It was completely silent to my ears as I looked at Jonah, excepting my own ragged breathing as I stared at the scariest thing that had happened to me today; the mafia pervert from earlier was a pussycat compared the anger I knew to be roaring in Jonah.My irrational, shocked mind was wishing that the legth of hall between us was much longer. He stepped down from the stairway, casually picking a stray thread from his suit jacket. I winced as the thread snapped.
Neither of us spoke for a moment; I looked at his face, my own frozen in shock; he looked at the floor by my feet, and I didn't know what he was thinking. Suddenly, as if prompted by some unknown signal, his gaze lifted up, travelling slowly along the line of my legs, over my hips, tracing the line of my chest, and resting on my face. An ugly sneer grew on Jonah's features, and my feet unconsciously shifted back slightly, my shoulders pressing against the front door.
My heel scraped across the tiling, squeaking loudly. I glanced down at my feet for a microsecond, but a microsecond was all Jonah needed to start bounding down the short hallway. In a short moment he had his meaty fingers around my neck, and he lifted me up; I gasped for breath as my feet dangled 6 inches above the ground. Trembling, my fingers tugged fruitlessly at his iron grip, but there was no deterring the monster that called himself my stepfather. Jonah's face was ugly, twisted with a hatred that I didn't know I deserved; his fingers tightened on my neck as he pulled me forward and back quickly, smashing the back of my head against the doorframe. I blinked hard, blinded for a second. I gasped, coughing.
"Let me go.." My words were mere wind in the face of his anger. His eyes were scarier than I'd ever seen, crazed like an enraged bull and bulging with anger. My mind, albeit getting oxygen-starved as it was, was frozen on the simple questions that pulled at my heart - Why did he hate me so much? What did I do to get him so angry? Wasn't there any way I could placate him?
Jonah seemed to know a way. Tears ran down my reddening face as his other hand ripped at my borrowed dress, tearing the seams. My trembling grew to shuddering as he pulled off my clothes. He shredded the shawl off along with the gown, and hs hand released me suddenly. I fell to the floor, gasping dizzily, my arm trying to cover me whilst I massaged my aching throat. Jonah knelt on my thighs, reaching down to my feet and ignoring my cries of pain. He grasped my ankle with one hand, whilst grappling the heel of my t-bar dress shoes and wrenching with all his might. I screamed, my cry dissolving into loud sobs. He casually slapped me across the face, knocking my chin into the tiling of the floor, and my sobbing lessened as I tried not to incite more of his violence.
It was to no avail; he suddenly seemed to realise the shoes wouldn't come off without undoing the straps, and he reached for his trouser pocket. My cries turned into terrified gasps as he pulled out a pen-knife. At this close range I could smell the alchohol on his breath, and at that moment I really believed I was being punished by some higher being; Jonah was my hell, and there was nothing I could do.
I pressed my forehead against the tiling, squeezing my eyes shut and simultaneously gritting my teeth. The sobs still wracked my body, but I tried to keep my leg still as I knew what was to come..
My expectations were not lowered, as I felt the cold blade against my skin. A second later I felt the pain, as it cut across my flesh in Jonah's drunken attempt to take all items of clothing off me. The strap snapped before the blade went into muscle, and I gasped through my teeth as he grasped my other leg. Another casual blow that I hadn't realised was coming smashed my head once more into the doorframe, and as I rested my head on the tiles again, I felt a wetness leaking behind my ear down to my cheek; the latest knock had me bleeding, my hair soaking almost immediately.
I felt Jonah's pocket knife againt my ankle again, but this time it was stabbed in - either Jonah was too drunk the realise which way he pointed the blade, or he just liked to see me bleed. Regardless, I screamed through gritted teeth as I felt the knife point scrape against the ball of my ankle joint.
My vision was going blurry again, and I wondered vaguely, in a remote part of my mind, how much blood I'd lost. Jonah would keep me bleeding throughout the night, not allowing me access to any aid.
I thought, this is it. I'm gonna be dead by morning. I could faintly hear Jonah's sadistic laughter over the buzzing filling my ears, and I realised that I wasn't going to die. Dying would be far too easy an escape from my hell. If I did die and go to hell, would I notice the difference anyway?
