The Sky Grows Grey ~ Chapter 3

The last time I looked at the clock it was 6:30 in the morning, and he was still in his deep slumber. His loud snoring was irritating and made it difficult for me to fall asleep. It wasn’t until I was overtaken with pure exhaustion that I must have dozed off. When I awoke, the sheets were damp with my sweat. The dried blood held the sheets tightly on the mattress and stuck them to my skin. I felt groggy, and my body was sore as I stumbled out of bed. The alarm clock showed 9:30 a.m., and for a second, I panicked until I realized that it was Saturday morning, my morning off, my day off. I wearily limped into the bathroom; and I headed for the toilet to begin to clean up the mess my body had made. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught the first reflected images of myself since the night before.

I stopped, dead in my steps, and faced the mirror. My achy eyes struggled to focus because I had not removed my gas permeable contact lenses the night before, and I was unsure if I would be able to open my eyes wide enough to remove them. The dryness caused a burning sensation as I struggled to open my tight swollen lids. From the painful sensation, my eyes began to water, but my eyes quickly gained focus.

What came into view frightened me; my face was swollen, bruised, and battered. I did not recognize myself. It looked as if a demonic face had taken the place of my own. The once thin porcelain face with sunken in cheeks lightly dusted with my brown sugary trademark, my freckles, was replaced by a face swollen to its limits. The face was so swollen the skin had just split open. Instead of the pale white skin that resided upon my frail skeleton of a face, my face donned a new color skin, one of blues, greens, purples and reds. Some places even looked as if the skin were black. My once big chocolate brown eyes could not be seen from the thin slits I looked out from. There were no longer lids above the eyes; instead they were replaced with two purple puffballs that hid the long luscious eyelashes that brushed the inside of my sunglasses as I wore them. The uneven swells and dips in the face reminded me of the peaks and valleys of the Colorado mountains that I loved to visit so much. The difference was the cracks on the top of the peaks that looked more like volcanoes with streaks of lava rock left behind from a recent lava flow.

The tears began to flow once again, and once again, the salty transparent liquid burned my face as they rolled up the peaks and back down the valleys. My ears were two purple masses that resembled an Aster Lilliput Blue Moon, a flower with its pale outer rims deepening in purplish color toward the center, which is red in hue. My sterling silver frog earrings dangled down from my lobes, but the posts were barely visible due to the swelling around them. I reached for the back of the left one and could barely fit my quivering fingers behind the lobe. The swelling accounted for the lack of room. The back pulled off fairly easy. However, I would not be so lucky with the right ear. I could not fit my fingers behind the ear at all. The swelling was too great, so I went into the closet and grabbed the toolbox, which contained the needle nose pliers I required for the removal of the earring back. Luckily, they were the right size to grasp onto the tiny back of the earring. Unfortunately, pulling on the post was pretty painful. The post was stuck into the swollen knot behind my ear. Because pulling slowly was way too painful, I had to yank the earring out. I felt as if I had pulled a large thorn from my skin. I dropped both the earring and the pliers at once and touched the knot. When I brought my hand to the front of my face. The tip of my finger was stained with the same crimson liquid, which spilled from my body the night before. I gasped. I never realized there was so much blood in my body to loose, and I had already lost so much.

I reached into the cabinet to get the softest washcloth I could find, because I knew the rougher ones would be much too harsh for the task at hand. I turned on the warm water from the tap, and dampened the cloth. I squirted my face cleaner on the cloth and began to wash the dried black streaks of blood from my face. The burning of the cleanser and the pain of the light circular pressure from the soft cloth made my eyes water, but I did not stop. I couldn’t stop, even if I wanted to. I knew the failure to cleanse the wounds could cause an infection that could lead to even more scarring than what was already the result of my unfortunate circumstance. As I cleansed the peaks left behind from those strong fists, the volcanoes once again erupted. One by one, I cleaned them, dried them, and bandaged them. There was a total of six bandages fixed upon my face.

I limped from the bathroom and thought to myself, “Why am I limping?” I lifted my nightgown and saw it sitting there on my leg. It looked as if someone had implanted a tangerine under my skin. The skin was stretched and red with a purplish center. It floated above the rest of the skin on my thigh. Why had I not noticed this the night before? When did it happen? I rubbed on the knot to try to cause the swelling to lessen. I have always known how to hide the bumps and bruises left behind by the abuse at another’s hand, and I don’t remember when I learned this. However, I know it is something I’ve known since my earliest memories.

…My little brother and I were playing around with each other like we always did. We would race to the kitchen once dinner was ready and push and shove each other out of the way to ‘fight’ over who gets to eat first. Sometimes, I would win, and sometimes, he would too. We giggled as we spatted each other’s hands and made one another drop the spoon or forks we were holding. I thought things were no different than what they usually were, so I paid no attention to the looming figure behind us. If we could see the glare in his eyes, we would have known that we were asking, practically begging, to get hurt today. However, we were so caught up in our game that we couldn’t see. I managed to get the potatoes, corn, and country fried steak on my plate, as did my brother. At the same instant, we both reached for the gravy ladle to drown our potatoes with the delicious white gravy our daddy had prepared. When my brother spatted my hand, I dropped the ladle. My brother threw his head back and laughed at the top of his lungs as he said, “How are you going to clean that gravy off of the ceiling?” His crooked teeth reflected the light overhead.

