Chapter Eleven
Rowan
The closer I get to my town, the faster my heart pounds.
I’m an idiot; I should have stayed home.
But I honestly can’t live the rest of my life knowing David is still out there.
Maybe I’m a bad person, fucked up in the head, but he’s the reason I am this way.
He’s the reason I wake up in terror, why my body is stained, scarred, and riddled with pain.
It’s all because of him. He’s the catalyst of it all, and he doesn’t get to live freely because I’ll never be able to again.
No matter how much time passes, I’ll forever carry their hands on me and fear in the pit of my stomach.
I didn’t need directions to get here, nor to his new place. Everyone knows what lies beyond the tracks here, and I know how to get here like the back of my hand.
Turning down the radio as I turn left, needing quietness, my eyes dart left and right, seeing the upheaval of the town. Falling down houses, empty lots, and numerous people lagging around, oblivious to the world surrounding them, overtaken by the drugs they’ve ingested.
Pulling my ball cap down lower, my hair tucked underneath it, my phone directs me to take the first right coming up.
Still, I ignore it, going my way, following the bumpy road jostling me, my heart picks up, the fact my body knows I’m close to David, closing the space between us, I parallel park the truck between two beat up vehicles, sticking out like a sore thumb.
Cutting the engine, I watch his house. The parking space gives me the best view without worrying about getting caught. The street is dead, which is shocking, but as I sit and the sun disappears, that all changes. They’re like cockroaches; once night falls, they emerge from their nest.
My eyes follow every person as I try to sink lower into my seat, peaking over the steering wheel.
I didn’t grow up where David is now, but the road and homes…if you want to call them that, are reminiscent of where I grew up a few blocks away.
Laying in my dark room, I try to force myself to fall asleep before my dad comes home, knowing what will follow when he does.
Funny how our bodies are; even though I’m exhausted from the constant of everyday life, school, and trying to walk on eggshells, my body still can’t come down from the anxiety to fall asleep.
I lie there counting, but once I get to three hundred, I’m mad at myself when I hear the front door slam shut. My body immediately coils into itself, preparing for when David comes through my bedroom door.
With the force of my door being kicked open, I feel the air rushing across my room, swearing I can smell the stale beer it brings along with it.
“I know you’re not fucking asleep. Get up!”
My eyes squeeze tighter with every word he spills at me while his voice grows closer to my bed.
I yelp when my sheet is yanked off me. “Stop,” comes out so defeated from my lips.
“You didn’t do a single thing while I was gone,” he yells down at me.
Staring up at him, his hair falls into his face, as his breath assaults my nose, making my stomach curdle.
My yelling back at him will make everything worse. Because I cleaned, I did everything that I was supposed to, but it never matters anyway. I don’t even know why I do it all; I’ll still get hated and yelled at, anyway. Maybe I should do something for me to actually deserve his wrath.
I don’t move as my body trembles. My eyes watch him retreat, but I know he isn’t done.
I cover my head with my arms, knowing what’s coming. He doesn’t hit me with his hands, but with whatever he can find to throw at me, and tonight, it’s each of my wooden dresser drawers.
The pain radiates up my arm as the wooden drawer edge catches my skin, followed by the other three.
He throws them at me with no care, hitting whatever he can.
I curl into a fetal position, hoping he’s done when I know that’s all my dresser holds, but when a pain pierces my skull, sending immense pain down my neck, my arm starts to tingle.
My cry comes out animalistic. The pain, foregoing any care; we have to not show him how bad we’re hurting.
When I hear his feet retreat out of my room, my hand roams my head, feeling wetness.
My lips shake as I cry louder, knowing it’s blood.
Opening my eyes, I see my three pegged shelf with a carved heart in the middle, laying on the floor next to my bed.
I stay curled into myself, silently crying, praying to not wake in the morning.
Still, when I do, sadness envelopes me, as I force my beaten body out of my twin bed, feeling my hair and scalp dried with blood, my body bares bruises I can’t see, but feel as my hand roams over the welts all over my arms.
“Can’t you just do something for me for once?” I whisper out to God, hating him for allowing me to wake up once again.
I’m yanked out of my memory by yells coming down the street. Squinting my eyes, I watch a man waving his arms as he walks backward, yelling at someone. I can’t hear what he’s screaming, but by the looks of it, it isn’t friendly.
The other person runs toward the man walking backward. Their arm swings out and hits the man. I watch as he falls onto the broken concrete path.
I raise a bit higher in my seat to watch it all play out as the person kicks and screams at the man, then bends down, searches his pockets, turns, and runs away.
I wait, watching, but the man doesn’t move.
“Fuck,” I say to the empty cab as I open the driver's door, stepping out, pulling the hoodie over my head. Jogging toward the man on the ground, I stop when I get a look at him. My heart feels like it’s not beating anymore, as my stomach drops.
Laying there unconscious is David. Skinnier, grayer, and older.
I watch his stomach move up and down, thankful he’s still alive, because I want to be the one to take him out of this world, not some fucking junky.
I stand there. I could easily do it right now, but I want him to know what’s coming. That’s too easy for him and, fuck, for me too.
I scurry back when he starts moving, coming to, but I stop before closing the gap between us, bending down. “Your time is running out,” I whisper to him as he struggles to open his eyes before I turn around, leaving him lying on the ground where he belongs.
I want to get out of this town as fast as possible, and I do. Before I know it, the welcome sign is just a blimp in my rearview mirror, as I speed up, needing the comfort and peace of my home.
The last thing I thought when I went there was that I would get that close to David, but God is funny, I guess.
I rub my head where the scar from that night still sits.
It needed stitches, but I didn’t have money, nor could I have gone to the hospital.
I super-glued my wound shut while biting on a rag in my bedroom; the stinging is something I’ll never forget.
I make it back home in record time, surprised I didn’t get pulled over. I wanted as much distance as I could between me and that fucking town. The entire drive, the only thing I thought about was David’s demise.
It gives me joy that he’s still a piece of shit, living in his own hell, of his own making.
Once home, I feel like I can inhale deeply. The smell of the grass welcomes me, as well as Roxy’s wagging tail, who meets me on the front steps.