All is fair in Love and Strikes (Sprace)

Chapter 9 I Race

I was thrown to the concrete floor, hitting the wall as I clutched my bleeding arm. "Stay down there!" An angry voice yelled from the top of the stairs. The basement door slammed shut and I heard the lock click. 'Like I have a choice,' I thought, lip quivering. I felt a hot tear slide down my left cheek and to my cracked, bleeding lips. The salty taste invaded my dry mouth. I relished the taste of the first drop of liquid I had consumed in almost two days. I made my way over to a cracked mirror in the corner. I looked at my shirt which was three times my size. It was caked with a thick layer of dirt, blood, soot, and sweat. I lifted it, revealing my scared, frail body. I hadn't eaten in weeks, I didn't know how many as there were no windows in the basement, the days just ran into each other. My only sense of time was when that evil, lunatic of a man, Joseph came to kick me awake to start breakfast. That was around 5 in the morning. You could practically count my ribs, my limbs were like toothpicks and my eyes were sunken in and shallow, they had lost their light years before. The only part of me that looked half human was my dark, wavy hair. Sure, it was a rat's nest, sure it had months worth of dust and grease, but it was the only thing that didn't have the memories of a beating. 

I took the candle, hot wax dripping down the sides, from the floor next to my make-shift bed of a thin, scratchy blanket and a block of scrap wood for a pillow. I slowly lifted the lit candle to my hand. I screamed in agony as I felt my flesh char from the blistering heat of the fire. I pulled my hand away. How is it that such a tiny thing could cause so much pain? Why is it that only one thing can cause a world of torture?  I was around four when my mother died of typhus, I was nine now. Five years. Five years worth of pain and suffering and abuse inflicted by my father. No. Not father. A father cares for you. This was just a man who screwed my mother resulting in my 'oh so unfortunate' birth.

I laid in my "bed"  and picked up the old shard of glass that sat next to the block of wood I called a pillow. I glanced at my pitiful reflection, but I didn't see the bloodied, bruised child I was, I saw a little boy skipping through the streets of New York, his parents in tow. The man kissed his wife on the cheek and they smiled as their little boy began playing with a young child around his age selling newspapers on the street corner. I half smiled, remembering the kid I once was. 

I took the glass and let it glide across my skin, pushing harder and harder with each stroke until  fresh blood flowed from my wrist, as it had done the night before, and the night before that. I put the glass back in its home beside the block of wood and fell into a dreamless sleep, staring at the ceiling wondering what it would be like to see the stars again, or better yet, join my mother in the clouds.

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I shuddered at the memory, trying to hold back the tears that dared escape my eyes. "Six years," I said, choking over the river that still threatened to fall. "Six years of that happening routinely. Six years until I got the guts to run. Six years of that terrible man who I vowed never cross paths with ever again." I saw a tear escape Spot's eye. Spot was crying. Spot never cried. Not in front of anyone at least. He wrapped his arms around me and I buried my face in his shoulder. I couldn't take it anymore. I let it all out, sobbing into the shoulder of the boy I loved while he kept his hands firmly on my back, holding me as close as possible, stroking my back with his thumb.

It felt like forever before Medda came back with the water and towel. Spot covered my chest with a nearby blanket so she wouldn't see my abusive history. She gave a concerned look to Spot. He nodded his head in the direction of the door, silently requesting her absence. She got the hint and left quickly. 

We sat in silence as Spot cleaned my fresher cuts. He opened his mouth to speak but closed it again. He sighed and shook his head. "It was me mudda's." I looked at him. Well, I kinda was already doing that, dreaming about what it would feel like to crash my lips onto his, have him kiss back with just as much passion while I ran my fingers through his messy, light brown hair. "hmm?" I asked, breaking out of my trance. I think I have Spot Conlonitis, I just can't focus on anything when he's around. Well, anything but him. "Da key, it was me mudda's. She had this box. It had old photos in it. Some with me, some with me bruddas, some with me whole family. This key unlocked it. Right before-" He gulped. "Right before she died, she unclasped it from her neck and placed it me hand. My fadda went crazy, set da house on fi'ah while me bruddas and I'se was sleepin'. I'se was ten. I- I'se was usin' da bathroom when I smelled smoke comin' from da kitchen. I looked down da stairs to see fi'ah takin' ova da whole staircase. I ran to wake me bruddas but the only one who would get up was William. He was five. We tried and tried but the othas would't stir. I jumped out da window, hurting me leg. I promised William I would catch him. But he just stood at that window on da second floor. Wouldn't move. I begged him to jump but he was frozen, eyes bigga then anything I'se eva seen. I watched as da flames surrounded him. He smiled and waved at me, and ran back in. I ran as fast and far away as I could. I came back da next mornin', finding William's almost entirely disintegrated skeleton clutched around da othas. The only thing I found intact was me mudda's box'a photos."