Spearmint

16. Julia

August 2018

Pain, it was the thing she experienced on a daily basis. Muse was becoming more violent, he was beating her and burning her for every mistake she made. She tried to 'behave' but it was never as good as he wanted it.

He was slowly becoming more pushy for sex, the only reason she knew she was there for. He told her he loved her but she knew he just wanted someone to spread their legs for him, to bend to his every will. He was groping her almost everyday and he was not gentle with it. Her breasts sometimes had bruises on them and sometimes he smacked her butt so hard he left handprints.

His new favourite torture method was burning her hands under scolding hot water, he would grab her and hold her to him as he pulled her arms out in front of her under hot water that he had ran until it was hot. He would hold her hands underneath the water until she screamed that she was sorry. When he released her hands he would sometimes let her run her burnt hands under cold water but if he was in a bad mood he would make her go back to mopping or dusting while he watched her and threw insults at her.

Night time was the same thing as usual, she would wash the makeup off her face with the expensive skincare and brush her teeth before she went to bed. Muse would sometimes come to bed with her and he would sometimes kiss the bruises he left on her face and tell her that she deserved them before he would reach a hand up her shirt to hold her chest while he went to sleep.

Sleeping was never comfortable. Her nights were plagued with more torment. All she wanted was a comfortable night sleep without someone's hand up her shirt. She wanted to go back home where Sprinkles and Andrea would be waiting for her with open arms. She wanted to eat more than just eggs and bacon for breakfast and she wanted to be able to clean only when she needed, or wanted to.

On days where his torture was bad he would throw eggs on the floor or flour. Sometimes he would make a mess just so she would have to clean it. When she would clean it sometimes he would make more of a mess or dump flour on the mess he made just to humiliate her.

"You really are worthless" he would laugh as he would pour flour onto the wet floor or some eggs he had cracked and smeared on the floor. Sometimes he would unplug the vacuum while she was working or he would dumb the contents from the vacumn bag onto the already clean floor.

"Wow you can't even clean properly," he would say. She tried to bite her tongue sometimes and sometimes she had to fight herself just to keep the tears at bay. If he saw them he would bully her more and she didn't want that. She could barely tolerate his abuse at the time.

*

Julia thought she was a little more lucky than most survivors although Muse abused her and made sexual advances to her he never beat her until she blacked out and she never thought he would until that day.

It was a day like any other, she woke up with a pissy captor pushing her to get breakfast started as he got dressed.

She went to the kitchen and made the usual breakfast, eggs, toast, and bacon. She wasn't allowed to switch up their routine because that's how Muse wanted it to be. Breakfast was made fast only because she did it everyday so it became like a choreographed dance. She knew where everything in the kitchen was so she didn't waste too much searching.

Muse walked in like he did every morning and made himself a coffee and started to make the pigs breakfast. By the time Muse was done and back in from feeding the pigs breakfast was on the table. They ate and Julia cleaned up while Muse had a cigarette.

When she was done cleaning up she went to the bathroom and packed on makeup so the bruises were covered and she looked 'presentable.'

When she had all the bruises covered she dressed in a pair of leggings and a loose t-shirt.

She gathered the bucket and filled it with hot soapy water and collected the rags she needed to clean. She always started in the living room, it was small and only needed a dusting and a quick sweep of the floor. If she noticed the couch was dirty she spent extra time vacuuming it.

She managed to clean everything except their bedroom. The house had two bedrooms (three if the cellar is counted,) and she was only allowed in the cellar and their bedroom. The other one was off limits according to Muse.

Dinner was early that night, Muse wanted to watch a movie that was going to be on the television so he made Julia make it earlier. Julia got to work as soon as she could to make dinner. He had wanted pancakes for dinner which was fine until he demanded that she help him with something when she came back to the stove the pancakes were burnt.

She panicked and was about to throw them out to remake them but the fire alarm went off which alerted Muse. He walked into the kitchen, his eyes frantic until he spotted her. His shoulders relaxed and for a split second Julia thought he wouldn't be upset, she could remake the pancakes. She watched as he turned off the fire alarm before he turned his attention back to her.

She could see in his eyes she was in trouble. He stepped towards her but they were slow as if he was waiting for her to run but she didn't.

She felt herself shrinking up the closer he got, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," she started to cry. He didn't say anything he just slapped her. He slapped her so hard she fell back and smacked her head, it was the last thing she remembered of that day.