Suddenly I was somewhere else entirely. It was a place I didn’t know but at the same time it was so familiar. It was a dimly lit room containing only a dirty three piece suite, a moth-eaten lamp and a coffee table that had obviously had a hard life. It seemed bigger than our house. The television set towered above me. I sensed movement and backed into the corner as two dark figures entered the room. A man and a woman. I was sure I recognised them.
Without warning, the man attacked the woman. I didn’t move. He yelled something I couldn’t understand and hit her again. Her knees buckled and she fell to the floor, sobbing. He kicked her and kicked her again, relentlessly. Each time she yelped and there was a horrible, horrible sound like thud. He didn’t stop. She was begging and pleading and, I couldn’t sit there and watch, I couldn’t.
“Stop it! Stop! Leave mummy alone!” I cried. My voice was very high pitched; it surprised me. “Stop it Daddy, please!”
Daddy? Mummy? Who were these people and why was I calling them that? I realised that I wasn’t able to change what was happening. Events were already written.
This was a flashback.
The man turned to me, his neck clicking in an almost mechanical way.
“Isabelle? Is that you, brat? What are you doing up?”
I cowered back into the corner.
“You’ve been a very naughty girl, Isabella Rose. And naughty children must be punished.”
He grabbed my collar and lifted me out from the safety of the TV set. He pulled his well-worn fist back and propelled it toward my face. I knew it had made contact, because I heard the sickening snap of breaking bones and I heard myself scream. But in this memory, this slither of my past which had previously been wiped out, I couldn’t feel any pain. Just emptiness. He dropped my body and I crumpled into a ball. He began to hick me as he had kicked the woman. Through my shaking vision, I saw her. Her chest did not rise or fall, and her awful sobbing had silenced. She was gone, and unable to defend me.
He kicked and kicked, again and again.
I opened my mouth to scream, but nothing came out.
That was the moment I lost my voice.
YOU ARE READING
Paper Cranes
Teen FictionIt's a paper crane, he told me. And I'll look at that old origami bird and remember it as the best day of my time with Casper Ardvan, No matter how short said time was going to be.
