by Jason Conley
“I wish I could graduate with my class but Carissa might do this again. If she can’t control herself, she needs to be in jail. I have to go ma’am. You were one of favorite teachers,” Destiny mustered a tear. “I am going to miss you,” she said hugging Mrs. Shelton.
“You just try to adjust to your new school and keep your grades up.”
“Bye, Mrs. Shelton,” Destiny waved, walking away.
“Bye, now.”
Mrs. Shelton gazed at Cole’s handsome frame realizing what was happening. Just as God had punished her for that night of extramarital fornication, he was punishing her for the act that she was participating in now. She knew it all too well. The tingling in her knees, the swagger, and the feeling that if Cole were not inside her she was surely going to die. Yes… she knew this feeling of lust. The same lust that had ruined her early twenties, had smashed any chance that she had had for her Masters, and not letting her have the time needed to do His work.
Mrs. Shelton needed to get home and save her son from the everlasting fires that were sure to engulf him if she did not change his ways. The ways passed down from the world, the ways that were past down from Mike. She knew, God knew, and soon David would know that the path was wrong.
“So, when should I call you?” Cole said.
“Never,” Mrs. Shelton replied, her voice stern. Cole was stunned.
“Well, then, it was nice meeting you,” Cole extended his hand, the gesture not returned. He looked at her hand, smiled, and pushed his buggy to the next isle of cars.
23
Mrs. Shelton pressed the accelerator; her tires spun leaving black tracks in the parking lot. Images of that little whore and her innocent son fornicating were all she could see. Demons are in that harlot and they want David, too. They cannot have him. He is not theirs! He will not be like Mike. She felt the heat of the Lord boiling in her chest.
Mrs. Shelton pulled into her drive almost hitting the house. She exploded through the front door nearly pulling it off its hinges. David listened from his room as she rifled through drawers. He heard the uncanny sound of the cold metal “rod” leaving its home. “David!” The walls echoed. “David!” Her voice cracked.
He stepped into the hall, “Yes, mother.” With “the rod” in hand, Mrs. Shelton stormed at David intent on punishment, intent on saving him, intent on releasing him. She pushed him back into his room. He balanced himself just as her first slap connected with his cheek. “Mother,” David said throwing up his hands to block another if it were to come.
“Aren’t I enough for you David? Is God enough for you?” She yelled inches from his face. He felt warm droplets of saliva splash against his now pursed upper lip. She pushed him to the ground. “I cook for you! I give you a house! And all you want is a little whore!” She held the word till her lungs ran out of push. “You think you can have it all. It doesn’t work that way. You either have me and God or you have a sinful existence with your little whore.”
“Mother, please,” David cried from the floor.
“Please what, David! You want me to save you from your sinful ways. You want me to burn for eternity. You want me to give up God so you can have some little fling with the town slut!”
“She’s not a whore!” David lifted himself from the floor. “I love her.”
“Love her?” The blade sliced long through David’s shirt ending with a deep gash in his skin. A thick, crimson stream began to flow. David closed his eyes convinced the end of the lashing would be his final breathe. Mrs. Shelton slashed with every word, “I… give… you… every… thing… and… teach you… about… the love… your… father… never… gave… and… you… just… want… to have… a little,” vertigo over took David, the floor catching his fall. “Whore,” Mrs. Shelton breathed heavy as she left the room.
David lay there unable to move and feeling the blood flow from his mangled torso. Cold over took him. Looking at his feet, Mrs. Shelton’s figure appeared in the doorway. Was this his mind playing tricks? She smiled at him. She held a white box and towel. He felt her kneel down beside him. She leaned close to his ear, “Do you really love her, David?” Her warm breathe splashed against his ear. The soft tone of her voice made David hope that she would understand.
“Yes, Mother,” David forced through his pale lips. The room vanished from David’s sight when the handle of “the rod” rapped his temple.
