by Tara Sivec
I’m realizing right in this moment, as everything starts to finally fit together in my head, that Nolan is the only thing in my life that has ever made me feel calm and normal. I will never actually be normal, but he makes it easier to pretend, and I think I’m starting to like it.
Seeing the slow rise and fall of his chest allows me to expel the breath I was holding and I look back to the person in the doorway, aiming the beam of my flashlight in that direction.
“I can’t do this anymore, I can’t. It’s too much. I thought I could do it; I thought if I just acted like it never happened, I would forget, but I can’t. You’ve made it impossible for me to forget. Nolan already knows too much: if he finds out everything, it will all be over for both of us.”
My father sobs, his shoulders heaving as his arms drop and the board in his hands clatters to the ground. I watch him warily, having no idea what he’s talking about and not trusting him one bit. His arm reaches out to the side and he flips a switch I forgot was there, the small room suddenly exploding with light.
“There’s no point trying to go on with this charade any longer. It was a stupid idea and I should have known it wouldn’t work,” he tells me, his eyes darting around the room, refusing to look at me.
My frustration with him grows to epic proportions as he speaks to me with cryptic words—just like my mother did before she shot herself—instead of just spitting out what he needs to say.
“Once again, you’re not making any sense. Sober up and then maybe we can talk about all the secrets and lies I’ve started to remember that all revolve around you,” I inform him, my teeth clenched so tightly together I just might crack one in half.
“I haven’t had a drink since this morning,” he replies sadly. “I couldn’t take another drink after I watched Nolan drive you away in my car. I knew you had been in my office, and I knew you opened the safe. The file was put in backward and the papers inside were in the wrong order. I knew where you were going, and I knew it was only a matter of time before it would all come back to you.”
I look into his eyes and realize he’s telling the truth. Aside from his steady clear voice, when he’s not sniffling and choking back sobs, his eyes are no longer bloodshot. They’re bright and filled with unshed tears, but they’re clear and no longer glazed over with alcohol and grief.
“Your mother knew right away. I could see it in her eyes every time she looked at you, but she still went along with it because I asked her to. She always did whatever I asked because she knew everything that happened was because of her mistake. She would have done anything to take back that one lapse in judgment, that one moment of desire that she couldn’t fight, but you can’t reverse time and fix your mistakes. You just have to learn how to live with them.”
I scoff, shaking my head at him, wanting to pick up the board he dropped and smack him over the head so he’ll start to make sense.
“Obviously she never learned how to live with her mistakes since she put a gun in her mouth and took the easy way out,” I remind him.
He sobs even louder, the sound making me wince and want to cover my ears.
“I know you’ve started to remember the things I hoped would never come back to you. I knew it that day in your bedroom when you told me about secrets being hidden,” he tells me, taking a deep breath to try and stop the quivering in his voice. “I wanted to hate you so much… You stole everything from me and still, I can’t hate you. You couldn’t help what you did. We tried to fix you, but we only made it worse.”
An irritated laugh huffs out of my mouth and I shake my head at him in disgust. “Yes, I’ve started remembering things. Like Dr. Thomas and the things he did to me. Do you have any idea what I had to live through with him? And you gave me to him. I was five years old and you tossed me away to a sick, twisted man who got a smile on his face every time he hooked me up to the electric shock machines, stuck needles in my arms to pump me full of drugs and every other horrible thing you could possibly imagine. You wanted to hate me? I think I’m the one who deserves to feel all of the hate in the world for you and my mother.”
I toss the flashlight to the side since I no longer need it, realizing that as much as I would like to bash his head in with it, I’m still waiting for him to give me some information that I actually haven’t already figured out on my own.
“You still don’t remember everything, do you? Please God, remember. Don’t make me relive it all over again. It’s too much. Oh God, it hurts too much!” he wails pathetically.
“Don’t you DARE talk to me about pain!” I shout, cutting off his mournful cries. “I spent the last thirteen years of my life, day in and day out, subjected to more pain than you’ll ever know.”
“Oh God! Oh God, what did you do? WHAT DID YOU DO?!”
“I gave you what you deserve. I’m letting you know what real pain feels like. How do you like it? Does it make you want to die? Or does it make you want to kill, like it does me?”
I ignore the pounding in my skull, forcing the headache away because I don’t have time for it. After weeks of being confused and trying to ignore who I really was just to make my parents happy, living through nightmares and memories I refused to believe because they didn’t match the lies they told me, and learning things about my life that filled me with revulsion… knowing that it was because of them that I didn’t have any of those happy childhood memories I deserved, I want to enjoy every minute of my father finally being sober enough to listen to the things I want to say to him.
“It must be nice to have all of these happy memories and pictures to go along with them. I haven’t had a birthday party since I was five. Do you remember that party? Probably not. I remember it, though, even if there aren’t any photos. I guess what happened down at the lake kind of tainted the whole thing.”
My hand flies up to my head, and I press my fingers as hard as I can against my forehead to stop the pain.
