Sleepless Nights

Frozen Peas

   Abbie slugged up the steps leading to her tiny house. The twinge in her stomach was becoming too much to bear, and her head throbbed in sync with her heartbeat. While explaining the story to Crane she purposely left out the many moments her body was left gasping for air. When crane restrained her the feeling of her lungs being sealed up and packaged away to be sent overseas was overwhelming.  Undoubtedly sympthoms of her asthma that's plagued her since she could remember. She thought Crane would actually kill her. Abbie doubled over on her steps to breathe evenly again.  Did he break a rib? 'Pull yourself together girl' she told herself.  She stood up straight and thought about the lie Jenny would be told. 'You were. Injured while answering  a domestic call. Nah she'll never believe that. Jenny knows everyone in this town she'll want to know who the unfortunate couple was.' Abbie decided to tell the truth if Jenny asked. When has lies ever made things easy  between them anyway? Abbie opened the door and noticed all of the lights were off. Jenny wasn't home. After thanking every God that was out there she hissed as she shrugged the jacket off of her indisposed shoulders.  Abbie stopped to look at her all too familiar living room with a feeling of security.  Something dared to come up from the pit of her being. Half sprinting to the bathroom, she tripped over one of Jenny's shoes and landed on the floor on all fours. Abbie made a mental note to remind Jenny to stop leaving her shoes out...again. Luckily Abbie made it to the bathroom in time. She spilled all of the Chinese food she had into the toilet. 'I guess it wasn't a good idea to eat right after having all that pressure on your stomach' she chastised herself. She figured that hugging the toilet for hours wouldn't make the pain go away, so she forced herself to stand. Seconds after searching the medicine cabinet she found some pain relievers and quickly popped them into her mouth. A few moments later there qas a bath drawn. The water felt so warm on her tightened muscles. She wasn't the type of girl to cry in front of people. In fact, she prided herself on being the suffer in silence type. Ichabod made her cry today. Which was the first time she's cried since he pulled that lame ass suicide stunt. If it were anyone else they would have been locked up, but she knew Crane didn't mean to do it. 'Never wake a sleeping soldier'she thought.  The pills were starting to make her sleepy, so she got out of the tub and put her pink robe on.  It was so hard brushing her teeth while looking away from her reflection, but she managed. After filing off to her room she fell into a  comfortable sleep.

   She awoke to the smell of bacon, and immediately squinted her eyes tight. The banging in her head mimicked the mornings in college after a long night of partying.  Moving was bad, her body felt like a boulder was on top of it. Slipping on a grey pair of sweatpants and a red long sleeved shirt, she slowly walked into the kitchen.

  "Thought you were dead for a second there, "Jenny joked as she sipped an huge cup of tea.

"What time is it, "Abbie asked wryly.

"Half past eleven. Do you want some tea because you look like-"

"No i'll make some coffee. What time did you get in last night," Abbie inquired.

"Like twelve. Why, was there a problem," Jenny began to feel like there was something wrong with her sister.

  They weren't as close as they used to be, but Jenny could always tell when something's bothering her.

"No there wasn't a problem,"Abbie lied.

The timer on the stove went off as Abbie made her instant coffee in her Keureg.

"Ooh yes the biscuits are done. Hey Abbs can you hand me the plates,"Jenny sounded genuinely happy.

Abbie's heart dived straight for her toes. The plates were high up. That would hurt.

"uhh are you gonna hand me the plates or not they're like right there," Jenny teased.

"Oh...yeah," Abbie responded just above a whisper.

Abbie reached for the tall cabinet with clenched teeth. Her shoulder wouldn't flex right, and her stomach felt as if she had done  a thousand sit ups and planks. Her shirt rose up to reveal a bit of her milk chocolate skin. Jenny stared at her sister suspiciously when she eyed the purple and black bruises trailing across her stomach.

"Ahh okay here, two plates," Abbie exhaled as she turned to meet her sister's gaze.

"What," she exclaimed.

  Jenny pointed at her still-raised shirt. Abbie immediately tugged her shirt over the baggy sweatpants she forgot to return to Luke after the breakup.

"How'd you get that? It looks a bit odd. Did Moloch send one of his lame demons again, " she questioned.

Abbie looked like a deer in headlights. Jenny turned to take the biscuits out of the oven.

"Not exactly,"Abbie sighed.

"Crane may have attacked me...kinda I don't know," Abbie finally blurted out.

  Jenny dropped the pan of perfectly golden biscuits onto the counter with a clang. She spun around towards her sister.

"What the hell do you mean he attacked you? How don't you know? Did he or didn't he," Jenny damn near screamed.

Abbie fiddled with the spoon in her coffee. Jenny is known to overreact in situations like this. There was an older boy in one of the many foster care homes they'd lived in that liked to sneak into Abbie and Jenny's room at night. He wouldn't do anything to them he'd just whisper things to Abbie while Jenny slept. Weird things like, "You're my sister now. Family is everything. I'm the oldest, so you have to do what I say no matter what it is,"

The next day Abbie told Jenny what the boy had said. Jenny stayed up the entire night waiting for him to come in, and when he did she beat him up with a sock filled with rocks. He never came back again.

"He did except he didn't know it was me," Abbie said shakily.

  Jenny crossed her arms and quirked her eyebrow, "Please do explain."

Abbie went through the entire story this time. The horrifying moment when Crane's hand briefly went to her throat, and the time he covered her mouth as she tried to speak. Abbie didn't like to appear weak in front of her sister, because if Jenny were in the same situation Ichabod would have left with basically every bone broken. After the conversation was over, Jenny asked to see the bruises. Abbie shifted her weight and lifted her shirt up so Jenny could inspect.

"Those are gonna need to be iced," Jenny said as she got a bag of frozen peas out of the freezer.

"Thanks," Abbie groaned.