by Cerys du Lys
Angeline panics. It hurts to watch. Her eyes widen and she scrambles to the floor, laying there like a lifeless doll, like I've just fucked her and she's got to lay still like she does for all the rest of them.
"Calm the fuck down!" I scream. Yeah, I actually said fuck. I think I did, at least. Maybe that was a first. I don't know why the fuck I waited so long. Fuck it.
"I'll be out in a second," I add. "Just finishing up."
"Man, you've got some serious fucking stamina," one of the guys says. "I don't know how you do it."
Another one shouts through the door like he's super fucking proud of me. "Fill her up, Noah! Give her your sin!"
That's a fucking laugh. I want to slap the fuck out of him. Shut up, you idiot. I'm doing important shit here.
Before I go, I crawl across the floor to whisper into her ear.
"I'm sorry," I say.
She turns to me, confused. "Why?"
"I wish I could help you more. I'm trying."
She smiles. We're really close. Like, close close. Really fucking close. If I move forward just a little bit, we'd be kissing, that's how close we are. I almost do. I think maybe she almost does, too. I may be imagining that.
We don't kiss.
"Do not be sorry," she says. "You are helping me."
I don't know if that's true. Sounds like a huge fucking joke to me. Helping? I'm leaving, love. I'm gone. I'm about to go. I stand up and do just that. I look over my shoulder before I unlock the door and see the most beautiful fucking girl in the world, the most beautiful girl I've seen in my entire life.
She's not naked, she's dressed in sunshine and heaven. The light from a nearby window covers her body, wrapping around her perfectly.
I unlock the door, open it, and leave. I don't know what the fuck is wrong with me.
*** Angeline
Noah leaves. He comes and then he leaves. This happens every day. Most of the time when he is here, they are here, too. They hurt me, they use me, they force themselves on me. I am killed, but I am not allowed to die. I am made to live so that they may do it again. Perhaps they will do it tomorrow, or the next day. Perhaps they will wait a week or longer, but I do not doubt that there will be more.
Pain is a constant, thrumming thing; my sole reason for existence. When I am with Noah, it is different, but...
Noah leaves. He comes and then he leaves.
I do not want Noah to leave, but what else do I wish for him to do? There is nothing he can do for me. I know this and I understand it.
This is not true, and I know this, but I think about it often. Here is what I think:
In the beginning, there was nothing. I am not able to fully remember the life I lived before coming here. I do not know if it is because of the accident, or because of what happened afterwards, but it is like a dream to me. I believe I must have had parents, and I remember their faces and what they looked like, but I do not understand how it is possible for them to have existed. They do not seem real anymore.
And so, in the beginning, there was nothing. I came, he took my medicine, and I hurt. I felt pain for a very long time. He forced me to work until I bled for him, and he did not let me stop until I lapsed into unconsciousness from physical exertion.
When I finally grew accustomed to the pain, he gave me more. He forced himself onto me one day. When I had fallen into a fitful slumber, if one wishes to refer to it as such, he slapped me awake. In my groggy state, he claimed my body as his. It is difficult to remember, also like a dream. I would not remember it happening, or not precisely, except that it happened again. More. It hurt. Why? Why is this punishment necessary? What did I do?
You must deal with the consequences of your actions, he told me. I do not know what actions I took that required consequences, except I realized it one day. It struck me so suddenly and strongly that I knew it must be true.
I must deal with the consequences of my actions, and the action I have taken which requires consequences is my very existence. I should not be alive. I am dead, he says. You are already dead.
I do not want to be dead. I wish to live. That is my sin. That is what I must pay penance for.
More came. People I knew. The boys I attended school with. They arrive and they begin to punish me, too. It is not enough. Nothing is ever enough. My existence requires an extreme amount of punishment.
Even then, it is not enough. I am hurt; every part of me is hurt. The first time he drowned me, I thought that was it. I did not wish to die, but I thought that was it. I am gone now. Goodbye. I am sorry.
