The house made of glass will surely crack one day, was what I thought at ten years old. The safety of the gates was nothing more than a façade. Behind those walls laid an unknown hell. Upper-class America was no safer than the poverty-stricken ghettos because danger lurked in the most unlikely places. At least in the streets I would have had some control and a chance to run. If I didn’t come from the family I came from, maybe I would have had help; maybe I wouldn’t have been all alone, even when the house was full of people. No, there I had nothing except time.
That night, the darkness came again as I lay and waited.
One Mississippi.
Two Mississippi.
He would be here tonight. I knew it. I felt it. The red rim of his bloodshot eyes at dinner was the sign I had learned. It was my warning. It was the evidence of his overindulgence in what my mother called the occasional adult beverage. Only, with my father, it wasn’t occasional, and it was always more than one.
At ten years old, I had survived one moment at a time, always waiting and counting. Funny how they taught you to count the seconds of time in school, while I used it to count the seconds passing by at home.
Things had gotten worse as time passed by. The harder Father worked, the more he indulged. The happy possibilities of a little girl’s daydreams were long gone, and in its place was a reality nightmares were made of.
I had been waiting for my escape, even if it wouldn’t come for years. I had been counting on the future being better than the present. I used to count the stars on my ceiling from the nightlight I once had. However, I got older, and Father felt it was silly for me to have them, so to the trash it went.
Once I had gotten beyond the preschool stage where visitors would expect my room to have a theme, I was stripped bare of any color or any extravagances tied to me personally. My walls were plain white with nothing hanging, for we couldn’t give in to the whims of a child for decorations. Therefore, I lived in a room with four white walls, white bed sheets on my bed, covered in a white down comforter. My dresser was white, my nightstand white, and my headboard was a built-in bookshelf, done also in white.
Not given any freedom of expression, I wasn’t permitted to actually store any books on the shelf. No, personal effects must go inside the toy box that sat inside my overly large walk-in closet. Our house was large with a very sterile feeling. My room wasn’t allowed to look out of place. Like everything else in that house, it had to have clean lines and a contemporary feel, my mother always said. Personally, I found it to be just as stuffy as the rest of the house.
Mama and Father always told me not to share the secrets of our home. The special secrets of our family were our own. I tried to tell once when it first started. The doctor at my check-up said no one should touch me … down there—well, except him when he checked me. I whispered my truths, and he patted my leg like everything would be all right. Only, it wasn’t.
No, he called my mother to the room, stopping to tell her all about my creative imagination in the hallway. The door was cracked, so I had heard every word he said to her. He made it very clear this was the silly nonsense of a child wanting attention. Of course, a man such as my father—her husband—wouldn’t do those things.
After that, I decided I would wait. My time would come … I prayed.
As the bed dipped, I closed my eyes tight. The bed in which I should drift safely to the land of dreams and fairytales had been nothing more than a prison of its own making.
Fingers moved through my hair as I concentrated on counting my breaths.
One Mississippi, exhale.
Two Mississippi, inhale.
Three Mississippi, exhale.
Rough, calloused fingers ran down the back of my neck then traced my shoulder before trailing down my arm, all the way down until the hand found the hem of my nightgown.
I tensed. He laughed.
“Fallyn, don’t tease me, baby girl.” His voice was gravely and not hushed.
He didn’t have to hide his presence in my room; my mother wouldn’t stop him, so I supposed there was no reason for him to be quiet. She was supposed to protect me; only, she didn’t. The staff always left promptly at seven nightly and didn’t arrive before eight in the morning. Privacy was what my mother said we needed. Really, it was another way to keep the darkness from being seen by any outsiders.
There were many secrets we hid from the world, but none amongst that house. If only the walls could speak for me back then...
Squeezing my eyelids, I forced them to remain closed.
Four Mississippi, I went back to mentally counting.
His hand moved to my butt, tracing the edges of my little girl, cotton panties. Why my cotton? Mama wore the silky, soft ones. I had seen them in the laundry. Why did he touch mine? To this day, I still questioned that.
