In the beginning I would go to sleep so exhausted that I didn't even dream. It was a relief really, for my mind to be simply blank for eight hours after so many years of waking in a cold sweat. Soon enough however they had returned, my body regulating itself to allow the nightmares back in.
I woke with my mother's banshee shrieks echoing in my mind. Screaming. At me? Probably. I had never heard her scream like that until the night I killed her husband. Not when he beat her, not when he went after me, not when he held a pillow over the baby's face when he cried for too long. Somehow, through all of it, it hurt her more to lose him than all the rest put together. She loved him, and not in that settled, tolerating way that often comes over a couple after many years, but really truly loved him, was willing to sacrifice everything for him. She was eighteen years older than me, and still, as a child, I already knew better than her, was the only one who was willing to stand up for the innocent baby who cried, who might not have survived my father the next time.
He was one of those men who was crazy, angry, drunk and violent in an unimpressive way- a small man with sneaky fists, with a wife who wouldn't even lift a hand to protect herself, let alone her innocent children. My mom had two kids that she couldn't take care of. I think there was another before me, another girl, but that baby hadn't lasted long. Lucky her. Needless to say, they never spoke of her. I found a photo once, with the name and the date written on the back. I didn't dare show it to either of my parents. I kept it hidden with my other prized possessions under a loose floorboard in the room I shared with the baby. Had to leave them all behind that night, even him. I wondered if they were still there after all these years. Maybe my little brother had discovered them, asked our mother about the sister, or sisters he had never known. Or maybe another family lived there, had laid new flooring and everything I had thought so precious was buried forever under hardwood floors or plush carpeting.
I assumed that it had been the nightmare that had woken me. Disoriented as I was, it took several long moments for me to notice the pretty Asian girl standing silently next to the head of my bed. This put me on the defensive for a moment, but I had seen her around, an older recruit, different than the others somehow, gentler, though you wouldn't guess it if you watched her fight.
"You have nightmares" she stated simply, as though she had strolled into my room for a chat.
"Who doesn't?" I asked, still irritated with her presence.
She shrugged. "Amanda wants to see you" she said coolly.