The cold sting of the alcohol being dumped on David’s chest pulled him back to the reality that he had momentarily escaped. “You love her! You love her! You just want to slip your little phallus into her. Oh, she would like that, too. That damned whore!” Mrs. Shelton shook the bottle until it slipped from her hands. “Lord, help me to keep teaching my son about your will,” she said raking the towel across his chest.
“Mother,” David groaned.
“Shut up!” Mrs. Shelton pulled a spool of sewing thread and a needle from the box. “I do everything for you, David. I cook, I clean, and all I ask of you is to be a good Christian boy,” she said as she threaded what he perceived as a stainless steel spike.
The first push of the needle broke through the flesh, clinching David’s body into an almost fetal position. Mrs. Shelton backhanded him knocking his head, again, to the floor. What little blood David had left was now flowing from his nose. The needle entered the raw flesh across the wound then back through again. She pulled the thread taut almost ripping it through David’s skin. She tied a knot and began the second of eighty-seven more stitches, David losing and regaining consciousness throughout.
David awoke to find himself, not surprisingly, alone. He forced his swollen eyes to look around the room. The towels Mrs. Shelton had used to wipe the blood from his chest were in a pile beside him. He did not know how long he had been out but the darkness and the quarter-moon light still stood high in his window. David’s stomach moaned for sustenance. He pushed himself up, and crossed his legs. He leaned forward resting his elbows on his knees and cupping his face, feeling crusted blood. Tingles surged from his chest then radiated through his body. His stomach wrenched. David tried to stand but he was far too weak.
He fell forward, his arms barely catching him. It took him almost an hour to crawl from his room to the kitchen. Once there, he was too tired to pick himself up to open the refrigerator door. He laid in-front of the icebox looking up at the white barrier that stood between him and living another day.
With her feet propped on the floor, arms wrapped around her knees, and her face buried in them, Carissa tried to fight through the pain and anger induced by the advent of her father’s lust. Her father had raped her. Carissa never fought back before but this time she had and lost. Maybe this was all she had, maybe all she would ever have.
Carissa sat glaring at the door. She was not sure what she was looking for. She knew he would not be back for more, at least not tonight. For now, she was as safe as she could be.
Carissa touched her stomach. She attempted to feel the life that was growing inside her. She wanted to know that this and everything she would face for the rest of her life would be worth the endurance of the tragic chain she would have to add links to as the road twisted just to keep from dragging. But sadly, the truth did not lie with a connection to a child that was only the size of a bean, at most. The truth lay dormant in some crevasse of strength in her soul that she would have to find.
Her abdomen wreathed. The pain spread to her legs and in an instant it was gone. Carissa rose slowly. She felt a warm stream trickle down her leg. Not bothering to dress, she walked out the door and to the bathroom. She wanted Randy to come out of his room; she wanted him to see what he had done. She reached through the shower curtain, turning both knobs to the setting she had used countless times before. Her stomach wrenched again, this time slightly longer and more intense. She stepped into the shower. She watched the white basin turn vermilion as the water rushed over her body. She washed every inch of flesh paying special attention to the areas Randy had touched. But no matter the amount
of soap or harshness of her scrub, the filth remained embedded. The vigor of every thrust could still be felt in her torn flesh.
David woke as the sun cracked the horizon. The hunger clenched his muscles. Small movements gave way to outstretched arms, to a grasp, and then to an open refrigerator. A pitcher half full of two day old sweet tea taunted him. He could hear his mother saying, “Do not drink from the container, David.” But she was not here and David did not give a good goddamn. He clasped the pitcher’s handle and pulled it to the edge of the shelf, weakened still. He propped his free arm palm open to catch the bottom of the pitcher just in case his strength gave way. His final pull left the shelf behind and the container’s bottom met with David’s open hand.
Holding the container, staring at the fluid swaying then cascading before him, he licked his dry lips. A surge overtook the weakness. Touching the spout to his mouth, the liquid washed across his taste buds, soaking his dehydrated mouth then washing down his throat, insides again clenching.
