Darkest Day
The room around her shifted like a mirage. She could only focus on the large boots that stood by her face. A harsh, growling laugh grated in her ears and she bit back a scream of terror. Her throat convulsed and her eyes burned with the effort of holding back the hot tears that pushed behind her eyes. A violent bruise across her cheekbone accented the purple of her eyes and the blood matted in her white-blonde hair looked fake it was so bright.
"Daddy? Wh-why are you doing this to me?" Her small voice shook with emotion that she tried futilely to conceal. "I- I thought you loved me?" She chanced a look at the looming figure above her. His dark-bearded face dipped closer to her small shape. A twisted sneer pulled his lips away from his yellowed teeth and she pushed herself away from him. The bare skin, which showed through massive rips in her shirt, hit the wall and his gloved hands wrapped gently around her neck. He yanked her up and slammed her against the wall.
"Do you not see how I show my love for you child?" He turned and hurled her small frame to the ground. She lay there stunned for a moment. But when he started coming towards her, her broken fingers scrabbled uselessly against the hard wood floor as she tried to pull herself away from the man she called father. He overcame her and pushed her face to the floor. Her pitiful screams and begging fell on deaf ears as her skirt was ripped from her hips.
When the man was done he stood and brushed himself off, sweeping out of the room. She whimpered softly, her whole body aching. Her blood congealed on the floor before she managed to push herself onto all fours. She moved forward a few steps before she was hit with a crippling wave of nausea. Shaking like a leaf the child vomits until she is dry heaving. Gasping for air she pulls herself up against the doorframe, leaning heavily on the walls in the corridor she wills herself into her room where she collapses on the thick carpet. She doesn't make a sound. No whimpers come from her lips and no tears from her eyes. She has nothing left inside, no energy to scream for help and no one to hear her even if she could. Darkness creeps steadily into her mind until it consumes her and she is no more
"Vanke!" The voice is shrill. It rips the darkness away the way he ripped away her clothes. She wants to tell the voice to leave, to allow the darkness to cover her. But all she can manage is a raspy moan. "Vanke what happened?" A soft hand touches to her wounds but all she can feel is his harsh grasp. Though her voice is scratchy and breathy she begs the person to stop. To leave her alone, and not touch her.
"Vanya. Please." That voice was lower. It did not tear away the darkness but it swirled around her the way his did. With what little voice she has she screams at them all to stop. There is nothing they can do for her but leave her to die. Yet they don't. Hands lift her up, water around her. Cloth touched her and the smell of alcohol reached her nose as it brought fire to her skin where he drew blood. A soft hiccupy sound finally freed her from the dark clutches of her mind. A soft white nightgown covered her and her hair was clean and braided in a long cord that pooled by her head. She pushed her torso off the bed and looked across the room to where her older sister sat on the window seat and stared out at the snow-covered garden.
"Kat?" The girl at the window stiffened and swiped her sleeve across her face before tuning to face her. "Kat." Her voice broke and she softly sobbed. "It hurts." The older girl made her way to her sister and wrapped her in a tight hug.
"I know Vanke. I know. Shh, shh. " The older girl wriggled out of the hug and stepped over to her own bed. She reached under the pillow and pulled out a long crème scarf. When she sat back down beside her sister she gently touched the bruise on her face than wrapped the warm scarf around her sister. Leaving a long bit to trail behind her.
The small nation in her arms wailed desperately, his stutter becoming more and more pronounced with each word. He was pouring out his pain and she was comforting him.
"Rape. . ." That one word slammed into her like a wrecking ball and a slice of pain shot through her. The darkness that she long ago learned to fear pushed in on the edges of her mind. The feeling of him above her, holding her down and saying he loved her. The memories came unbidden. Slashing at her sanity. With a guttural cry she pushed away from her friend. She backed away, her head in her hands. Her back collided with the wall and she slid to the ground. A broken mix of a sob and a laugh boiled up from her stomach and she sat on the ground, grinning like a Cheshire cat while tears ran down her face.
"Never again daddy. Never again. You said you were showing me love!" Her words broke and a high-pitched scream of laughter burst through her lips. The sound was like nails on a chalkboard and it cut off with a rasping noise that started like a moan and ended in a horrified scream that echoed off the walls.