The Gang

Chapter 3*

" Wake up bitch! Go to school and get out of my fucking house!"

My father was yelling at me through my locked door trying to turn the knob and get in here. For some reason instead of moving away from the door and him like I should have my body stood there frozen. Once he figured out that it wasn't going to work, which took a long time to be honest, he started banging on the door and you could literally see the wood caving in. My mind was racing and I still had all the numbness in my body from last nights beating.

" Bitch!!! Come on look this door! This is my house and you do what I say!"

I peeled myself from the floor feeling all the pains in my body come alive and limped over to my door groaning. I reached out and unlocked the door jumping a step back. I don’t know why I listened to him and unlocked the door when I knew that it would just be pain for me. The door banged open hitting the wall behind it which already had a dent in it from the knob hitting it multiple times with just as much force.

My father was standing there with a sick smile on his face as he looked over all the fresh bruises on my body that you could see through my thin white shirt. He walked towards slowly enough to make me take a step back from the intensity of both that and the smile which was still on his face. I don’t even know why I try to fight it anymore I know thats there’s no escaping him when he’s in a mood like this.

I made the idiotic mistake and backed myself into the farthest corner from my door in my room and the look on father's face meant that he knew this. I wouldn’t put it past him to have this all planned out predicting all the moves I would make. Seeing this he quickened his pace and came right up to my face, staring down at me. Before I could register anything the pain on my face flashed across like forest-fire. I looked at my father's retreating back with my hand over the cheek that he had just slapped. The whole way out of the room he let out a sickening cackle that made my skin crawl.

As soon as he left the room I went over to where my mirror was and checked out the havoc he had done to my body last night. Everywhere on my stomach was black and blue except for a small area about the size of my fist. My cheek was red and swollen on the left side of my face and already beginning to bruise.

I walked over to the cleanest spot of my room which was still disgusting and started to get dressed. I pulled a pair of faded jeans, a short sleeve shirt and a hoodie. I slowly crept down to the bottom level of my house carefully listening for any sounds from him. With not hearing anything I quickly crept out of the door and started to walk to school seeing how nobody would drive me and I was too close to take a bus. The walk from my house to the school was only a five minute walk so I wasn’t bothered by it that much.

Once I got there I went straight to the library because classes wouldn't be starting for at least another half hour. I always tried getting there early, mosty to get rid of the feeling of being scared of everything. I had never really been hurt inside of school mostly because most people weren’t aware of my existence. The morning librarian looked up at me and smiled.

As the tremors in my body started slowing down and I was getting calmer I went back to the shelf I was at yesterday. It's where I usually spend my morning because from that spot you could see and hear everything that goes on in the library. Even though it was completely irrational I was hoping Markus was already at the school for some unknown reason to me.

I slowly lowered myself to a sitting position on the ground holding a scream because of the pain. At first I tried curling in on myself but pain ran throughout my stomach so I straightened out my back and reached in my bag to pull out the book the Markus had gotten down for me yesterday. It was Super Dark by Tanith Morse.

I started to zone out of the world and into the book. I was about three chapters in when I heard voices near me. At first I tried to ignore it and focused on the book because I was at a really good part. As the people got closer their voices became louder and some I couldn’t zone them out any longer. I put the book back into my bag and leaned my head against the wall behind me. It felt nice o pretend like there was nothing bad in the world.

A few seconds later I heard, " So, dude why were you late to the meeting yesterday? Banging some hot chick?" I knew that voice it was Brody. Brody is Markus' best friend and his second hand man. You never really saw them apart from each other.

" Nah man, I just had to come here to get something after school for a class." That was Markus. My heart should have been pounding knowing someone was coming towards me and it had been when I heard Brody speak, but when Markus began talking it calmed right down.

I don't know why but at this point I started to get up so I could hear them better, and not to lie I might have wanted to see Markus again. I was pressed against the end of the book shelf and if they had turned around most likely they would have seen me. The next thing that came out Brody's mouth made me stand still and hold my breath.

" Dude, I was woken up be this loud bang from the house next door." Shit, I live next door to him. He could have heard when my father threw my door open and the knob hit into the wall. I’ve never really imagined that neighbors would hear it and if they did how come they never came over or asked me what it was?

" But that's not all. It happens almost everyday and there's always yelling going on. I just worry about the girl that lives there, I've heard that the father is a mess." I can see them stop walking just a few feet away from me and Brody had turned around to face Markus. I was really surprised to see that his race actually showed a bit of concern.

" Who is it?" Markus seems like he really couldn't care less about the answer when he asks the question. I can see that Brody is a little frustrated by the fact the Markus doesn’t seem to be interested or that he even cared.

" Siena Parks."

And that would be when I passed out falling onto a bookshelf taking down all the books from it with me. Just as I was going to down I saw the boys look up at the noise and then surprise and worry go through their eyes and they tried to make their ways quickly towards me.