The tea was gone within a few large gulps, strength building. He watched as the emerging fog flowed from the bottom self and down to the floor. Condensation built on the crisper drawers. He noticed the cool escaping and dancing across his swollen wounds, soothing there burning tinge.
David ran his fingers through the condensate watching the droplets fall. He could see the green of an apple resting content in its red matted bag. He slid the drawer until it toppled from its seat. The bin fell to his side, scattering the contents on the linoleum floor. The first apple gently touched his fingertips as its brethren collided against David’s leg. He caressed the smooth green skin. His index finger touched the fruit’s hardened dead stem. He had never thought of something as simple as an apples texture, his appreciation had never given itself to analysis, but this apple was perfect, life giving. He clasped its cool flesh, bringing to his lips. The firm fruit smelled sweet and satisfying. He gave it a quick kiss then he sunk in his teeth. The juice ran down his chin as he uncontrollably devoured the fruit. Crunch after beautiful crunch, the sweetness grew, strength coming with it. After four apples and a half of a package of ham and cheese luncheon meat, David was able to rise from a sit to a shaking stand. Pins and needles overtook his hand as he pressed it against the freezer compartment door.
Carissa stepped from the basin and onto the bathroom floor. Her stomach had soothed as her period began. The blood was a darker red with heavier clumps than she was use to. She was sure the baby was gone.
Opening her bedroom door, she heard the saw of her father’s nose as he slept peacefully, fully without a care for what he had done. His pillow softly caressed his satisfied soul into a beautiful eclipse of the past and present, dancing in unison along the dreamscapes of his defiled escape.
Carissa’s anger, or what she thought was anger, guided her from the door to the closet to the bed, back to the door, down the hall, and out the front. The crisp windy night grazed her face, cheeks tightened. The stars littered the sky with bluish light. Her steps were brisk, still guiding her, not against her will. Each foot seemed to press deeper into the concrete, cacophonously driving her forward.
When her legs finally stopped moving she was in the space she had shown David only days before. The trees rustled as they had always in the night. Gusts increased the sounds of the trees damping the noise that chattered in her head. But this time was different. She felt it odd but something told her she was being watched. She passed the feeling off as wild thoughts brought on from the song of the coyote howls being carried by the passing winds.
David moved slowly from the freezer door, his strength gaining but still well below the threshold of what was needed to actually move for any meaningful time. He stumbled with an extra apple in one hand, a large glass of water in the other. He stopped to rest only several feet from where he started. A few deep breaths and a large swig later, he stepped into the hall, through the doorway of his room, placed the apple and water on the nightstand, then collapsed to his bed. Something told him he would be safe for now, something else told him to get the hell out and not come back. He embraced the first and drifted back into a semi-comatose state.
24
The sun shone through the leaves forming a beam of light and warmth on Carissa’s face. She woke almost surprised to find herself sleeping on the old chair in the woods. She rose to a sit and felt soreness spread through her tightened muscles. She stood and gave a long grunt as she stretched, feeling a rush of blood through her body. The cramping in her stomach had subsided. She opened her pants and examined the pad. It was almost soaked through but she did not seem to be bleeding heavy anymore. Carissa made her way through the woods and back onto the lonely Sunday street, the memories of the night before not quite letting go.
The final streetlamp flickered to its nocturnal end as the sun rose above the roof-top peaks. Carissa’s shoes tapped the asphalt as the birds started their morning song. A crisp breeze blew across her face. Closing her eyes, she inhaled the soft staleness of the still fall, not quite winter day. The coldish air stung her lungs. She let a soft breath out and smiled. As much as Carissa hated the nights, the daybreak brought to her the new life of a future not yet written. In the first rays of dawn, Carissa was not an outcast. She was not tainted. She was not her father’s whore. She was not a may or may not be-expecting abomination’s mother. She was Carissa. Carissa just…was…in the morning light.
