Tied

She smooths down my hair. “You poor thing. I told you I thought it wasn’t a good idea for you to get a job yet. It’s too much. You need to rest and let your mind and body heal from all the abuse. If you need money, Daddy and I can give you whatever you need.”

Sighing, I wish we could go just one day without her bringing up what happened to me in some way. As much as she says we all need to forget it, she is always the one bringing it back up. “Mom, I need to do something.”

“Well…maybe just start with a hobby,” she suggests.

“Like what?” I ask.

“I don’t know, Holly. Maybe photography? You love those pictures you bought.” She pulls back the privacy curtain and stares around. “Where the hell is that doctor? I need to get back to work. I have meetings all day long today, and I have a ton of baking to do for Christmas. It’s just two days away.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry.” She looks at me apologetically. “It’s just a very busy time of year, that’s all. Do you know how to bake?”

I stare at the woman who should know everything about me and knows absolutely nothing. “Yes,” I answer softly. “They let us bake at Merryfield. We’re allowed near ovens.”

“Good,” she says, clearly not catching my newfound dry sarcasm. “You can start baking the cookies when I take you home. I think it’s best I take you right to the house from here and not back to your apartment until after the holiday. I want to keep an eye on you.” She pulls her phone out of her purse and starts to read her emails. “Maybe you could take up cake decorating or cupcakes. Lots of young women do that.” She doesn’t look up from her phone as she makes these suggestions. “Then after the holidays, we’ll think about online college classes. Your father and I are discussing what’s best for you so we can help you have a good future. That’s all we want for you, so you can put the past behind you and try to live some kind of a normal life someday.”

Some kind of a normal life? Someday? She says it like it’s almost an impossible feat. Like there’s a huge mountain of unsurpassable obstacles in front of me. Like I’m so severely backward and damaged that I’m doomed to a life of… what? Living in a supervised facility? Living with my parents? Not being able to do something worthwhile and important? Not able to get married and have a family someday? Her insinuation hits me harder than anything that anyone else has said to me since I’ve been freed. I lost my childhood and the opportunity to form friendships and relationships. I missed out on a lot of my life. I was mentally and physically abused. But I’m not stupid. I’m not afraid to live and learn. I want to. Determination sprouts and grows in me as her words resonate through me. I’ll prove her wrong.

I’ll prove everyone wrong.

Soon, the doctor comes in to discharge me and advises me to rest for a few days before resuming daily activity. I almost laugh at that. If I spend any more time resting and sitting still, I’m going to lose my mind. I can’t do it anymore.

12

Tyler

nineteen years old

This party is boring as hell, but I didn’t come here to socialize. I came here for my three favorite things: oxy, weed, and speed. Oxy to kill the pain, weed to chill me out, and speed to wake my ass up.

I wouldn’t mind a side of coke and a blow job to top it off, but neither one of those seem to be options for me tonight, judging from this crowd.

My old high school friend Jimmy invites me to all his college parties, even though I haven’t had any sort of academic goals or socialized with friends since I was pushed into a bonfire three years ago and came out looking like a side of beef jerky.

By the time I had gone through countless burn treatments, skin grafts, and other horrific shit I’d rather not think about, school was no longer a priority for me. My chance of getting an athletic scholarship was gone. Most of my so-called friends had gone MIA, one of them taking my girlfriend with him.

Good riddance, assholes and bitches.

Friends were overrated anyway, once morphine became the love of my life.

Pre-fire, I worked out five days a week and ran every morning. I ate lean and clean. I meditated and did yoga. I had a few beers and got stoned maybe once or twice a month with friends to unwind. My body and my mind were my ticket to everything I wanted in my future: athletic success, inspiring others, and an equally beautiful and healthy partner to share life with.

At sixteen, I had a clearly defined path mapped out for myself, and I wasn’t going to let anything get in my way. I had watched my father struggle to pay bills and work his ass off seven days a week at the motorcycle shop he’d owned for twenty years. Pop had a lot of biker friends, and if they needed something, he was there. That included fixing their bikes for free because that’s what bikers do. It’s one big family. That shit didn’t pay the bills, though, and I refused to follow in his footsteps. I’d let my brothers do that. Me? I was getting out of this town, population of twelve hundred.