I returned to life, though. It hurt. Having that happen to you is one of the most horrifying things I can think of. It is still terrifying to me. When I kill, if I kill, I do not want you to come back. I do not want to hurt you like that. I do not want you to hurt others, but I do not want to hurt you, either. I am sorry.
While I struggled to fight against him one day, he tells me something different.
"I am doing this for your own good, Angel," he says. The way he says it makes me believe him. I do not want to believe him, but I do. I am not good. I am bad. I am already dead, so nothing he does to me should matter, but a small part of me rebels and rejects this ideology.
"I am doing this for your own good. You were placed back on this mortal coil in order to repent for your sins. This is what you were meant to do. I'm punishing you because you can't be trusted to punish yourself. You don't even understand why you need to be punished, do you?"
It is true. I do not understand. Is he doing a good thing, then? If he is, why does it hurt so much?
Some of this changed when Noah arrived. It hurt, but in a different way. I love Noah. I do not know if I am supposed to love Noah, but I do. I wait for him. When I see him, I can do more. I can be stronger. Perhaps that is good. I begin to think it is, because it means I am able to persevere through more. I am able to feel more pain, and I am able to accept it, because Noah is there. He is only a few feet away. I can reach for him... I can stretch my arm and curl my fingers and grasp at the image of Noah.
He is watching me. I feel safe. I do not know how I feel safe, but I do.
Noah leaves, though. He comes and then he leaves. Sometimes we are alone, and I like those times. Noah brings me food. I try to be polite with him. Hello, thank you, Noah, thank you for the food. Thank you.
I try to be patient and kind and act like a lady, because that is what Noah deserves. He does not make me do this, though. He lets me eat fast and without regard to etiquette or propriety. I do not mean to eat the entirety of what he gives me, napkin and all, but a napkin soaked in room temperature jam tastes better than air, void, and nothingness.
We talk. I love Noah. Noah, do you know that I love you? I do not tell him this.
Love is selfish. It is not for me. I am being punished for being selfish.
Still, I love. I am sorry. Please, forgive me...
I cannot do this anymore. I do not tell Noah, but I cannot. It is not for me, it is for him. I am bad. I am sorry, Noah, but I am bad. I am being punished. I do not know what I did.
One day he tells me he will not be able to return for a little while. How long is a little while? He struggles to say it, but eventually he does.
"I need to help out around the house. I tried to get out of it, but it's hard now. My family's struggling really bad," he says.
I nod. I do not wish for his family to struggle. Go, Noah. Help them. Be kind. You are a good person, Noah.
He leaves. I stay.
That night when I am alone, confined to the basement, I begin. I no longer need chains to keep me in place. Where shall I go if I escape? I do not have anything. I know nothing. I am no one. I am being punished.
I punish myself. This is not a punishment, though, because my intent in punishing myself is to kill myself.
I do not have weapons or anything with which to do a good job of it. I do not have water that I can drown myself in. I do not have whips or chains or hard-toed boots to flail and kick myself with.
Those are the weapons of others.
I only have myself.
I scratch at the underside of my arms. I am bruised and battered and it hurts, but I continue until I bleed. I keep scratching. I scratch and I bleed and I hope that it is enough. How much blood is in my body? How much do I need to get rid of before there is not enough and I die? How long will this take?
It does not happen. I pass out before I am allowed to bleed enough to kill myself. In the morning, I awake in a dried puddle of my own blood while someone kicks my sides and curses at me.
I am unholy. I am an abomination. To act like this in a House of God is beyond despicable. He grabs my hair and pulls me to my feet, then drags me out of the basement. When we reach the top of the stairs, he pulls me towards the entryway of the church and slams me into a pew. I sit there, discarded and dejected.
He locks the doors of the church and returns for me. He brings me to his private quarters. I have been here before, and I believe I know what to expect. He will hurt me, but he has hurt me before. This is not new. I have survived through it for a long time, and I realize I will survive through it now. Perhaps I will live forever. I cannot even kill myself... what good am I? I am not good, I deserve punishment.