Carissa walked through the streets aimless and disjointed. She made her way down blocks she had seen maybe once or twice in her life. Every house seemed new as she admired the way some shadowed gables crept sliding curves off the hard lines of other porch fascia in the yellow light.
Carissa looked into the open windows. It was not a spectacular sight. Nothing seemed different about this neighborhood from hers. Some had families milling in the front rooms, others had people putting their final touches on their ties, and then others were rushing to cars for church or breakfast she assumed. While the houses were prettier and the yards better kept and the cars different, they all seemed to have an every-other-Sunday-in-every-other-neighborhood air. Carissa wondered how many of these houses kept the remanence of a family. How many of these homes have killed their children’s future? How many of the houses held what Carissa has been left with? Not many.
Carissa was now watching her feet as she tried to get out the neighborhood as quick as possible. Even though she had only been in this neighborhood a few times, the street names were the same, only on a different side of town. She took the next left, turned right two blocks later, crossed a highway, and was back into the streets she had always known. It struck Carissa odd that only three blocks separated the two neighborhoods yet she still did not know anyone on the street. It’s probably better that way.
Carissa found herself standing once again in front of her home. Only this time, it felt different. Although she felt the tingles in her chest, she was not scared or excited. She felt no anticipation. She knew what she was going to find. She knew Casey was gone. Lea would not be watching television. Her father, well, she did not know what her father would be doing. She would not be telling him anything or confronting him so she was not nervous. She could not quite put a word to what she was experiencing.
With heavy breath, Carissa walked up the stairs. This time she did not pause. She did not consider squeaking steps or how fast she opened the door. She stepped into the living room, looked left and right, and then made her way through the hall and into her room. She heard Randy’s voice having what sounded to be a one way conversation just beyond his bedroom door. By the “But...hey…jus…na…b,” being uttered, Randy sounded as if he was on the wrong side of the one-way chat.
Carissa closed her door behind her. Not much had changed since the night before, except her comforter was on the floor. And…this did not feel like her room anymore. She knew with all certainty that she was in her room. Most of her clothes were in the floor. The bed she had slept on since she was twelve was there. Even most of Lea’s s
tuff was still there, but none this seemed to matter. Carissa’s night had changed her. It occurred to her this would never be her home again.
Carissa reached in her dresser and grabbed some clean underwear; she pulled a pair of pants from the closet and found a shirt from the floor that she was sure she could wear one more time. She held it by each arm stretching the sleeves wide so she could make sure there were no crusted spots. She tucked the clothes under her arms and headed for the bathroom.
Carissa took off her clothes and stood looking at her reflection. Her hair was a mess, she had red imprints on her back from the springs of the ratty clearing chairs, and small distinct bruises on her forearms. Fingerprints. The bruises were small, tender reminders of how much Randy cared. She wrapped her hand tight, as tight as she could get it, around her opposite wrist. The pain was there but not intense. She wiped her hand across her soft but disheveled face. Then she just stared into her own eyes. She was ashamed. She had let so much happen. She ran Casey off, she disappointed her father, she hit him, and she hurt her friends. She hated herself this morning. She hated everything she was and had been and will become. She hated Carissa. Estranged. Carissa found the word.
The warm shower relieved Carissa’s aching muscles for the time being. She bent at the waist and with a snap lunged her hair forward. She took a towel and wrapped it around her still sopping hair. She took another towel and dried her body. She slid her panties over her legs, her pants followed. She then grabbed her fresh bra. When she reached for the back clasp, her shoulders stiffened.
“Carissa,” she heard Randy at the door. Randy wrapped his knuckles twice again, hard. “Carissa.”
“Yes, daddy,” she said. There was no need to sound cute.
“You have a letter on your bed,” he was stern. “Three day suspension. I hope you’re happy. I have to meet with her father tomorrow to set up a payment schedule and beg that he doesn’t fucking sue us.” Randy stood at the door. He half waited for her to scream at him but knew she would not.