“Wow!!! I guess I’ll have to get the step stool to reach that one,” I replied.

“GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!!!! There will be no dinner for either one of you!” Daddy yelled.

My baby brother’s eyes filled with tears as he sat his plate down. “It wasn’t his fault Daddy. I know better than to pick on him like that. Please, Daddy, please let him eat.” My daddy moved toward my brother, but I stepped in between them. I pushed my little brother back as my father towered over us. I could see the fury in his brilliant green eyes, and I could see that someone was going to get hurt today. I could see in his eyes that my brother would not survive this one, but I knew I could take on the blows that he couldn’t. That small boy tugged at my shirt, and I quickly turned around and shoved him as my father moved closer. “Go! Go on, now! Get out of here! Hide!” I screamed.

My long hair was grabbed, and I was tossed to the floor. My eyes filled with tears as I yelled, “Daddy, he’s just a little boy. It’s my fault. I know better.” The fact that I was only two years older never crossed my mind. I stood and faced my father, but he turned after my brother anyway. “YOU KNOW YOU ARE A SORRY SON OF A BITCH!” That got his attention. He was no longer worried about what my brother did. I knew ‘that’ particular phrase was the thing that no one could say to Daddy. I knew that was the phrase that would make him turn on God had He spoke it. I really didn’t feel that way, but my brother’s safety was my only thought.

Daddy punched hard into my gut. The force of the blow from the six-foot man threw my little five-foot body back. I tried to steady myself so I wouldn’t fall. I knew I had to take the blows because if I didn’t, it would only get worse. Daddy tackled me to the floor. His large body pressed into mine while he wrapped his hands around my tiny neck. The pile of dirty laundry in front of the dryer cushioned my fall to the floor. The weight of his body kept me from being able to pull any air into my lungs. My vision began to fade as I looked into my Daddy’s fiery eyes. The smell of cheap beer filled the air. I tried to stay awake, but there were dark circles around the view I had held. I could hear screaming and crying from behind him. The last thing I remember seeing was my mother on Daddy’s back. Her arm was wrapped around his neck, and the other grabbed the top of his head.

My brother and I never played like that again, at least not in the presence of Daddy….

Once the pain had begun to subside, I stood up straight and tall and glimpsed at the room around me, which looked as if it were a war-zone. Books that toppled from the bookshelf were scattered on the floor. Blood splatters were on the wall and the headboard of the bed, and drops of blood could be seen in the carpet, which led from the bathroom to the bed, from the bed to the light switch, from the light switch to the table, and finally, from the table back to the bed. The blood soaked sheets would have to be disposed of, and new sheets would have to be bought. The painting of a lily that once hung on the wall had fallen to the floor. The broken hand carved frame of the painting was in desperate need of mending. A bloody handprint ran up the white wall next to the door facing of the apartment and stopped at the light switch. Blood was splattered on the glass of the fifty-gallon hexagonal fish aquarium, but the puffer fish and black shark inside were oblivious to the world outside of the aquarium. They swam around as usual darting in and out of the porcelain castle I had bought for them from the pet store in the mall. A bloody smudge could be seen on the glass of the television where I must have bumped into it as I tried to find my way around the darkened room.

I went into the kitchen to grab a bucket of cleansers from under the kitchen sink. Pain shot through my body from my foot. The broken scotch bottle in the floor supported my suspicions that the violence began well before I returned home from work the previous evening. The green glass of the bottle was scattered across the kitchen floor. On the linoleum, a new indentation and tear could be seen. I knew the new tear must be where the thick green bottle impacted the floor. I hopped back from the glass on one foot and left behind a trail of bright red drops of blood. I eased myself down onto the carpet next to the ugly harvest gold linoleum and propped my foot on my knee. I examined my foot and found one large and two small shards of green glass protruding from the ball and arch of my foot. I carefully grabbed the pieces of glass and, one by one, pulled them from my foot. I could not get to the cabinets that held the washcloths from where I sat, and I did not want to get more blood on the carpet, so I pulled off my blood stained nightgown, and I tied it around the new wounds.

With my arsenal of cleaning supplies, I stood up and went hard at work to erase the previous nights’ sins. As I began to scrub, I wondered, ‘Where could he be? Why had he left? Did he leave for good? Did the images that greeted him when he first opened his eyes this morning instill a sense of guilt in him forever? Am I finally free?’

The answer to the last three questions would be no; he did not leave. He would never leave and not take me with him. I would be his prisoner for all time. If he did feel initial guilt, it would never stick; and I was not free of him, not yet anyway. His key scraped against the door-lock as it found the keyhole, and my body began to shudder when I heard the turn of the key. As the door opened, and his foot crossed the threshold, I wondered, ‘What would my immediate fate be? What is he going to do to me?’


...to be continued...