Payment

REWRITTEN

Note: Rewritten and kept short and sweet. The next chapter will possibly be longer than the originals but I want to try and keep the story as close to the original as possible.
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A long time ago, when I was nothing more than an infant birthed to two miserable people, my greedy parents stole a large sum of money. No, it wasn't their first time stealing, but the theft wasn't the problem. The person who they had robbed, by our luck, just happened to be a vastly wealthy and powerful man. The type of man who took limps as punishment. 

My parents, not knowing any better, spent the money on drug addictions and on the tremendous debts they owed.  At first, it seemed like they were going to get away with it. No one showed up to collect and no threats were found staked to our door. But they couldn't outrun fate any more than a rat who had wandered onto a cheese infested trap. Eventually, that scary man showed up to our door in the dead of night. I was too young to truly comprehend what was happening but I can never forget the feeling I had when I looked up at him in that doorway, thunder and rain outlining his humongous form. It was a complex emotion, the twisting of wonder and fear. He was violently beautiful, like the villain of a fairytale.

And every year since, when he comes to collect what my parents had promised in exchange for his discretion, that feeling swelled in my chest like an infection. It burned and festered long after he left until three hundred and sixty five days passed and I saw him again.

But this time, after eighteen years of faithful payments of milk, cheese and anything we could muster as profit, we had nothing. 

Betty, our last surviving cow had died off earlier that year from starvation and we soon to follow. We had nothing of value that could suffice.

It was a clear fall day, cold but bearable. I had spent the season collecting leaves and painting them with berries id found in the forest. I even had one in my hand when he arrived at our door in his usual silent brood. I hadn't meant for it to happen but the fragile leaf I crushed tight in my fist was the same shade of his eyes. A pasty green, both vibrant and mysterious. I could imagine his personality the same as that broken leaf. Angry and shattered with ill emotion, at least that's how I perceived him to be. 

I knew very well this was our last day. With him here, standing like an elephant in our home, out of place and ready to trample it all to dust, I knew my life was about to turn upside down. He was no different than any other time id seen him. His long chocolatey brown waves of silky hair framed his sharp featured face. Masculine in definition and as unyielding as the weather, he stood dressed in extravagant black attire, waiting for something we could not give. But our empty hands didn't seem to phase him in the slightest. He still expected to leave here with something, anything he could take. I could even imagine him demanding the clothes off our backs.

I remained silently crouched  in the corner of the room staring at him as he addressed my parents like peasants. He had never held compassion in his deep booming voice, only discontent. Which stuck me as odd. If he was so disgusted by my vermin parents, why did he insist on collecting payment himself rather than sending someone in his place? It was beyond me why he would bring himself to this disgusting place each year. While I admired the sense of royalty in his every movement, I was scared to death of him at the same time. These opposing emotions filled my stomach like mutated butterflies as he stood tall in our little shack of a home, eyes slowly shifting from them to me. He had this heartless tone when he spoke and his eyes, those bright green eyes, burned me like sparks flying from a fire. 

"Sir Dominik, I-I.." My father began to panic looking around frantically.

In all honestly, in that moment, in my father desperate grasping at straws, I wasn't as terrified as I should have been. An odd sense of peace slithered across my skin.

"You can not pay me?" He spoke apathetically. It was so monotone, so void of any emotion it was almost like he wasn't surprised in the slightest. And he shouldn't have been. This was bond to happen from the beginning. 

"No, sir." My mother choked, hot tears streaming down her pathetic cheeks. "We have nothing to give you. If you could just give us a little more time!" 

That's when something wildly unexpected happened. Through my mothers mindless pleading and choppy unflattering tears, Sir Dominik looked straight at me. His eyes found mine and everything went silent. I'm not sure if my mother had stopped blubbing or if I was to stuck by his gaze to hear her. He spoke and all I could see was the ever slow movement of his lips. They formed silent words that refused to find their way to my ears. 

But my parents seemed to hear him loud and clear because the next thing I knew they were screaming. Well, my father was. My mother on the other hand had collapsed to the floor, relief etched into her teary eyes. She was just shy of a smile, and my mother wasn't one to smile.

"My Rozalina?!" My father stumbled back in disbelief. 

"Victor, quiet! That girl has never done anything for us! Sir Dominik, if she pays our debt than take her, please!" My mother was hysteric.

Slapping away her now silly tears, she gathered herself and made her way to me. As violent as a bird pinching the life from a worm, she plucked me up from where I hid in plain view and hoisted me to my clumsy feet. It wasn't enough that her claws sunk into my skin, she had to jerk me along and toss me before his feet like an offering. I peered up at him, not a single emotion filtering through me eyes. I saw my sentence. It was just going to be a continuation of my tormented life. There was nothing he could bring upon me besides death that could prove otherwise. So I didn't waver, didn't question why my mother had been so gleeful at my abandonment. 

"But she's our daughter!" My father grabbed my mother by the arm, shaking her as if it would instill some sense into her. It did nothing. 

"Shut up you pathetic imbecile!" My mother growled at the man she had once loved. I could see in her blazing eyes that she now loved no one. I doubt she even held favor for herself.

I thought for a moment my father would fight him. Maybe, somewhere in my mind I could muster up the image of him throwing his fists in my honor. But that was a far off fantasy. My father was just as distanced from any sentiments as my mother. The only difference between them was that years down the road, I knew he would look back and think of me. Perhaps, he would even cry at my dispense. I hoped he would. I desperately hoped that one of them saw at least a speckle of worth in me. Any child would wish this from her parents.

"Take her." My father looked at the ground. "But if you come here for more money you won't find me. I'll be gone. So you'll have to deal with this woman alone." 

My heart squeezed painfully at his submission, at the fact he wouldn't even look at me. And just like that, he turned on his heels and shuffled out the back door. I could hear the leaves crunching beneath his feet as he wondered into his next life without the burdens of me and mother. I took a long moment to watch his back and toss all my life at it. I wouldn't need it. So, I thought of all the memories that filled my mind and I threw them away, emptying myself before taking Dominik's hand.