CHAPTER ONE. THE RANG
You,” my voice broke before I could control it. I felt it splinter in my throat, then sharp like broken glass. “You made me abort our baby.”
People walked past us as if the world had not just tilted, a couple brushed my shoulder on their way into the mall. Music floated from a*****e speaker somewhere behind us, cheerful and lively, cruelly normal. Daniel shifted in front of me,
“Rhoda, listen.” “No!” The word tore out of me before he could finish. Heads turned. "I let the weight of their stares slide off me like rain. Let them watch,let them witness the drama."
“Don’t you dare say my name like that.”
A hot broken fire scratched at the back of my ribs. My hands trembled, "My eyes scanned every line of his face, tracing the curve of his jaw and the set of his mouth, hunting for a glimmer of the man who used to hold me."
“You forced me to get rid of my child,” I said. My voice shook now, the rage inside it cracking open to reveal something rawer. “And that wasn’t enough, you took away my womb.”
The words hung between us, heavy and terrible. Daniel dragged a hand through his hair.
“I’m sorry, Rhoda,” he said quietly.
Looking around like my face is of a high heat. “I was never ready to be a father.”
"The words struck my chest, knocking the oxygen from my lungs. My ears rang with a high, thin whistle, and for a second, my knees forgot how to hold my weight."
The lights around me dimmed that is almost like an eclipse
A bitter laugh escaped my throat. It sounded strange even to my own ears.
“You bastard!!.”
"The sound faded in the air, leaving my throat dry and aching."
Leaving only the broken remains of what used to be love.
“After everything I did for us,” my voice broke. “After all the sacrifice”
My chest rose and fell too fast. It felt like the air itself had turned sharp. “You did this to me.” Daniel took a step backward.
“Rhoda, calm down,” he murmured. “People are staring.” “I hate you.” The words came out low, rough, scraped straight from my bones. Before I even realized what I was doing, "a flow of heat rushed from my core to my palms. My arms snapped forward, my weight behind them, burying my hands into the fabric of his coat and pushing him backward."
Daniel stumbled backward. His heel caught on the uneven pavement, and he fell, crashing onto the ground with a dull, ugly thud. Gasps rippled through the crowd but I barely heard them.
Something inside me had already broken loose.
My eyes landed on a piece of wood lying beside a construction barrier. I didn’t remember deciding to pick it up. My hand simply moved,”Rhoda wait” The wood came down once.
The sound that followed was sickening a crack that sliced through the evening air.
Then silence. Daniel’s body went still,the wood slipped from my fingers and
clattered onto the pavement. For a long moment, I just stood there, breathing, staring at him. My heart raced violently against my ribs. “No…” My knees weakened, and I slowly dropped beside him. “Daniel,” I whispered, pushing his shoulder. “Get up,Stop pretending,”
My hands lingered over his face before moving to his neck.
"I pressed three fingers into the soft hollow of his throat. I held my breath, waiting, praying for the smallest shake, the tiniest kick of life against my skin. But under my touch, his skin was only cooling, silent and still as stone."
The scream of sirens ripped through the night. Red and blue lights flooded the parking lot as police cars screeched to a pause. Doors shut. Boots pounded across the pavement.
“Ma’am, step away from the body!”
I didn’t move. Two officers grabbed my arms and grabbed me to my feet. Cold metal snapped around my wrists.
“Madam,” one officer said firmly, “you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say do or can, will be used against you in the court of law.”
"The officer’s mouth moved, his lips forming shapes and sounds, but the words reached me like a muffled radio in another room. I watched the gold badge on his chest catch the red pulse of the siren flash, dark, flash, dark."
People stared as they led me toward the police car.Some whispered, pointed
And some just watched.
I stood inside a courtroom that smelled faintly of dust and old paper.My hands were chained. My future was already sealed, “Rhoda Williams,” the judge said, his voice heavy with finality, “you are hereby sentenced to twenty years in prison for the crime of manslaughter.” The gavel struck once, twice, and three times,each sound felt like a door slamming shut. I didn’t cry, I didn’t beg.
I simply stared ahead as the guards led me away, the chains around my wrists clinking softly with every step.
Because somewhere deep inside me beneath the grief, the rage, beneath the life I had just destroyed one thought echoed louder than the judge’s sentence.
