Melancholy
The sound of the rustling waves echoed in my ears and the cold wind passed itself harshly on my weak body. My body felt numb and sore. The pain was all over; physical and emotional. Silent tears ran down from my eyes again as if it could relieve the pain I was feeling. It was tormenting to look back on my horrible life. I couldn't believe that I had led such vile existence. There was no more hope.
At the age of twenty-two, I had agreed to marry Charles Evenson, due to my father's insistent pressure. I was hoping that someday I could love him. Yet I didn't have the chance to do so. I had pleased both of my parents who were long since convincing me to become attached to this man. He was a gentleman as the courtship went on, but deep inside my heart, I knew that no man could measure up to the compassionate man I had adored six years back.
After we got married, the unpleasant truth had slapped me right into my face. Charles Evenson was a horrible man. A monster. He abused me, degraded my own self, and brutalized me until I couldn't take it anymore. I went back home to my parents; away from my dehumanizing husband, away from anything related to him. But they didn't listen.
My mother told me that I shan't be complaining about how Charles had treated me. That was a part of being a good wife. She told me to stay with him and be quiet. I was distressed about how my parents reacted. They really didn't even have a slight concern about me. Charles was beating the living daylights out of me and my parents had nothing to do about it.
For an agonizing period of time, I had endured the physical and emotional pain Charles had inflicted on me. I didn't thought that one day I could breathe freely again until the World War I erupted and he was sent to fight overseas. It wasn't a long term relief for me because he was eventually gone back at the year of 1919. I thought he would change positively but he had gotten much worse after what the war had imposed on him.
I unwillingly got pregnant on the months that followed. The child was not formed out of love; he was formed because Charles had forced himself upon me. After I found out about this fact, I knew that enough was enough and that I should escape from this monster. I wouldn't risk my child. He was the only thing that had taken hold on my dear life. Eventually, I took refuge from the home of my second cousin but the news had spread so fast about my whereabouts that my parents instantly knew where I was.
I ran away again, hoping that I could find a place where there would be no one to recognize me, a place where there were no Charles Evenson and Mr. and Mrs. Platt. I had succumbed to my escape until I found myself living in Ashland, Wisconsin. I had supported myself and my unborn child by working as a school teacher. Everyone there thought that I was a war widow. Gladness had filled my heart even for just a brief period of time because no one there was trying to take me back to the hell of a home I've got.
It wasn't long until I had born my child, my son. I was twenty-six. Grief had stricken me when he died a few days later due to a lung infection. That was the time when I felt that the world had long left me. Everything that I've got was lost. My son, who was the most precious thing in the world, didn't even have the time to open his little eyes. There was nothing worth to live for. I was hopeless.
I had lost the will to live.
And now I found myself standing on the edge of the cliff. The sound of the ocean waves and the wind had filled my hearing again. The tears on my cheeks were cold as it started to subside. So this was how cruel life really was. By the next sound of the wave, I took a deep breath; filling my lungs fully. I did in order to smell the salty scent of the waters and feel the soil beneath my feet. This would be my last moment.
I took a step forward and flung myself off the cliff, letting myself feel the wind and the gravity pulling me. It was like a déjà vu.
I closed my eyes, filling my head with the images of my past. There were only two things that ran through my memories. First, was my free-spirited childhood. And the second was, unbelievable and unexpected as it was, lasted much longer than the first.
It was the image of a certain doctor who had treated me with all his heart and he was smiling warmly at me. I felt calmer. The speed of my downfall had gotten faster and eventually, I felt my body collided with the earth.
I knew then that I was going to die.
There was a commotion but I didn't know exactly what was happening. I felt being lifted and tugged. In the farthest corner of my mind, I knew that there was someone near me and everything became silent.
That was when I first felt the agonizing burn of hell.
