Eyes: Danielle Carlino

The Eyes

I sat down on the bed, sensing my mother's suspicious look. We always had a hidden language between us, a coding that certified the other when something was wrong. I was grateful for my makeup, as I had successfully hidden the small bruise on my arm, but she still knew something was wrong. She just didn't know who. 

No matter how hard I tried, how much I cried, she never noticed. Until now, it seemed. She finally cleaned her eyes, and her own irises were exposed to the hate I had experienced. His hate. The spit that had been thrown in my eyes as my fingers grasped around the bitter, cold glass of a beer bottle; begging it to sprout into some variation of Prince Charming, and unleash its sword, slaying the dragon that laid on the couch, an old movie dancing across the screen. 

As I laid on the bed, I could hear breathing downstairs, his breathing. It only made my chest tighten, but my mother placed her hand on my leg, comforting me as I sat down in the dark room. The mattress and comforters were decorated with tax papers, and different sorts of paper work; some of them empty relief checks... we all knew where they had gone. 

Just tell the truth... the truth. It's supposed to be the 'good guy' thing to do, right?... are there even good guys and bad guys anymore? I could always tell by the eyes: if someone was good or not. It had became my own super power, something I concealed unless I had to unsheathe it in my most desperate moments. This was one of them. I looked up, and saw the comfort in her irises, and I breathed. She was not like my father; this was different. She was my mother. Someone had to love me out there, right? It had to be her. She had to trust me. She had to listen to the truth. She was my mother.

I felt my words stutter before me, and as my tongue played Twister with itself, my thumbs fought each other, wrestling for dominance. After a moment of heavy breathing, and trying not to think about the consequences of the words that soon left my mouth, I structured a sentence, tears threatening to brim over my own eyes with a fatal consequence. 

"He hit me."