The photos in the living room. All those photos of a happy, normal childhood. I was in each one of those photos. I’m in each of those moments frozen in time, but I never remembered being there, even though there was proof. I don’t understand. How could there be photos when I was sent away with Dr. Thomas? My childhood was filled with torture and pain, not birthdays and normalcy.
“You sent me away with Dr. Thomas when I was five,” I mumble, trying to make sense of the jumbled mess of thoughts in my head.
Everything that suddenly made sense a few moments before has now become a tornado of thoughts, swirling and twisting, flashing through my mind too quickly and all wrong, blowing away before I can grab them and make them right again.
“Yes, the day after your fifth birthday. I knew what happened at the lake was only the beginning,” he explains. “You had his eyes. Even though they were the same beautiful green as your mother’s, I could see it from the first moment I looked at you that they were empty and dead. Just like Tobias’s when he was little. I knew you’d grow up to be just like him if we didn’t do something.”
I squeeze my eyes closed and shake my head back and forth.
“I never grew up here. I lived with him for thirteen years. I never came back until a few weeks ago. How are there pictures? HOW DO YOU HAVE PICTURES OF ME?!” I scream.
I hear my father sob and I open my eyes to see his knees give out as he crumples to the floor. “You have to remember. PLEASE remember. Just end this once and for all. I can’t do this again!”
Backing away from him, I trip over Nolan’s legs, my hand smacking against the wall to stop me from falling. I continue moving until my back hits the wall and I sink to the floor, staring at my father with his head buried in his hands as he continues to cry.
“GET ME OUT OF HERE! Why are you doing this to me? I’ve been nothing but nice to you! Please don’t leave me down here—it’s filling with water! SOMEONE HELP ME!”
“No one can hear you scream. Just like no one ever heard me scream for thirteen years.”
I cry out as the pain in
my head gets worse and my hands tangle through my hair close to the scalp, tugging and pulling to make it stop.
“My name is Ravenna Duskin. I’m eighteen years old, and I live in a prison,” I whisper.
“STOP IT!” my father suddenly screams.
I glare at him, knowing I’m right back on the edge of that cliff. I thought I was falling before, but that was just a small jump. This time when I take that final step, I’m going to crash when I hit the bottom, breaking into a million pieces that will never fit back together.
“My name is Ravenna Duskin. I’m eighteen years old, and I live in a prison,” I say again, louder this time.
“STOP IT!” my father shouts once more. “REMEMBER, DAMN YOU! LOOK INSIDE THAT HOLE AND REMEMBER!”
I’ve always hated Tanner and Claudia Duskin. I hated them for giving me away and I hated how Dr. Thomas thought it was a treat for me to hear stories about them and their lives—lives that I’d been removed from. He taught me about the prison and he’s the one who told me about Tobias. I knew almost everything before I came back here, dead set on getting my revenge. My plan was in place but in order for it to work, I only needed to learn a few more things.
“Aren’t we finished with all the questions? I’m pretty sure you now know more about me than anyone else in the world.”
“You’re right. I think I know everything I need to about your life and the person you are. I think it’s time for that trip down to the basement that you promised me.”
No, no, no. This isn’t right. It can’t be. The walls of this prison aren’t just whispering the secrets they’ve hidden, they’re screaming the truth, and it’s bleeding out of them, dripping down the stones and covering the floor. I was wrong. The words I wrote in my journal were all wrong. The walls might have seen everything, but the truth that will destroy me is really buried in the floor.
“My name is Ravenna Duskin. I’m eighteen years old and…”
My voice trails off as my eyes slowly move away from the man who continues to sob a few feet away. They move across the stone floor at his feet until they stop at the edge of the hole.
“The men are coming tonight to fill this in. Oh God, what do I do? I can’t let them see this. They can’t come down here. I’ll just cover it up. I’ll cover it up and I’ll pretend like it never happened. It’s okay. Everything will be okay. Ravenna is fine and everything will be okay.”
I hear my father’s words so clearly in my head that I have to glance back at him to make sure he isn’t really speaking. I can still hear the thunder booming around the prison while he spoke like a madman, pacing around this room and making a plan I knew would never work. Ravenna would never be fine. Ravenna would never be okay and he only had himself to blame.
“My name is Ravenna…”
I can’t make the rest of the words come out. They won’t come out because my eyes have moved back to the edge of the hole. The hole that is no longer wide open and a danger to anyone who comes down here. I stare at the large piece of wood that covers it, knowing there was no point in my father covering it up. You can’t go back in time to fix your mistakes, just like he said. Throwing a cover over it and pretending like it never happened won’t make it so.
It happened. I made sure it happened and my plan was executed perfectly. I had no regrets, no remorse. It made me feel alive for the first time in my life.
“I see it in your eyes, little girl. I can feel it in the air. You like the way it makes you feel, don’t you? You need it just to breathe, and you want it just to feel alive.”
Leaning my body forward, I get on all fours and slowly crawl to the edge of the hole while my father’s cries get louder, his wails of grief echoing around the room like the ear-piercing sound of lambs being slaughtered. My heart beats faster and I feel something stirring inside of me. The last piece of the puzzle, it’s right here in front of me, and I have no choice but to grab it. I want to see. I need to see. I ran out into the woods in the middle of a thunderstorm because I knew he would kill me for what I’d done. He chased and he chased and he screamed and he almost did it, too.