My thoughts went hazy, and Jonah's laughter seemed to mingle with someone's sobs. I assumed they were mine, as the person sounded familiar, before I realised my teeth were still gritted, my breath too ragged. Jonah was yelling now, I could hear, yelling at the sobbing, at the other voices - my thoughts went to earlier this evening - Ariel, her brother Carter; as I clung to the memories I could hear their voices in my buzzing ears. My eyes fluttered, and closed, everything going dark, but I could still hear Ariel and Carter, and someone that sounded like Carter but more baritone, and a mingle of other voices. I felt cold, and I shivered, as I tried to keep listening to those voices. Jonah was yelling at the voices now. My fingers twitched with a suddenurge to slap him for yelling at my voices. I tried to laugh at my newfound ferocity, but I merely huffed a sigh. It sounded like a death rattle.
Jonah's bear-roars were receding. I've lost too much blood, I thought. I never even got to see Ariel one last time, never got to finish telling my story to Carter. I wondered vaguely if they would miss me. I felt something warm press against my cold fingers. They felt too numb to squeeze back the grip that held them. Even Ariel's voice, the most prominent, was fading now. She sounded worried as she got fainter. That was funny, my hazy mind thought. Ariel was never worried about anything, except about me. Like the time I fell off the school gym apparatus, or the other day when she stole my watch. I huffed out a chuckle. Ariel shouldn't worry. When I was gone, she'd not have to. I made my cold lips smile, barely feeling like they were part of my face anymore - I'd almost forgotten I even had a body. I felt detached, cold and detached... my mind slipped into a black netherworld.
I woke up. That itself surprised me, the first time I opened my eyes after. When you believe and accept that you're dying, waking up alive is always a surprise.
My eyes were blurry, and filmed with a red tint, so it took me a moment to orient myself. I blinked the flim on my eyes away hard before I could see properly. I was looking at a ceiling, a white, clean ceiling. I was relieved it wasn't red or flaming - maybe I'd simply substituted that hell for this one though, I thought, as I looked to my right and saw only blurry white. Maybe I was going to live hell in a frozen wasteland.
However, I didn't feel cold anymore. I could even feel my body properly now, though my head was still blurry as I did a body-parts count. My legs felt heavy, my arms felt sore, my back and neck felt strained. But they were there. I closed my eyes again for a second, my mind slowly getting clearer. I could concentrate on my senses again.
I could feel somthing soft and cushioned below me which I lay on, though my legs felt kind of crusty and solid despite the pillowing. Another soft sheet covered me, and I realised I was in a bed.
I could smell disinfectant, and a citrus tang that comes with recycled air. I could hear the ticking of a clock, which was strange - I'd never had the luxury of a proper analogue clock, not since I lived in my mom's apartment.
I wondered for a moment if hell was lulling me into a false sense of security, and I opened my eyes to the left this time. More white; a bed table; a monitor that flashed lights in a pattern I couldn't quite force my mind to decipher; and a flash of red, dark red that pulled at my heart in a familiar ache. I blinked, forcing my eyes to focus - as they did, all thoughts of hell flew out of my mind. I raised one lead-heavy arm to poke the redheaded lump curled up in the white armchair beside my bed, my face falling into an easy grin as Ariel woke up, arms flailing like a bad ninja and eyes wide and unseeing. She suddenly focused on me, and in a second all I could see was dark red hair. It reminded me of a time not too far back, at school, when she'd thrown her arms aorund me in a running hug. It seemed like years, but I realised it was probably only two days ago, if that had been the sun shining through the white-framed window. The day after the masked formal.
My arms lay flat for a moment, before I forced them to pick up their lead-heavy selves and suddenly I was squeezing her back, my face buried in her red locks as I pressed her tight against me, taking comfort in the warmth and familiarity of my best friend.
"Ariel!" I whispered into her hair. "Where are we?" I could feel her swallowing before replying.
"In the city hospital." Her voice was thick, and she didn''t elaborate. One hand was stroking my hair, and I thought I could feel a wetness on my shoulder that indicated tears.
"Oh. For a moment I though I was in hell." I'd tried to make it sound like a joke, but I immediately realised it was the wrong thing to say. Ariel tensed beside me, then her body started shaking slightly, and I could hear little put-put sounds that I recognised as her crying. I rubbed my hand on her shoulder blade, hugging her tight and shh-ing her comfortingly, like my mom used to do to me. I didn't know why I was comforting her, but I knew I had to.
Ariel didn't make any other sound for a few minutes, when her crying abated to thick gasps of breath. I squeezed her in a tight hug once more before pulling back to look at her, my expression concerned and quizzical. Her eyes were puffy in a way that told me she'd been crying a lot, and her eyes spilled tears silently once more as she met my gaze. She caught my hands in hers, and held them between us, as she sat up to perch on the edge of the hospital.
[[Continued in part 2]]