hi
August 4th:
Her legs throb, her heels splintering, and her knees are grinding together. She keeps walking, though, her eyes bloodshot and stinging as she hasn't slept in two days, her nights spent in tears. She keeps moving forwards against the pressure of the wind pushing her backward, her hair whipping behind her. She moves forward, handling all of her emotions as ammunition.
Her shoulders are red and peeling, stinging at the touch. Her eyes cloud as if the watercolors of her world have faded. The crayons used to paint her picture are too broken of the point of use. Leaving her with pencils to shade. Everything feels drab, a frown etched on her face.
Words are being whispered into either of her ears, carried by the wind. People stare at her oddly, her clothing sweaty and dirty. Mara concentrates on the words and not their eyes.
Go back, they love you no matter what, the more sympathetic of the two voices whispers into her ear. This voice is thick and seductive, drawing on her heartstrings. It is overpowered, though, by the tumultuous voice whispering in her other ear.
Keep going. People can never love you, especially now. This voice is resolute. It is like glass shards in her ears, cutting the strings between her mind and her heart. It pushed her further, father, moving past the grief.
Different cars slow down, passing her, throwing her worried glances through their glass windows. She keeps moving forward, her head raised, staring at no real point but ahead. Ignoring the phone that vibrates in her hands, powering it off.
23 missed calls from Ryn.
47 missed calls from Elias.
Mara keeps moving forward with the one thought in mind; terror. She is scared, terrified that they will send her to the room with white walls. An enclosed space where no colors are allowed. Where the outside world is shut away from inside the hollow walls. Even more afraid that Elias will be mad, she betrayed his trust after all.
Her promises are empty, weightless. They soar with the birds she wishes she can become. Being a glass doll doesn't sound so bad, she can shatter to the point of unrepair, and they will just replace her. She can be heartless, with no internal strength but stuffing. Make her destruction the fracture of a toy and not the tearing down of a person who can, or could, be.
So she keeps moving ahead, not looking back, gripping the polaroid to her heart.
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Trigger Warning beyond this point - abuse, drugs, etc.
The world seems more merciful at night time. You can blame everything on being wasted, and society will believe you. Everything immoral can be buried behind dark niches, so people will only see the immeasurable. You can be anything in the night and anyone. Mara can be Madonna if she really wants to. All it will take is a wig and some acting, makeup if she wants to go full out.
Like a child playing dress-up, you can escape your skin for the night. Shed your history like an outfit and become an astronaut flown out to space. A paleontologist, discovering the world's largest unearthed dinosaur.
A bird, soaring above it all.
But during the day, Mara feels on utter display as she walks towards the familiar abandoned warehouse. The brick exterior is decaying, as the entire building seemed to tip towards you, bound to fall. Colorful graffiti tags covering all the metal doors, locked with rusted chains that are easily breakable with some force.
The security system, once inside, though, is almost impenetrable. Two men stand guarded with weapons, the skull and crossbones tattoos snaking around their necks enough to turn anyone off. Some of them have teardrops marked in ink, below their eyes, a sign that they've killed before.
Mara had seen it before, what they can do. What he can do. It doesn't turn her off like it should have, rather, intrigued her. She found the danger enticing, the recklessness charming. She was enamored by him, and his work, and his hold over her. She felt wanted, maybe a little used in some circumstances, but desired nonetheless.
She always finds herself back to him, his work, his danger. Back to the cigarette burns on her shoulders and back, his branding, his fire. As long as she stays in line, she is his property, his girl. With that title, she is like royalty to the gang, his lackeys have to serve her.
She loves the power and doesn't mind what she has to do to come by it. She is his bubbly, faithful Harley Quinn. And he is her sociopathic Joker.
He wasn't much older than her as they met on the streets. Both of them runaways, they used each other to survive. What he didn't know was the entropy that brewed beneath her fingertips. What she didn't know was that he was the heir to the most malignant don.
They were just two kids with shattered backgrounds, marking the streets with their fire. Creating trouble for the fun of it, the thrill that made them want more. Craving it.
Then his father was killed, and he inherited it all. All the money, the power. All the targets traced on his back in blood ink. And on the flip side, she met Ryn, falling into a less chaotic lifestyle that didn't put marks on her back, but smoke inside her lungs. And they survived, in the same world, on the reverse sides of what was once their city. Their paths never crossed, their fingertips never danced in the joint fire again.
But, somehow, somewhere, they met again. And Mara was seduced into the lifestyle, the power. He lived off his domination over her, the control. A toxic feeling that had somewhere, twisted in all the vines of wretchedness and violation, become their variant of love.
She knocks against the metal door three sluggish times. Hesitating, she knocks one last time, the code of entrance. It takes a minute, but eventually, the door swings open, revealing a man with dark skin and a sickly smile. He stares at her, his eyes raking over her absence of clothing.
