After the Storm
Cheryllynn Dyess
Copyright © 2019 by Cheryllynn Dyess
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Cover created by Cybele Digital Services
Graphics used:
Photo by Ravven
Photo by Marina Mazur on Unsplash
Photo by Josep Castells on Unsplash
For all those who carry their demons with them inside, there is hope of defeating them!
Contents
Foreword
Untitled
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Epilogue
Afterword
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by Cheryllynn Dyess
Note from author
Foreword
After the Storm was written as a type of biography to illustrate how I overcame all the demons in my past. While today, I still work to overcome some… know that there is hope that it can be done. Happiness and peace are attainable. I can only hope my stories inspire others to do find the peace they deserve for themselves.
Book Blurb:
Bec was never far from trouble, usually she was the one starting it. All her life she struggled with abuser after abuser until she found herself among others like her and together two of them decided to make a change. Teens with special abilities found alliances in the least likely place, a mental hospital, where they decided to change their future and determine their own fate. Bec’s decision was to get out and get even. She could make her demons suffer from the damage they caused, or she could let them continue to destroy her. She chose the former.
Warning:
There are trigger topics mentioned in this story such as child abuse, domestic abuse, and sexual assault. The mentions do NOT go into any gory details or recount the exact abuse—bare minimal mentions to make the storyline flow.
Prologue
It was her tenth birthday party. Balloons lined the fence, party hats sat in front of the chairs where each child would sit along with brightly colored paper tablecloths that covered the table where the large unicorn cake sat in the middle but there were no children, as least not anymore. The birthday girl sat on the porch crying. Her long mousy brown hair hanging down around her face as she leaned forward in what she thought was the worst day of her young life.
Less than an hour ago, the yard was filled with kids' laughter and presents stacked high on the table near the colorful cake. Rebecca’s face was glowing with joy. Her eyes twinkled with happiness as she played with her friends when suddenly her mother rushed into the yard and yelled, “Everyone leave. This party’s over! Get out! Now!” Mothers rushed to get their children and say their goodbyes to the birthday girl if they could get close enough to her.
Grabbing the child by her shirt, Rebecca’s mom twisted her fist in the shiny material as she lifted the child off the ground. Yelling down at the child as their guests scrambled to get out of the way, “How dare you ruin it for me! He was a good man! And all because you had to be born, he left.”
One mother, who was last to gather her things, looked over at the child with sad eyes. Walking up to Monica, she laid a hand on her shoulder, “Don’t you think you should take a breather first? You can’t seriously think it’s the child’s fault she is here. Who’d want a man who didn’t love their kid?”
Monica, enraged, pushed the woman back, “You don’t tell me how to raise my child. She is a burden. An inconvenience and I should’ve aborted her when I had the chance.”
Rebecca dangled under her mother’s grasp, crying and broken, “Mommy please. I’m sorry. I’ll be better. I promise.” Her tear-stained face reddened with emotion as she was once again reminded of how unwanted she was. Her breaths started to become short and raspy as her mother’s grasp tightened around the neck of the shirt. Looking toward her friend’s mother, her eyes begging for help from anyone began to roll back in her head.
“But your daughter? Have you been drinking? Just let me help her.” The woman tried to reach a hand out toward Rebecca.
Pushing her away again with her free hand, Monica tossed the child aside into the yard. Turning towards the woman, she growled, “Get out of my yard. I don’t need help with her! She is pathetic and no one wants her here.” Pointing her finger at the woman she stepped closer, the woman grabbed her own child in fear of retribution for her trying to help and ran out of the yard.
Turning around, Monica searched the yard for her child. The child she felt was a burden to her. Walking around the entire yard, she began lifting table clothes to peek under the tables and looking behind and under bushes in the yard. The child was gone. She sighed, and spoke to herself out loud, “Good riddance.”
Rebecca was in her usual hiding place, on the roof. Her mother never looked there. As small and light as she is, the young girl could easily climb up the side of the house where the gutter drain was attached. Sitting on the roof with her knees pulled in close, she listened and watched as her mother searched for her and damned her existence. As her mother walked inside, Rebecca heard her throwing things around while cursing and yelling at her. She couldn’t understand what she had done wrong. She listened to all the rules and did her very best... but it was never enough for Monica.
