Solid Ground

Prologue.

Then

Tears were cascading like waterfalls down my cheek as I watched everything I knew and love walk out the door for the very last time. I closed my heavy eyes, hoping the blackness would cover the pain deep within my chest but all it did was drown out the visuals I knew were still there. Nevertheless, I quickly realized the auditory affect was just as unpleasant as the visual. The sounds I heard resonated deep within me as if I was hearing them all for the very first time.

I could hear the creak of my old wooden floors as he strode away in his favorite pair of black Givenchy boots. They were the pair I bought for him when he graduated college and also the ones he wore more than anything else he owned. I heard his watch moving against the button on his pocket as he reached to open my door. The same watch he carried around with him everywhere he went. It hadn't worked in a long time but it meant too much to him to leave behind. I heard small releases of breaths coming with every step he took.

There were sirens outside, most likely responding to a call from someone within the building concerned about what had just transpired within our upstairs apartment. There was something different about these sirens. I heard them all the time living in the city so close to a hospital so I associated them with loss and pain. I usually felt a ping in my heart every time they started up in the distance knowing that someone was suffering somewhere.

Now, as I heard them closer than ever before, I associated them with hope. I felt, for the first time in a long time, that I might make it out of this.

Hope is the only thing I was left holding onto as I heard them pull up in front of my building. I knew there was not long before someone came in here asking a whole lot of questions that I was not prepared to answer.

I knew he had reached the door when his footsteps went silent. One lock. Two locks. Three. All unlocked. I let out a loud sob as he pulled it open. The ever-present noises stopped momentarily. I hesitated to open my eyes but finally gathered the courage to face the man in front of me one last time as he spoke. You couldn't tell by the look on his face but I knew he was panicked. This time it had gone too far, he had overstepped even the farthest of his bounds.

"You have no idea--" He paused, looking down at me curled up in a ball on the floor. "You have no idea how sorry I am." If I knew anything for sure in this moment, I knew that those green eyes would stay with me for the rest of my life. He turned on his heels and was gone before I even had time to respond.

In that moment, I was finally the only person left in my small world. There was no one left for me to turn to, to confide in, or to even call. Everything I knew had just disappeared down the back stairwell and every part of my body succumbed to the unruly pain that had been threatening to take over my body for too long now.

My body was covered in bruises. Some were visible, black and blue reminders of what I had just endured. Some were too deep to even recognize from the surface anymore. Only I knew they were there and only I could understand the true pain left too far within myself to even begin to recover from.

I heard the ping of the elevator and could barely hear the officers rushing through the apartment building towards my location. I heard doors opening and shutting, probably the neighbors trying to catch a glimpse of the quiet blonde girl who lived nearby.

"In here." One of them shouted as they found me on the hardwood floor. It was a young woman in a police uniform, probably about my age. She had dark brown hair that was pulled back into a ponytail, wearing a facial expression that not even I could replicate. She was mortified as she hurried to my side, slowing down as I inched backwards from her.

A few more officers came inside and started scanning the room, taking small noticings at everything that seemed astray in my small apartment.

"Sorry." She softly smiled, trying to reassure me. "I didn't mean to startle you." Two men followed slowly behind her but she stuck her hand out in an effort to stop them momentarily. "This is Charlie." She gestured towards one of the men who I assumed were paramedics. My eyes were hard to hold open but I could tell he had about the same hair color I did. He was older though and it did not appear that he was fazed by the situation in front of him.

The other one stood a little bit further back from Charlie. "And this is Theo." His face matched the one the police officer wore when she first spotted me. She was able to compose herself quicker than he was. He had dusty brown hair and stood taller than Charlie. All I really noticed though were his quivering hands. "They are just going to look you over, okay?"

I nodded, sitting up from my position on the floor. They talked quietly between themselves for a moment then slowly approached my side, reaching for their supply kit as they assessed my wounds. I could tell they were being extra cautious, being careful not to do anything that may tamper with the evidence. Me, being the evidence of tonight's event.

I cried softly.

"My name is Cassandra." The officer smiled and found a spot right in front of me on the floor. "I know you may not want to talk about this right now but I just need as much information as you can give me, okay?" I nodded. She seemed content with the fact that I was not going to say much. "The neighbors told me they thought you live here with someone. Is he here?"

I shook my head and she wrote something down on a piece of paper. "I have officers out looking for him now. Can you tell me where you think he might have gone?"

I pointed to the door and then in the opposite direction of where they came in. There was another officer standing there watching me. The two paramedics continued their work and began wrapping up the open wounds on my body that were spilling blood. As I watched them, I quickly realized how much damage was really done.

"These cuts. Are they from the glass?" One of them, maybe Charlie, asked me. They were all surveying the room, trying to put together a story that I was not offering to give. A few bottles had been thrown, chairs were knocked over, and there were various holes in the wall that I had just taken notice to.

I shrugged my shoulders. I could not remember. I did not want to remember.

"How do you know this man?" Cassandra asked me.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and looked between the two men tending to my wounds and her. The shame and guilt I felt must have been evident on my face because she edged me further. "Are you two together?" She asked.

I shook my head and choked back a few tears. "He's my brother." Everyone in the room froze and looked in my direction. The only thing I felt in this moment was pain and I think they all felt that too. I could hear all the questions in their head as if they were shouting them from the rooftops. Who could do that to their family? Aren't brothers supposed to protect their sisters? My throat burned as the truth spilled out one last time. "My brother did this."