Count, Fallyn, don’t think of the hands moving, just count. Five Mississippi … Six Mississippi … He will finish sooner rather than later.
His fingers edged closer to the spot, and knowing it would hurt, I braced myself. It would burn, so I would squeeze my eyelids more, trying to remain unmoving, unnerved, and unresponsive. If he was drunk enough, he would believe I was asleep … If I was asleep, I didn’t have to participate.
I exhaled deeply as if in dream.
Seven … Oh, it stung.
When his finger pushed between the curves of my girlie parts, I tried to think of the two walls they represented. Mama had bought me a book about little girls, explaining my parts. Why didn’t he understand they were to cover and protect the opening—my opening?
His thumb circled my middle, his finger pressing inside my tiny portal, and I gritted my teeth as I clinched my whole body tight.
“My baby girl, always so greedy.” He leaned over, licking my neck as bile rose up my throat.
By some miracle, I remained steadfast in my breathing and maintained control of my body. Inside, I wanted to jump out of my skin and hide my soul from the world. Then, just as the fire hurt and the burn built, something inside me twisted, and I became removed. Sick, screwed up, seriously drowning in disgust, I lay completely still, forcing myself not to throw up as he continued. I didn’t want him to touch me. I didn’t even want to share the same space, the same air with him. He was there, though. He wasn’t going anywhere until he’d had his fun, and I was left covered in his filthy, sticky mess.
His breathing came in pants, and I was certain, if he knew I was awake, my hand would be working or my mouth. At least that night, I was saved the humiliation of an audience. He was always rougher when he made Mama watch. To this day, I didn’t know if it was a power play or a sick game between them. Either way, I was thankful for the break that night, even if it was only once.
The shrill scream of my mother filled the air, yet the man over me didn’t move. Then there was silence. Unfazed, he continued to slide his finger in and out of me.
Removing his finger, I thought for a moment he might be done early because of the commotion outside my room. I was wrong.
Slowly, as if not to disturb me, he rolled me to my back then moved his hand down the front of my panties as he lay beside me.
Eighty five Mississippi, I tried to count silently, failing at reaching the next number when the burn hit me as he shoved his finger inside me harshly.
Thud, thud, thud. The pounding of someone walking sounded through the hallway.
My father tensed over me, his finger still inside as he moved my hand to his crotch. He was hard.
I blinked my eyes open as he slid my hand over his covered length. It took a minute for my eyes to adjust to the light coming from the hallway and my bathroom. There was a shadow in the doorway, and it moved to my bed.
My father was so drunk he didn’t even realize there was a man behind him. A large, powerful man, covered from head to toe in black was standing behind him with a knife that was dripping with something as it was raised high in the air. In the darkness of my room with only my bathroom light giving some visibility, I wasn’t able to make out anything more.
The finger kept plundering in and out sloppily while I absently stroked his manhood out of habit. The stranger grabbed my dad by the hair, and his eyes grew wide. A gasp escaped his lips as I watched the knife come around in front of his neck. Like every other night he visited, I continued to stroke, knowing I couldn’t sleep again until he finished what he had come in here for. Until the big mess came, I wasn’t allowed to stop, and I couldn’t sleep, which meant I couldn’t escape into the land of my dreams.
Counting again, I moved my hand up and down as I watched the fear in my father’s eyes.
My father choked on his words as the knife began to slice him. The blood splattered my face, yet I continued stroking. My eyes came up to meet the stranger’s through his black mask as the finger inside of me pulled out. I watched intently as the man cut my father—my life source—from one ear to the other.
I didn’t scream. I didn’t yell. I didn’t move except to continue stroking my dying father’s cock, as he called it. I merely continued on with my task as I had done for many months now; only, instead of being covered in his sticky residue, I was covered in his blood.
The mess is here. My job is done, I thought to myself.
I stilled my hand then looked up to the man who had most likely killed my mother and was then holding my father as the life drained from his body, and I smiled.
Seriously sick and twisted, I met his dark brown eyes and smiled.