You must deal with the consequences of your own actions. Consequences. You must deal with them. Your actions require consequences. You...
He shoves me towards a desk and makes me sit. Without saying a word, he goes to a trunk in the corner and opens it. When he returns to me, he has a strange contraption.
"Do you know what this is?" he says.
I do not. I shake my head. "No."
"You think you're smart, do you?" he asks.
I do not think I am smart. I did not ever say I was smart.
"You think you can get out of this as easily as that? You're not allowed to kill yourself, you stupid bitch. Did I tell you that you could do that?"
"No," I say.
"I'm going to make sure you don't do it again, too. I've been saving this, but I thought I'd need to use it for something else. Do you realize how ugly you are, Angel? It's disgusting. You sicken me. You're filthy. Your soul is trash and you don't even realize it. Maybe it's because the boy's like to fuck you. Is that what you think? That because they stick their sinful cocks in your cunt that they like you? They don't like you, you worthless bitch. They're all so much better than you. They're only using you to help get rid of their own sins. They're becoming righteous and every day you become more and more vile and sickening."
He says this, but he is wrong. He is wrong about one thing in particular, and it is that I do not think they like me. I have never thought this. I... I hope Noah likes me, though. Do you like me, Noah? I love you...
"Fingernails are for pretty girls," he says. "They paint them up with polish to look nice. You wouldn't understand, but a wife's duty is to cater to her husband's needs. You don't have to worry about that, either. You're never going to have a husband. I don't think you need those fingernails anymore, either. You aren't pretty, Angel. I can't even stand to look at you half the time."
I do not understand what his meaning is at first, but I comprehend what he means to do soon enough. He bolts the machine into holes in the desk, and then he pins my wrist down with his hand. He jams my finger into the slot in front of the machine and presses the crescent-shaped wedge beneath my nail and then he slams down hard on the lever and...
He laughs. He laughs and laughs and removes all of my fingernails, one by one. Thumbnails hurt the most. They are the largest and they hurt the most. When he is finished removing them, he plucks them free from my body's confines and drops them into a glass jar on the corner of the desk. My bloody nails leave clawed scrapes of red along the bottom of the jar, as if they are begging to be freed.
I cry. I scream and cry and tears stream down my cheeks. It hurts. Please, stop. Please, Noah... please help me... Noah, where are you?
Noah leaves. He comes and then he leaves. He has already left. He will not come today. He will not be here tomorrow or the day after, either. He has told me this, and yet I do not wish to believe it. I need him. I...
Once the priest finishes with all of my nails, he stops laughing. I think that he is done, but then I realize he is not. I still have one nail left. It is the nail of my smallest finger. Am I allowed to keep this one? It is small, and yet I love it now. It is mine. It is all I have left. I thought I had lost everything until I realized I still had my fingernails. One last chance, one final moment, a prized possession, allowing me to end my life and leave.
I hope you will find happiness, Noah. I do not wish to leave you the same as you do not want to leave me. I do not blame you when you go, because I understand you must. Please do not blame me when I am gone? I love you...
The man returns with a pair of long needle nose pliers. He grins at me and grabs my hand and jabs the prongs of the pliers so that they dig beneath my last fingernail. It hurts so much. My entire hand is slick with blood, and now it bleeds more. He shreds and tears my fingernail, pulling it off piece by piece, ripping through gouts of flesh. It becomes lose eventually, forced free by the torturous tool in his possession. He rips out my nail and adds it to the rest.
The nail of my smallest finger looks so sad and broken. The others are like scales, dirty but rounded. The last is ragged around the edges and looks like an ill-fitted puzzle piece compared to the rest.
He throws me on the bed and strips off his clothes and then forces himself onto me. I am still crying. I try to push him away, but I am weak and he is stronger. I try to claw at his back, to dig my nails into his skin, to make him know even a little of my pain, but I cannot. I have no nails.