A soft breeze ran across her skin. The leaves in the gutter started to rustle just enough to show something shiny laying in the gutter. Crawling on her hands and knees, Rebecca stretched as far as she could to reach it but alas, she wasn’t able. Inching forward, the small girl pushed out her hand with tiny fingers in what anyone would call a fools chance to reach the shiny object. Only this time the object shook under the leaves. Rebecca jerked her hand back and watched carefully as the object quit moving. Not fully understanding what was happening, she pushed her arm out again with her hand out and mentally willed the object to be within reach. This attempt was rewarded with the object flying into her hand as her fingers wrapped around it. Turning her hand over, slowly she opened her tight little fist one finger at a time. In her palm sat a shiny quarter. A quarter she couldn’t reach but came to her.
Her tenth birthday was the day her life changed forever. Soon, the young girl mastered this new gift and never shared it with a soul.
Chapter 1
“Seven,” the young woman bit on her nails as she looked out blankly into the room, “I believe I was seven. Could be younger, but really can’t say for sure.”
“Want to tell me what you do remember?” Asked the nasally woman sitting across from her. Today the doctor wore a bold dress suit tha
t is deep red, cut high in the front and went past her knees. She was always very conservative with her wardrobe since she dealt with a wide range of patients. She wanted them all to feel comfortable. She had taken off her jacket before Rebecca came in for her appointment. Bec, as she liked to be called, was claustrophobic on top of the other myriad of issues she was forced to come see the good doctor for and felt like she was being choked by her wearing her jackets.
Bec was silent while she scanned the room. This is what she did when she remembered but was hesitant to talk. Her memories had come back little by little over the last few years, but some memories haunted her every day, like this one. “I remember living in a small two-bedroom trailer. To me it was great, but I was just a kid and what the hell did I know. Looking back now, it was run down. I had my own room and that was fun. I had friends there too.”
Georgia Wilson was a wise woman and her experience with Bec had taught her not to push, so she said nothing while she looked on. Bec was debating on whether to give the details of one of the main events that started her life of horror or whether to avoid them again. Georgia had been seeing Bec for over a year now and this was the pattern. A few words spoken here and there and then Bec would shut down or start playing with things. “Bec, can you put that down now? You know it's fragile and always makes me nervous when you do that.”
Bec smiled a devious smile as she looked at the good doctor from her lounging position. Looking back at the glass dragon figurine, she gave a mental push to swirl it in the air before lightly landing it in its original spot on the bookshelf. “You know I like to play with it. I don’t know why you’d think I’d ever hurt it.”
“Well, not that you are my first telekinetic patient, but you are the first to play with my figurines. Usually the other patients would break things, guess I have to work on that.”
“Look doc,” Bec said as she turned towards the doctor. Now with her feet firmly planted on the ground in front of her, “trust goes both ways. How can I trust you if you can’t trust me?” Her devious smile had faded, and she now looked like the terrified sixteen-year-old she was.
Putting her pen down on her notepad and placing them both on the table next to her, the doctor sighed. “You’re right. I actually do trust you, but I am concerned that you’ve yet to tell me more about what happened. I can’t help you if I don’t know.”
Bec stood and moved to the window faster than any normal human could possibly move, but then again there was nothing normal about her. Two fingers made an opening in the blinds, allowing her to stare out into the bright sunlight. “Is my time almost up? I’m bored and I want to go outside.” She turned to the doctor, “they said I could go today if you tell them I was good in here.” Her voice was now pleading with the doctor.
“Give me something to report, then Bec. Tell me about that day.”
Taking her time, Bec moved at normal human speed to sit back down in the large round chair. The overstuffed cushions and wild butterfly patterns on the material made Bec comfortable, so she curled her feet under her, took a deep breath and began, “I remember my mom was at work. My stepdad was there with his friend. It’s the first time I remember him touching me, everywhere. He told me to open my mouth and… did things,” the shame and fear began to well up in her but she quickly tamped it down. She had to tell this part of her story at least as much as possible without going into an anxiety attack. She needed to go outside. She continued slowly, “he shared me with his friend who did a lot of the same things. Then they both told me that this is what daddy’s and little girls did but mommy’s couldn’t know, cause it was their special secret.” Bec swallowed hard, “that was the moment I knew I’d never be the same.”
The doctor just sat there silently. She knew Bec had just revealed one of her darkest memories, but they were definitely not the earliest. Bec had blocked out a lot of her memories from growing up having endured sexual, physical, and mental abuse all of her life. She had grown up watching her mom do drugs, drink heavily and always think of her last. She was an inconvenience to her mother and her mom had reminded her of that every day, all the way up to the day she admitted her to the mental hospital where she now resided in. Bec’s mom told the intake nurse that Bec was a danger to herself and others and needed help. It was her fifteenth birthday when she arrived and even though Bec was scared and felt alone; she was safer there than anywhere else in all her short life. Bec’s story told a much different version of what was really going on. Sadly, this was too common an occurrence.
