I was seven when I was killed. Only seven. A stupid age to die. I always wanted to live to be a hundred and five, but I knew that wasn't going to happen. But I never wanted to go this way.
My dad was always drinking. I don't think I had ever seen him without a beer bottle in his hand, full or empty. I never cared. My mum never drank, and she and I did everything together. Dad never hurt anybody, and he was always there when I really needed him. His breath was never fresh, but I though that is just how every dad's breathe smelt like. Peanuts and beer.
We lived in a small house, surrounded by trees, far out from the city. Mum said she loved connecting with nature, and I learned to do the same. I never liked watching television, and books where never an interest of mine. The woods where my life and I could climb every single tree there was to see. I had picnics with my dolls out in the forest and at nights, sometimes when my mother wasn't tried, we would sleep out in a tent, and giggle ourselves to sleep.
Ilana means great tree. My mother named me it even before I was born. It suited me perfectly. Through my whole life.
Which, go figure, didn't last quite as long as we all expected it too.
I was playing outdoors with my friend, Juliann. My dad had promised to drive her home. But I knew that when Daddy drunk, it was not safe to drive.
"Daddy, I think Juliann should just stay here for a while. You're not fit to get into the car." I notified my red faced father. I felt smarter then I really should have been, but I knew a lot for my age, and didn't want to hold it all in.
"I think I know when I am fit to drive and when I am not, thank you miss." He hissed at me, taking another sip from his beer.
"Beer's a sin, daddy. I told you that. Stop drinking." I sat down, is skirt getting caught in my feet.
"Don't, little miss." My dad got beat red in the face, and I backed away. Juliann told me she wasn't sure about going home; she didn't know my father was drink. She just though he was mad at her. I told her he was only mad at me, not her. She shrugged and got her bag.
I had never seen my father so wildly drunk before. My mother was out in the woods, taking our dog Sammie for a walk. She said that when dad got drunk like this, to call for her. I went out to the back steps of the house and screamed
"Mother! Daddy's really drunk."
I figured later that was the wrong thing to do. I felt a hand grab my shoulder and push me back inside.
"Daddy…" I stumbled back into Juliann, who was sobbing.
"Get in the car." My father was as anger as a mob of bees. I took a step away from him.
"No dad." I stood up for Juliann as best as I could.
My father did something I could never imagine him doing, ever. He growled, went over to me, and picked me up around the waist. I began to cry out, and punch him several times in the side. He didn't let go. My father was never an average weight man. But he was never considered to me, overweight. But when he picked me up, I thought he was the strongest man in the world.
"Dad put me down!"
He didn't listen to me. He began walking to the car. The keys rattled in his left hand, as he held me in his right.
My mother came in next, caught by my shrills and screams, from before and after. She saw my father almost at the car, and she left out an ear piecing scream.
"My holy lord!" She wailed, running out the front door, which my father had left wide open. He began shoving me in the back seat.
"Mary, this girl," My father slammed the door, his words slurring, "Needs to lean a lesson. "
"Dick, you get back here. You do not take our daughter out when you are in this state!"
I thought my mother was talking about the way my father was dressed. Baggy jeans, fly undone, and a halve buttoned up striped green shirt.
"Mother!" I pounded threw the window. I didn't think about opening the door. I felt as thought I was endlessly trapped, and could never even imagine to escape.
My mother began to run towards the car, but my father locked the doors as she grabbed on to the passenger seat door. She began pounding on the windows as my father starred the engine, I was so scared, and I couldn't catch my breath. I stared up at the front door, and my friend, who was so unsure of what was going on, was pale and sobbing. I only thought about her, not about the condition I was in. My father put his foot on the execrator. He car speed forwards, toughing me forwards and my mother away form the car. My father and I had both forgot our seat beats.
The radio blasted on, and my father didn't bother to turn it down.
The speeds my father reached where unimaginable for me. My mother, the only one who I ever got in the car with, only drove at a reasonable 60 miles per hour even on the endless empty roads that took us form our house to the city.
But today there where quite a few cars on the road. It was Sunday evening and I wondered where they where all going.
My crying was just an endless noise, droning in with the loud music and the hum of the speed of the car. My father pressed his hand on the horn as she passed a slow old lady, who was going the average 70 miles per hour. She gave him a stern look, but thought nothing of it. My father just barley missed another car coming form the opposite side of the road. It honked swerved to miss my father. We made it. I was sobbing more loudly then the music now.
"Shut up, little miss." My father screamed, his eyes leaving the road, and he swerved, but quickly rejoined his posture and continued driving at high speeds. The next car we tried to pass was when we where hit. My father began to pass this couple, who looked like they where singing together form a song that was on the radio. He screamed at them and the man put up his middle finger. My father was driving right next to the couple. I saw the car coming, but my father did not. I screamed for him to turn, but his eyes where fixed on the man beside him. The impact of the crash sent me flying into the windshield. The glass shattered threw my skin and I screamed, but that only filled my mouth with more sharp objects.
That was all I could remember. Nothing else.