Tino is the right-hand man, the one to tell the rest what to do. He has more experienced than the rest of them, his black eyes guarded at the lives he's seen lost. Some of those lives were taken by himself, a natural-born killer, he doesn't have compassion.
"Ah, look who it is, la Princesa," he mocks, blocking her entrance with a wide stance. His hand rests in his pocket, a silent warning of her testing.
Tino isn't afraid of anything other than himself. He only has one appearance, hatred, which he is demonstrating as of now. His eyes concentrate as he stares at her like a predator, she is helpless prey to his vindication.
"Moverse," her tongue is thick, her unused Spanish almost second nature. Her family is part Hispanic but only ever speaks English. She learned her native languages on the streets, some of her language is broken but understandable by most. "Let me in."
"What makes you think you can just come back here," he chuckles heartlessly, bringing his lip ring into his mouth. Tino is older than the bunch, maybe thirty, but he still looks like a teenager. Most of the boys called him babyface behind his back, always behind his back.
Never to his face, that would be their last words spoken.
"You've been gone a while, little M. Things changed, the boss is a little pissed off with you," Tino hints. Mara shakes her head, crossing her arms over her chest angrily. She should be afraid of Tino, that sensation in her chest tightening. But she isn't because what does she have to lose, other than herself. And she is so far depleted that she could care less. The one person she cares about most probably hates her existence.
"And yet I always come back," she pushes past him into the warehouse. She's met by the cutting air, a way to keep the men intact. To keep them scared, he had always said. A shiver coursing through her spine as everyone's attention turns towards her, their eyes calculating. Each of them smiles knowingly, watching her depleting figure disappear towards his office.
Mara matches each of their gazes with her own, wordlessly daring them to act. She lives in a state of destruction, and these men want blood. She doesn't mind giving it, as long as she gets the power, the authority. She wants the worshiping of her, the fear that laces their eyes.
She doesn't knock on his door, walking in with a slam of his door hinges. Seeing another girl on his lap doesn't turn her off, she just glares at her. Mara's eyes are glacial, revengeful. The girl can easily notice that Mara has nothing to live for and nothing to lose. The worst kind of person to deal with since they have no care.
There he sits in his desk chair, the jagged scar running down the side of his face. His dirty blonde hair is longer, but his chilling green eyes are the same amount of bitterness pooling in them. He looks at her, smiling keenly, as he watches her push the other girl incessantly.
"Hello, Liam," Mara greets, her voice charming. She wants him to want her, to keep her. She has nowhere else to go, she knows Elias will have talked to Ryn, so she can't go there. And home is never an option these days.
"I see your desperation, it's a turn-off," he says with an eerie smile. He likes her jealousy, her easy temper. The way she will worship one person, and one person only, when in a manic state of mind. He most of all likes his dominance and her submissiveness.
The gears inside her head are moving at a fast speed, but the world seems to slow down. She watches as lips move, as words caress her eardrums but make no indentation. The way she buzzes with all the memories of this place encasing her at once.
"I'm back," she whispered, her hands sliding up his shoulders. It feels wrong, touching him, not like it feels like with Elias. But she is desperate, and Liam is the only person who had never turns her away, as long as she has something to offer.
"Mmhm," his hand catches hers, bringing it to his lips. He kisses her wrists, sending goosebumps up her arms. Not the genuine kind, though, the sort that makes the hair on the back of her neck standing at alert. She isn't afraid of Liam or of what he can do, but it all feels off.
"So, can I come back?" She murmurs into his ears.
"No," he smirks, pushing her away.
She stumbles back, her eyes wide as her spine crashes into the wall with authority. Her head almost grazes the edge of the framed picture, his father watching over them all. She deflates, her shoulders hunching over as she stares at him in surprise.
She can smell the cigarette on his breath, the whisky on his lips. His eyes are red, a bit hazy. His actions are sluggish. But his words, his words are crisp and cutting, piercing her.
"N- no?" Mara blunders, regaining her composure. She will have to work harder, this is her only option of survival at this point.
"You owe me money, remember. Until you bring it, you are of no use to me." He shrugs, turning back towards his paperwork. More enraged than before, Mara swings her fists towards his desk. Again, he catches his wrists before she makes contact, his skin burning into hers. That rippling feeling, savoring her again.
"You can leave," he sighs, pushing her away with more force, more determination. She is wasting his time.
"But I need you," she pleads, beggingly. She tries to trace his shoulders with a light brush of her fingertips. How he used to like it, but his hand catches hers, this time clutching it harshly, he bruises her skin.
"I don't need you, though. I have Candice, who you so rudely got rid of. You left, you lost your place, now you can go."
So she leaves, with nowhere else to go, and she wanders. She wanders until she comes to the once place that will never turn her away. And she sits down, letting the tears consume her in choking sobs. Letting the ache penetrate her torn heart.
She is lost, gone with the breeze and entirely destroyed.
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Authors Note:
Thoughts?
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- Nia
Edited 4/6/22