“Oh God, Ravenna! My baby! My poor baby!” my father cries from behind me.
My hand presses against the edge of the wood and I slowly push it back, uncovering the hole inch by inch.
“I love you, Ravenna. I love you more than you could possibly imagine, and I’m so sorry. We’ll be together again soon. Wait for me.”
I hear my mother’s words to me the night she killed herself and I didn’t understand why she said we’d be together soon. It made no sense that she wanted me to wait for her in a place that she’d be going to first.
The wood scrapes against the stone floor as I continue moving it out of the way, refusing to look down until the last second, building the anticipation, letting the excitement grow until I’m ready to burst. If I lean forward any more I’ll fall in, so I give the wood one big, hard shove and watch it slide across the floor until it bumps into the wall on the other side of the room.
The hole is wide open now, just a large dark pit with dirt floors and dirt walls where they used to leave men to die. It’s a good place to hide secrets, but I’ve just proven that they never stay buried for long. The truth will always claw its way out, screaming to be heard.
“My name is…”
Sitting back on my knees at the edge of the hole, I hesitate before looking down, keeping my eyes on the wall across from me.
“LOOK, DAMMIT!” my father shrieks from behind me, his voice so shrill that it hurts my ears. “Stop repeating that nonsense and LOOK!”
I won’t let his voice anger me, not this time. I do as he says one last time, following his orders like a good girl, knowing that whatever happens next, it will be the last words he ever says to me.
My eyes move slowly down the wall, across the few feet of stone floor and over the edge of the hole. They move down, down, down, over almost eight decades of packed dirt, dirt that became so hard after the natural spring beneath it continuously filled it with water over the years, whenever there was a hard rain. It’s not hard enough, though, to prevent the scratches and claw marks I can see on the walls from fingernails that clawed so hard into the packed dirt that a few snapped off and are still stuck there.
“My nails are broken. Why is there dirt under them? Why are there scratches and bruises all over my arms? What happened? Why can’t I remember anything?”
“Shhhh, everything will be fine, Ravenna. You had an accident a few days ago, but everything will be fine. Just close your eyes and rest.”
The thunderstorm that night came at the perfect time. My plan included other more painful and gruesome ideas that I first started dreaming about when I was five years old, but this was for the best. It’s not my fault I had the excellent swimming skills and was never afraid of water. It’s almost laughable that something so refreshing and cleansing, and the one thing that could make my pain disappear during sporadic rewards for good behavior over the last thirteen years, became the catalyst for someone else’s pain and misery.
I failed when I was five and they sent me away.
I succeeded at eighteen, only to be chased out into the rain and hit over the head in the hopes that I would die for my sins, resolving them of theirs.
It’s a pity they had to learn the hard way that you can’t kill evil. Not with torture, not with guilt, not with lies…maybe it’s not something anyone can physically stop. Maybe it’s not something that can be bashed with a brick to the head, and it’s definitely not something that can be covered up with lies when that brick doesn’t get the job done, in the hopes that it won’t remember the truth.
Evil always remembers the truth.
I already know what my eyes are going to find when I get to the bottom of the hole. The tornado in my mind has suddenly ended, dropping all the pieces and parts, fragments of memories and bits of conversations into all the right slots, and I see everything now. I remember it all, and I finally have the answers to my questions.<
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It really is amazing how the mind works, and Dr. Beall was right. A person’s mind will stop her from remembering certain things until she’s ready. Until that shattered and broken mind is healed enough to finally see the truth and accept what they tried to make her forget.
I lean forward and I see.
Nothing will ever be the same again.
Nothing will ever be good again.
It will all be bad.
Bad.
Bad.
Bad.
“My name is…”
I stop in the middle of my sentence, forcing myself to hold the rest of the words in a little bit longer as my eyes come to a stop at the very bottom of the hole. Now that I can see, now that I can remember, I wait for the anticipation to build once again. When I say the truth out loud, I’ll finally be free and I want to savor the excitement.
I stare at the girl with the long black hair, forever pulled into a tight braid. My eyes move over the dress that will never again be a bright shade of pink but an ugly, dull brown caked with mud and forced to dry with stains and streaks left behind by the dirty water that filled the hole. I look into the wide-open green eyes that now look just like my real father’s, and mine—dead and empty.
“Do you see?” he whimpers behind me. “Do you finally remember what you did? RAVENNA! OH MY GOD, MY BABY! I LOVE YOU. I’M SO SORRY!”
He screams the name and his words of love as loud as he can and now I know he’s not talking about me. Just like my mother wasn’t talking about me when she apologized, told me she loved me, and begged for me to wait for her.
They never loved me. They never wanted me. It was all for her, the girl at the bottom of the hole, who got everything that should have been mine. She was the good one, and I was the bad one, and that’s how it would always be.
I failed when I was five and tried to drown her in the lake.
I succeeded at eighteen and finally got my revenge.