Prologue
I wake up to the sound of a floorboard creaking. I look at the digital clock on my nightstand. It's 3 am.
Just like always.
In the silence that follows, I count the number of steps it will take him to get to my room, from that creaky floorboard.
24.
I silently count in the dark with my heart sinking.
But today I hear the door knob turn just as I have reached 17.
He is impatient today.
Something twists inside me.
I close my eyes as the sound of his heavy breathing gets closer.
My bed gives a small creak as the mattress shifts under his weight.
I do what I have always done. Close my eyes and pretend to be invisible.
I clutch my bedsheets in my right fist as I feel his weight on top of me.
He grunts a little as he yanks the blanket that is separating us.
A scream builds up in my throat and I clench my teeth against it.
His rank breath washes all over me, and I hold my breath for as long as I can, resisting any trace of him inside me.
His cold skin touches my legs and I inhale sharply and, just like that, he is inside me, possessing me, marking me as his, and I suffocate in the thick air between us.
All I manage to get out is a tiny yelp.
I open my eyes to see something, anything to take me away from it all physically, but all I see is darkness.
And just when I think I am about to die, I hear something.
A muffled sound from afar.
"......... don't know why it keeps happening." A feminine, slightly frustrated voice.
"Just hold her head to the side," said a calm, reassuring voice.
I focus hard, trying to recognize them and wonder why aren't they saving me?
"Lydia!!!" That same female voice, now choked with worry.
And just like that, the spell breaks.
The darkness fades and the weight is lifted off me.
My mother's worried face looms into view, along with my stepfather's.
I realize what is happening and that I will be having a full-blown seizure soon.
I close my eyes, physically exhausted from this ordeal, welcoming the empty darkness that now awaits me.
*****************
I wake up the next morning feeling sore and exhausted.
" Lydia, time for school," My mother's voice floats through the slightly open bedroom door. She knows I hate it when she leaves it open.
Suppressing my frustration, I groan and drag myself out of bed to get ready.
As I descend the stairs to our kitchen, I see my mother fluttering about the breakfast table like normal.
We never make eye contact as I sit down to eat, but she quickly fills up the silence between us with her mundane chatter.
" Gotta hurry today. Lots of work to do. Detentions to hand out, policies to discuss...."
"...... can't wait to meet that strapless-shirted girl's parents and tell them that she needs God in her life. The school can do as much...."
I tune out her sickeningly cheery voice and focus on her hands.
They are fidgeting with her rosary beads, and she hasn't had a bite of her breakfast. She is nervous, just like always.
I fight the questions back down, knowing it won't be any use.
The doctors have termed what I have as focal aware seizures, a strong sense of déjà vu or fear just before a seizure.
But I havent been entirely truthful as well. How do I tell them exactly what I experience.
But something feels entirely wrong, like a piece of the puzzle is missing.
I tried to tell my mother, once when I was younger, and all she had to say was that I should pray more, or stop watching too much television.
Needless to say, we aren't close.
A familiar horn honks outside, indicating my friend is here to pick me up, and I almost catch her heave a sigh of relief, though she fights hard to be less obvious about it.
I paste a fake smile as I climb in the passenger seat of my best friend Anne's hideous hot pink Toyota.
And as soon as my butt hits the seat, she is spewing all the information she has been holding up about the parties we werent invited to, but she kept an eye on, on the socials, and the current events that unfolded there.
I let myself relax into her presence but somewhere in the darkest corner of my brain a question continues to eat me inside.
What is wrong with me?
What kind of a girl am I to dream of something that filthy and dark?