Georgia Wilson would recommend Bec be able to go outside that day after a year of being held indoors but would she also come to regret that recommendation.
Bec gleamed when the nurse unlocked the door to let her go out into the yard. Barbed wire fencing enclosed the small area, but at first Bec didn’t care. She stood in the sun with her face towards the great star soaking in all she could. It was April and the sun was warming up the small town in Texas, getting it ready for another blistering summer. She didn’t pay attention to the other teenagers in the yard with her, not at first. She only cared that she had the sun on her skin again.
Across the yard, sitting at a metal picnic table was Kyle. He was a fiery young man whose temper landed him in the hospital. This was his second day in the sun. He watched Bec as she came out of the hospital and spread her arms, leaning her head back to let the sun ravage her body. As he looked at her, he could see easily she was in very good shape and had some personality to go with that smoking hot body. “Those clothes do you no justice,” he whispered to her.
Suddenly, her eyes were thrown open as she looked across the yard at the young man. She had heard him clearly as if he stood next to her, but he was at least 20 yards away. Always the cautious type, Bec scrunched her eyes to see him better and try to figure out what he was and what he could do.
“I’m a telepath. My name’s Kyle. And you are?”
She smiled. She wasn’t sure what it was about him, but she knew he was trouble and trouble she liked. Walking over to him slowly, she straddled the bench and faced him. “Neat trick, Kyle. Bec.” She held out her hand for him to shake. He looked at it hesitantly, glancing up at her a few times before shaking.
“Nice to meet ya, Bec. I think we’re going to be great friends.”
When he looked up at her, his grey eyes against his ebony skin popped out at her. She’d never seen such beautiful eyes before. His long dreadlocks were another story. “Don’t count on it,” Bec quipped before hopping up and taking off towards the fence. The guards stiffened as they watched the young girl go straight for the fence. Hands on their weapons, they waited her to make the fatal mistake of touching the fence. They gave no warnings here, but Bec already knew what her limits were. Today she just wanted to jog the perimeter, choosing a slow steady pace so the guards could see her. She needed to see their strengths and weaknesses. She was determined to find a way out; they just didn’t need to know that… ever.
Catching up quickly to her, Kyle fell into an easy pace with Bec. “Ya know you don’t have to be alone in here. It’s good to make friends.”
“I don’t need friends, Kyle. And I’m not fucking you!”
“Whoa, easy there. No one said anything about fucking. I’m talking about alliances.” He slowed his pace with the last word and came to a stop. This got Bec’s attention and she slowed down as she turned to look at him.
“What would an alliance with you get me?”
“Information. Help. And one day, a way out of here.”
“I’m listening.”
Chapter 2
Sitting on the hood of her ’65 Mustang, Bec took a long swig from the clear bottle and savored the burn as it went down. It’d been three years since she left the Gifted and Special Adolescence’s Hospital (GASAH). Today, she owned her own hair salon and was a bonafide businesswoman; it was the work she did on the side that made her the real money though and gave her the greatest satisfaction. Shop closed up five minutes ago and she never did a job
without some liquid courage. Over the last five years, Kyle and Bec became great friends. He never lied to her about a thing and he showed her how to get her revenge and make a living doing it for others. She had one more devil that needed to die before she’d be at peace and he was in the wind, for now she’d deal with other people’s demons.
“Hey sexy. You ready for some afterhours fun?” Kyle shot a gleaming smile at her.
She loved his ebony skin, soft grey eyes and that genuine smile that never changed. She just wasn’t going to tell him that. He saved her that day in the yard at the hospital and she’d never forget that and every day since they’ve been out. They’ve worked closely to heal their invisible scars and helping others.
Kyle snapped his fingers in front of her eyes, “Hey, you in there?” He said teasingly.
She shook her head to clear the memories, “Yeah, sorry about that. Want some?” She pushed the bottle towards him.
“Nah, I’m good lil’ mama. I think you’re good too to be honest,” he tried to pull the bottle away but only received a glare in response. Holding both hands up in surrender, he spoke softly to her this time, “Bec, you don’t need that. It won’t make it go away.” Kyle knew her story, he’s the only one she ever completely confided in. But she knew his story as well, his was just as dark and just as frightening.
After the Storm (Gifted and Special Adolescents Hospital Book 1) Page 1