My mouth waters and my throat bobs, so I lean over the toilet and gag some more. I feel dirty. So dirty, I’m not sure I’ll ever be clean again.
I lean my forehead against the rim of the toilet and try to breathe past the sick feeling still in my stomach.
Trouble’s going to kill me tomorrow. I know it, and I won’t do anything to stop him. I’ll find him and show him that I won’t fight him. He can do whatever he wants to me. I deserve the worst possible thing he can think of. JW and J
udge will help, which will make it easier for Trouble. Me and my brothers love each other and would do anything for each other. It’s going to hurt Trouble to have to hurt me, but I hurt his sister.
Thinking about Rella and what I was forced to do to her tonight has my empty stomach rumbling again. Tears and sweat splash in the toilet as I choke on air. I know I hurt her. I saw the blood.
Out of all the times my father has put his penis in me, it has never hurt so much as when I was forced to do the same to Rella. I fought him so hard. I screamed, I kicked, I punched, but it was never enough. In the end, it was my father’s voice in my ear that made me stop and do what I was told.
“Either you take her, Aziah, or I will, and the pain she’ll feel from me will be fifty times worse than I’ve ever given you.”
After that, I looked at Rella, her small body, the tears leaking down her cheeks, the fear in her eyes, and I knew I couldn’t let my father touch her like that. I knew he would hurt her too much. She was so small compared to him. He’d be too big for her. He’d damage her.
As much as it hurt me to look at her as I did the most horrible thing I’ve ever done, I wanted Rella to see how much I hated it. I wanted her to know I was hurting with her. I wanted her to know she wasn’t alone.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered through my scratchy throat.
It hurt even worse when her head bobbed up and down. She fought in the beginning when she realized what was going to happen, but when she saw me step up to her, she quieted down. Rella and I were a year apart. Her brother was my brother, so she was my sister. We all played together, along with JW and Judge. We were close and we trusted each other. I’ve known Rella my whole life. To hurt her in such a way shredded something inside me. To see the trust in her eyes as I was made to lie over her small body tore my chest wide open.
We both cried the entire time, but we never stopped looking at each other. I repeated my apology over and over again, knowing my words would never be enough, but each time she accepted them.
I push away from the toilet and get to my feet. My legs shake so much I have to hold on to the sink so I don’t fall. My reflection in the mirror catches my attention. I look as white as a ghost, except around my eyes. They have dark rings around them. My eyeballs have several dark-red splotches, like there’s blood in them. I wonder if it’s from all the screaming I did in The Hall or from puking so hard. I look like someone who died. I feel like I should be dead.
I curl my fingers around the edge of the counter of the sink, then jerk my hand back when something sharp stabs my hand. Dropping my eyes, I notice a nail sticking out of the wood just underneath the lip of the counter. I glance at my hand and see a small pool of blood gathering in my palm. I curl my fingers into a fist and the blood seeps out between them, dripping into the sink. The sting gets worse the more I squeeze. Opening my palm, I stare at the small nick from the nail for a long time. It still hurts, but the pain is fading.
A thought comes to mind.
I open the cabinet under the sink and grab what I’m looking for. Turning the shower on to hot, I take off my clothes and put them in the trash can, then walk underneath the spray. As soon as the water hits me, I hiss out a breath at the burn, but it feels oddly good. Putting what I grabbed on the shelf of the shower, I grab the washrag hanging on the hook, rub the bar of soap over it until it’s really sudsy, and start scrubbing my body. I scrub until my skin is red and hurting, but it still doesn’t make the nasty feeling go away.
My eyes lock on the old-fashioned razor blade I stole from my dad several months ago and stashed under the sink. The metal sparkles under the light in the shower, like it’s beckoning me. I give into the need and flip it open, revealing the sharp edge.
I press the razor against the inside of my upper arm, right above my elbow. I don’t want to kill myself, I just want to see what the pain feels like. To see if it’ll hurt worse than the pain I went through tonight. I felt something when the nail stabbed my hand. It didn’t take away the pain of what I did to Rella, but it distracted me for a moment. What if I did something worse, went deeper?
I never want to forget what I did, it’ll help build the rage I feel for my father. It’ll give me the strength and courage to kill him when the time is right. I just need something to help ease it, if only for a moment, so I can keep focused.
Blood immediately appears when the razor sinks into my skin, and a strange feeling fills me. It’s almost like relief, but not quite. Satisfaction, maybe.
It stings, but it feels good too, because it makes me think about that instead of the horror of tonight.
My eyes track the line of blood rolling down my arm. I made sure I didn’t go too deep and didn’t make a long cut. I lean back against the shower and close my eyes. This pain isn’t fading like it did when the nail stabbed me, which is what I was hoping for.
I slide down until I’m sitting on the floor and drop the razor blade beside me. The water beats down at my feet, and there’s a line of red rushing toward the drain.
Leaning my head back against the wall, I stare up at the ceiling until the water runs cold.
CHAPTER SEVEN
RELLA
THE NEXT DAY, I SIT ACROSS from the only friend I’ve had in the past twenty-four years. Layla never knew how much her friendship helped me, especially after Deanna and Mick died. I didn’t tell her of my childhood or why I still lived with “my parents.” She knew very little of the truth because I was scared if I opened up, I wouldn’t stop and the whole story would come out. If that happened, I have no doubt she would have gone to Trouble. As much as I missed my brother, it was better for both of us for me to stay away. I wouldn’t have been able to handle coming back here then.
“I’m so sorry I lied to you,” I say after finally telling Layla who I am and how we became friends.
Tears swim in her eyes, but she wipes them away before they can fall. She shakes her head. “I always knew there was more to the story than you gave me, but I never imagined you were Trouble’s little sister. It’s still hard to believe.”
Lacing my fingers together, I press them against my thighs. “I didn’t want you to know because it would have been too hard on everyone involved.”