Title: Just life
Author: Mapiya Huyana
Rating: T (due to theme)
Warnings: Rape, suicidal thoughts
Genre: Tragedy, Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Romance
Disclaimer: Nothing is mine.
Author's Note: Okay. I'm very - and I mean very - unsure about this. This is not that kind of story what I usually write but I got an idea about this and I wanted to give it a try. I publish this my eyes tightly closed so I'll need your honest opinion more than ever. This is only the prolog and actual chapters would be longer ones. If someone wants to start to be a beta reader for this story, I'll be happy. :) Now I'm gonna go to my secret hiding place so you can't hang me if you don't like this.
Prolog
A big city will never sleep. Someone will always be wide awake and walks down the streets of Sacramento no matter how dark it is. Especially on the weekends. Every Friday night the cabs will drive around the city because people want to get from place to another in order to find a better place to drink more alcohol. Once they are drunk, they will sing and start a fight; they will drink more and go to home after the sun will rise early on the Saturday morning. Everyone knows that it is a thing that belongs to the Friday nights. Everyone are so accustomed that they don't even notice when a new fight is about to start. No one looks at you twice no matter where you are or what time is it.
Everyone who knows even a little bit about this city also knows where you don't want to be at Friday night. Like in every other big city, Sacramento also has its dark side. The worse side where the fights contain the guns and singing is changed to screaming for a help. Every city has a neighborhood like that so it's nothing special. Everyone in this city knows that this particular area on the west side of the city isn't the best neighborhood in Sacramento. There are many dark alleys and streetlights doesn't work so well as everyone hopes. There are gang fights, guns and a lot of more bad things and still, there are no cops. It's like no one cares what happens in there. No one really does want to know what have happened in there. If you don't know, it's not your problem. If you just forget the gunshots that you have heard and the fights that you have seen, you're not in the trouble.
So no, this is not the dream neighborhood to live your life and still many people lives in here. It's not like they want to live in here. It's more like they don't have a choice. Living in here is so much cheaper than in the heart of the city that if you don't make much money in a month, this neighborhood may be your only chance to get a shelter.
The street which has no official name – everyone calls it with a different name and no one knows which one the right one is – is pretty quiet now. It's Friday but there are no fight or gunshots to be heard. Not even a single footstep breaks the silence. For once this street is like any other in the better side of the city. Only the streetlights don't work that well what makes the street more dark and threatening. A full moon illuminates the street of its silver light and makes shadows darker and longer than streetlights would make.
Suddenly the movement disturbs the peace in here and makes the street alive again. A dark clothed man steps to the street from dark alley. He smiles a little but there's nothing good in his smile. The glow in his dark brown eyes doesn't promise anything good. He carries a gun and probably a knife too. He doesn't scare to use them. He is one of those. He is the man who is like an animal and takes what he wants, no matter what it does to the others around him. He is the only one human being who is walking down the street and nobody pays attention to him. There are no movements in the windows of the houses – no one is watching. But why should they? They wouldn't see him well because he avoids the streetlights when he walks away - but yet it's nothing suspicious in this kind of neighborhood. He doesn't want to be seen.
The man disappears soon and the silence falls down again before a quiet bang is heard. After that there is a moment of silence before a hissed curse cuts the air. And the silence falls again. Couple minutes passes without another sound of a life and then, footsteps are heard. Human footsteps which are slow and uncertain but they are steps nevertheless.
A woman, probably something near forties, steps to the street. Her eyes are looking on the ground, her hands are in fists and tears are running down on her pale cheeks. She closes her eyes in order to calm down and stop crying. She leans to the wall behind her and tries to stand straight without success. Her feet don't carry her so well and she needs to sit down on the ground for a moment. She buries her face to her hands and sits knees against her chest. She doesn't sob but you can see the tears running down on the cheeks. She opens her green eyes after a while. There are more tears burning in those green eyes just waiting for their time to run down on a pale cheek.
She tries to get up from the ground. She has to try it many times but eventually she can make it. Her feet don't look stable and she has to lean on the wall but she is standing on her own feet. She concentrates on breathing by calculating in and out and in and out and... Slowly she begins to calm down. Her body isn't shaking anymore and she stands stable. She steps a little step forward but still leans on the wall. She feels more self-confident after her little step so she takes another. She is walking slowly next to the wall but she is walking nevertheless.
She steps into the spotlight of the streetlight. Her dark hair is pretty badly messed up and her clothes are dirty and ripped up. Her sweatshirt is supposed to be white but right now it's more like grey with dark red dots. Her sweatpants are as dirty as the sweatshirt is or maybe even dirtier. She is wearing running shoes. Just by looking at her clothing you can tell that she has been jogging. But the light reveals that she isn't alright and something has gone terribly wrong.
By knowing the neighborhood and remembering the man who showed up earlier, you can make a pretty good guess that the woman's condition has something to do with the man. But look at her – she doesn't look like a dead person. She hasn't been shot or stabbed. So… there's only one good guess left.
She has been raped.
She winces when another human being appears on the other end of the street. She quickly straightens up and walks with a little faster like she would know exactly where she is going and everything would be okay and so on. She keeps her eyes locked on the ground when the stranger passes by, without looking at her twice. She walks to the end of the street and turns to another street without looking back. At the crossroad she raises her eyes off the ground to look around in order to find a shortest way to home. That's when you can see her face and recognize her. Dark brown hair, green eyes, pale skin and petite body…
She is also known as a Senior Agent Teresa Lisbon.
A/N: ... I'm not sure should I poke my head out of my secret hiding place but I'm gonna do it, so I can ask your opinion about this story. In case you didn't get it yet - I'm very unsure and I don't know should I continue this or not. It depends on you so please, pretty please, tell me what do you think.