Raising the bottle of whiskey to my lips, I welcome the burn as it seeps down my chest and into my gut recalling, with equal bitterness, how I left the hospital with a flicker of hope and a handful of prescriptions. Hope soon took a backseat to an addiction that had crept up on me slowly, obliterating my plans.

My physical scars were easy to see, splayed out across my flesh for people to stare at, back away from, and question endlessly. The scars on the inside, though, managed to go unnoticed as they snaked through me like a poison.

A tall, lanky kid approaches me where I’m perched on a fence post thirty feet away from the crowd of college kids drinking, dancing, and making out. He wouldn’t be coming over here in the dark unless he had good reason, so I know he’s the one I’ve been waiting for.

“You Ty?” he asks nervously, his eyes scanning the area like he expects the police to jump out of the shadows.

“Well, I ain’t Mickey Mouse.”

He pushes his silver-rimmed glasses up his nose. “Jimmy sent me to hook you up.”

I take a pull off my drink. “Yay for Jimmy,” I say sarcastically. “Whaddya got, Waldo?”

He reaches into his jacket pocket and produces a clear plastic bag filled with weed, pills, and a small vial of coke.

“How much?”

“Eight hundred.”

Without much regret, I pull out a wad of cash. Some worked for, some stolen. “Guess I won’t be eating for a while,” I say, handing almost all of it over to him.

He double checks my count. “Or you could just not do drugs.”

Laughing, I snatch the bag from him and cram it down the front of my jeans. “Not exactly good advice coming from a dealer. Don’t they teach you marketing in college?”

“I only sell it. I don’t do it.”

I jump off the fence and give him a friendly smack on the back. “Do yourself a favor and don’t do either.”

Too tired to find a girl drunk enough to go down on me, I ditch the party and head for my car, parked on a dark, dead-end street. On my way, I spot a lone girl leaning against a car in front of Jimmy’s house, her face in her hands, crying. As I get closer, I realize it’s Wendy.

Lighting up a cigarette, I saunter over to her. “Whatsa matter, Wendy? Karma biting your ass?” I slur.

“Fuck off, Tyler,” she lashes out, wiping away the snot that’s running from her nose. Three years ago, I thought she was one of the prettiest girls in school. Somewhere along the line she lost her glow, and a dull version of my first crush stands sniveling in her place.

Cradling her chin in my palm, I lift her face toward the streetlight to see the purple and blue discoloration on her cheek and the beginnings of a black eye.

“Don’t touch me.” She jerks her face out of my hand and looks down at the ground between us. “Get away from me.”

“You still can’t look at me, can you Wendy?” I ask, leaning closer to her, my body inches from hers. “Do I make you that sick?”

She lifts her head, and her cold gaze flits from my eyes to the mottled flesh that runs across half my forehead and down the side of my face. Gulping, she closes her eyes and turns her head away.

“You’re drunk and probably high, Ty. That makes me sick.”

“Then look at me.” I rest one hand on the car door next to her. “Look at me like you used to.”

Still looking away, she tries to melt into the car door in an effort to put more distance between us. “I can’t, okay?” She says defiantly. “It skeeves me out. Are you happy now?”

I take a long drag off my cigarette and blow the smoke in her face. “Yeah, Wendy, I am. ’Cuz it looks like you’re getting exactly what you fucking deserve.”

I leave her standing there, wondering what kind of future she thinks she’s going to have when, at nineteen years old, she’s decided that a good-looking guy who hits her is more appealing than one who’s scarred up but treated her like gold.

My emotions are broiling when I get behind the wheel of my old pickup truck. Three years later, and Wendy still has the ability to twist the knife—reminding me that, even after seeing her every single day for three hundred and eighty-six days—I never realized her shitty-ass version of teen love came with a condition, and that condition was looks. Everything I did for her was forgotten in an instant once I wasn’t good looking enough for her anymore.