My fingers slide, slick with life and blood, across his naked back, and there is nothing I can do. He satisfies himself, using my body to do so, and then he does it again. When he is done, he drags me to the stairs and throws me down them. I fall and tumble and break and bruise, slipping down stone steps. When I reach the bottom, somehow I am not completely broken.
I am alive. I cannot even kill myself; how can I expect stairs to kill me?
I crawl towards my basement room, the one in which I am forced to stay most of the time. Once I reach my fetters, the ones I no longer need, I collapse onto the floor. I do not remember falling asleep, nor do I remember waking up, but at some point I must have. They are back, the boys from my school, and I am being used for their pleasure again.
Life continues. I wish I did not. I wish I stopped. I wish I did not exist.
*** Noah
It's morning. Breakfast time, to be exact. I'm sitting at the small table in our kitchen and picking at my food, waiting for my dad to leave and start getting ready for work and my mom to go somewhere or look the other way or something like that so I can pack away some food for Angeline.
You know what fucking sucks? Breakfast food, that's what. What the fuck can I give her? Toast works, but what else? Sausage and bacon are too greasy; won't work. Eggs? Where the fuck do you want me to put them? They've got those breakfast bars, but my mother doesn't believe in that shit. Eat a homemade, balanced fucking breakfast, Noah. It's good for you.
You know what's good for me? Not having to watch people rape and abuse a girl every day. That's better for me than some fucking eggs and bacon and toast, mom. Don't mean to break your fucking bubble there, but that's the way it is.
There's lunch, too. That's harder to save, though. If I don't eat all of my sandwich, someone else wants it. And then what the fuck do I say? No, fuck off? Uh... and when it's some little fucking nine year old kid who forgot his lunch or some shit?
Yeah, fuck you. Sorry. I'm just one guy. I can't save the damn world, but I guess I'll fucking try to. I don't know what else to tell you. I do some odd jobs when I can and buy Angeline snacks, but I need to be careful what I bring. It's got to be food that I can stuff in my coat pocket that isn't super fucking obvious to everyone, you know? Even a small bag of potato chips won't work half the time, because it makes too much
noise when I walk. Candy bars are good, but that shit's so unhealthy. I want to at least try and give her something nutritious.
So that's my day in a nutshell, and here I am.
"Noah," my father says before he gets up to go get ready for work.
"Yeah?" I say.
"I wouldn't normally ask you this, but times are tough, and I could really use your help after school for a couple of days."
My mom leaves as soon as she hears that. I don't think she wants to listen to this. It's a man's conversation, apparently. Fuck if I know what that means.
"I know you've been going to help out at the church, and I think that's great. I like the initiative. It's just..."
He tells me some sob story. It's my sob story, too. This is my fucking dad, you asshole. Can't pay for the house, can't buy food. He's got a job, but he needs to finish it fast because otherwise he won't be able to start this other job in time, and then he'll have no work for months. We can't live like that.
What the fuck am I supposed to do? Sorry, dad, but I'm going to have to tell you to go fuck yourself. I'm dealing with some heavy shit. I need to help some chick out. I need to fucking protect someone, but I can't even protect anyone. I'm fucking useless. Just thought you should know. Yeah, sorry about that.
I don't do that. I tell him I'll help. It's just a simple lumber job. We're cutting down some trees nearby, chopping up wood, blocking it for some lumber place. You know that firewood you see in grocery stores or places like that? They've got signs sometimes, like it's fancy. Buy some fucking firewood, you piece of shit! It'll make your house look homey as fuck! Yeah, that's what we're doing.
It's nice firewood. I like my dad. He's a good guy. I think he is. I never want to know if he's done some bad shit, because I just can't take it. I don't want to tell him about all of the bad shit I've done, either. I never want to talk to him again. I hope he understands. He wouldn't like who I've become, and I don't want to be the one to disappoint him like that. Let's just be a family, alright? Remember that time I helped you chop firewood? It was nice. Don't forget it. You don't need to know anything else, just that.