4. four
four
LYSANDRA
I packed my bags the night I received the acceptance email. Mario signed my waiver, completely hammered, the next day. Thankfully, the school’s scholarship paid for my flight to get there but for me to come back.
It was fine, though. I wasn’t planning on ever coming back to the States.
I refused to be on the same soil as this man, as the woman who abandoned me, and the people who refused to help me.
I had worked to save up enough money to live off of while I found a new job in Scotland.
My savings would serve as a backup plan in case of an emergency.
I would not wait another second to leave.
I lived in California, but didn’t believe in the illusion of it at all.
My residence was in the most cursed city of the entire state.
Whoever was born in this place had to carry an anathema their entire life.
No one who came from the Valley is known to ever “make it”. No one from this place was successful.
But I will be.
They would all regret their negligence, their silence, and their uncertainty. All of it.
My success would be my revenge.
And that was my determination as I zipped up my last baggage. I was leaving today. While it was still night, I’d be departing. The cab would be here soon, and my drunken stepfather had already locked himself in his room. I was going to leave without saying goodbye because he wasn’t worthy of one.
He had no remorse when he broke me, so I would not have regret when leaving him.
Once I was outside, waiting, I thought about how hard winters would be like in Edinburgh.
The brakes of the yellow cab screeched slightly, causing me to hiss. I looked back at the crumpling trailer that I had called home for way too long. My mother left me in this home. She ran away. And I was about to follow in her footsteps; maybe that was the only good example she set for me.
I quietly walked toward the passenger side of the cab, the woman in the front of the car pressed on the window button.
“Hola, buenas noches. Está bien si coloco mi equipaje en su cajuela?” After greeting her, I asked if she would let me put my luggage in the trunk of her cab.
“Claro, mija.” She agreed, motioning toward the back of the cab. She gave me that nickname. The one I heard every parent tell their kids. Mija or Mijo, which meant daughter or son. No one had ever called me that before.
“Muchas gracias,” I thanked her.
Pulling my luggage into the back of the vehicle.
I froze when the trunk slammed shut and I realized I had left my passport in my room. What if he caught me when I went back inside? My grand exit would go up in smoke.
I looked back at the broken trailer.
“Ahorita vuelvo, se me olvidó algo.” I quickly let her know that I’d be back.
“Okay, está bien mija,” the woman chirped, saying that it was okay.
I ran back inside, careful not to trudge too harshly upon the steps or pull the door open with unnecessary strength. But once I was inside, it was too late to go back out. He was standing there with another bottle, staring at me with a deep frown on his face.
“Where are you going?” he asked groggily, his eyes bloodshot.
“Nowhere. I’m just cleaning up and throwing out the trash,” I replied, rushing to my room, hoping that he wasn’t behind me.
But his shuffling footsteps were already closing in on me.
When I pushed the door to my room open, my passport was on top of the bed.
I rushed to it, setting it safely inside the pocket of my jacket and zipping it up to ensure it didn’t fall out.
Mario was standing by the threshold of my bedroom. I stood idly, shifting from one foot to the other, my fingers trembling. Hoping he wouldn’t follow me out, praying to God that he collapsed before he saw me leave, wishing that he would just let me go.
“I need your help with something,” he said, a slight smirk appearing over his chapped lips.
Small crescents formed on my palms, my fists sinking deeply into them.
Mario grasped my arms, pulling me closer to his body.
My face contorted in disgust toward him and his bad breath.
His rough hand began to snake around my waist. Bile inched up my throat.
I pushed him with all my strength, and even I was surprised when his back clattered against the picture frames hung on the hallway wall. “Don’t touch me!”
“Hey! What the hell?” His face grew red with anger when he realized what I’d done.
The cab lady was outside, waiting for me, with my luggage in her car. What if she left? She seemed like a nice woman, but I couldn’t trust anyone. “I have somewhere to be.”
“A dónde crees que vas?” His voice ripped through my eardrums as we marched through the shattered hallway of the trailer. He questioned where I was going.
“No te incumbe,” I replied, telling him it was none of his business.
“You belong to me. Of course I need to know where you’re going!”
Rage ripped through me. All of these years, I had choked back my anger, my frustration, and my hate him. The hell he put me through ended today. I was leaving this place. I was leaving everything behind, especially him.
“I don’t belong to you. I don’t belong to anyone, matter of fact. I’m not your kid, and you’re definitely not my father.”
“More respect when you speak to me, cabrona.”
“Respect? Is that what you think you deserve? You are an excuse of a man. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone so shameful and disgusting before.
Just look at yourself, look at what you’ve become.
No wonder my mother left you,” I muttered, pushing past him.
“And now, I’m leaving you too. You deserve to live a sad, lonely life. ”
As I stepped closer to the front door, I could already hear his deafening steps rushing over to me. I pulled the door open, hoping to jump out of the house before he put his hands on me again. But I miscalculated, and I was being hauled back inside; his calloused palms gripping my hair.
His fingers imprinted on my shoulders as he held tight onto them, yelling at me.
His face was mere inches from mine as he screeched, “Who do you think you are? Do you think you’re better than me for you to just leave like that?
You don’t think I know where you’re running off to?
I should’ve known you would’ve ended up being a whore just like your mother. ”
“Mija?” the woman’s sweet voice interrupted the tension in the air.
I let out a breath. She hadn’t left.
“Who is this?” Mario exclaimed.
My gaze went straight toward the older woman who peeked inside the trailer through the railing of the wooden steps. If she came inside, Mario would hurt her. The woman hadn’t left; she hadn’t stolen my things. She was outside, trying to help.
I looked back at my stepfather.
When I was a child, I begged him to treat me like his princess.
I wanted a father, even though he was a crappy boyfriend to my mother.
But my mother was more screwed-up than him, because he stayed and she didn’t.
I wasn’t his, and he still tolerated me.
He still fed me when I was a child. He also beat me, hurt me, and almost did the most unimaginable thing a man could ever do.
I stayed because I had no hope. Now I had this sliver of it, and I wasn’t going to let it go.
I slammed my head forward, with all my strength, aiming for his nose. I heard the crack when my forehead came into contact with his face. My head vibrated, but I ignored it as I kicked his groin. Blood spilled onto his lips and into his mouth as he groaned, reaching downward.
“Goodbye, father,” I whispered mockingly.
Then, I was out of there. My steps pounding on the railing, jumping over it, and pulling the woman with me.
“Is everything okay?” she asked.
“Hurry, we need to leave before he follows us!” I ordered.
I didn’t have to give her much instruction; she hurried to her side of the car, turned on the ignition, and raced down my street.