed willing myself to get up. By the look of the sun from the small window at the top of my room I could assume that it was around 3 o'clock. I slowly raise myself out of bed and saunter across the room, my feet on pins and needles from the night-chilled ground. When I get to the bathroom on the other side of the room I immediately turn on the shower. The sound of the water trickling is slightly calming.

I find myself jumping in before the water heats, not even caring about the cold, just wanting to wake up.I drench my hair in the cold liquid and run a layer of strawberry shampoo through it. When I close my eyes to rinse it out the man's face, the one in the park, puts itself in my brain. The same smug look on his face when he killed my sister. "Wasn't real." I say allowed. Stop thinking about it.

I wash my body then turn off the water that had long since turned warm. Grabbing the pink towel off the top of the shower, I step out and dry myself off. The towels abrasiveness, like sandpaper, is irritating to the touch, not that I care. As I stand in front of my sink, starring at myself in the mirror, I find it hard to recognize the person staring back at me, then again I haven't recognized her for a long time. No, not for a while...

I shake the thought from my head and brush the tangles out of my hair until a sits nicely on my shoulders sweeping the top my belly button. Throwing the dreadful pink towel back over the shower I wander back into my room to the front of the bed, where I try to pick clothes for the day. Going to the chest I end up picking up the light blue dress that I had worn that previous week on the same day. Might as well . I say to myself.

As I tug the dress over my head, onto my body I feel a sense of comfort, and uneasiness at the same time. I also discover that a bruise has formed on my forearm from that one client yesterday, or was it the one from Wednesday...I can't remember, not that it matters. When I get the dress on I turn to my right to the full length mirror next to my bed. My head cocks to the right as I stair at myself.

The dress's familiarity is some what conferring, though quite cold with its narrow straps. I run the skirt fabric through my fingers feeling it's softness as I do often just out of nervous habit. The dress is very fitted but flares out at my hips, the hemline ending just at my fingertips. I take a deep breath, somewhat of a sigh, as I take one more look in the mirror and head back to the bathroom. My hair's no longer wet, just slightly damp towards the bottom and around my ears so I take the black comb off of the counter and run it's needle like teeth through my hair, releasing the tangles.

Just then I hear the earsplitting screech of the metal door to the entrance of the room skid along the concrete underneath it. I freeze. It's been four years, you would think that I'd be used to it, you'd be wrong. I can feel the goosebumps on my arms and my hand that was once held the comb in its grasp, is now shaking uncontrollably, causing the comb to fall to the ground in the clutter. I hear footsteps, the clashing of the door closing, and the snap of the lock, blocking off the rest of the world from me and locking the evil of it inside.

"Ready for the day Miss. Sunshine?" He says in that oh so familiar voice. I hear his footsteps getting closer to me, the low heel of his dress shoes clinking on the floor, I turn my head to the side and stare at the ground. I feel him put one of his hands around my waist, the other on my head brushing my wavy brown hair out of my face. I can feel his hot breath on my neck... and without looking I can see a smirk on his face.

"What's wrong bitch can't look at me?" He snarled. The hand that was once playing with my hair went under my chin forced my head up making me stare at his reflection in the mirror in front of us. It then traveled down my neck, across my collarbone to my arms where he dug his nails into my skin.

"Auuuhhh!" I exclaim as pain shoots through my arms.

"Look at me!" He commands, roughly turning me around and pressing my body hard against the sink. Pain shoots up my lower back, I close my eyes as he pushes his lower body into mine. "Now!" He shouts again.

Finally I look up, and stair into his unusually bright pale blue eyes...they're just as dark and soulless as before. I think.