Abandonment is one word to describe Evelyn Ward's childhood.
Known as an orphan freak and paranoid schizophrenic, she was dragged through years of therapy after admitting to hearing whispering voices and seeing creatures and living shadows.
...
My apartment door slammed shut behind me as I threw myself on the couch, growling in frustration. It was absolutely useless! Every day for two weeks I had left Jorden at night to train with Zev, and there had been no change. No matter how hard I tried, I made no progress.
The power he told me I had, lingered just beneath my skin. The fiery current ran through my body when I reached for it, incomparable to any other feeling, then it slipped away, lost to the darkness inside me.
Freak as a human, useless as a faerie. That was my explanation. Zev, however, insisted the fault wasn't mine, simply growing up in the human realm had hindered my abilities. Yet there seemed to be something left unspoken, more to what he thought than what he told me.
The lumpy throw pillow absorbed my anger one punch at a time. Why did everything have to be so messed up? Spending so much time with Zev didn't make me crave him any less, and now I didn't know how much I could trust him. Just how much was he hiding from me, and why?
Tears blurred my vision, the salt water drawing out my pent-up self-pity and anger as they ran down my face.
A wraith settled behind me, its raspy whispers grating against my mind, agitating me and bringing my anger to a boiling point. Lashing out, I struck at it with my fist.
Its inky depths were so icy, I yelped, withdrawing my burning hand as it skittered away, hissing at me. The skin on my hand was red and burning, and a trail of red trickled down my wrist where it had scratched me.
Throwing the poor pillow across the room, I kicked the arm of my couch, leaning back and pulling my cell phone from my pocket to call Chelsea.
After countless numbers of rings, my own voice greeted me. "Hey, this is Chelsea's phone. She's too busy doing important things to talk to you, so leave a message after the beep."
Hanging up the phone, I sighed, staring at my injured hand. It figured, no matter how well you thought you could trust someone, the moment you started depending on them, they fell away and left you in the dust.
I could've left a message, but in the last weeks, I had left her enough messages that had gone unanswered, so why bother?
Her reasons for pulling away were unknown to me, but perhaps it was my insistent self-destruction that had driven her away. Maybe she had finally had enough of being my shoulder to cry on when I felt sorry for myself, but wouldn't do anything to fix it.
I had been pushed past my breaking point and everything I did shattered me further. Maybe I wanted no part in redemption. Sometimes I wondered if I was worthy of being saved.
My soul and every piece of me was broken, and fear of being healed kept me from wanting better.
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Do you feel bad for Evelyn? Nothing seems to go right for her... But then maybe it's her fault. What do you think? Let me know in the comments!
