Her Secret Pain

A Funeral

It was the day Kacie's father died. He suffered from complications of the heart. He was a loving father and a good provider.

Kacie was Daddy's little girl, she loved being around her dad and asking him things.

Everybody gathered around their mother to give comfort. She was crying so hard because she lost the love of her life, her partner in crime, her strength.

A few familiar faces were there, but most of the people at her house were strangers to her.

While her sister and brother were busy tending to the guests, she was hiding at the corner table looking at her father's watch.

"Watcha doin' there tiger?" said a familiar voice.

When Kacie looked up she saw her uncle, Rick

Looking at Daddy's watch" she replied.

" Come, I want to show you something cool." Her uncle, Rick, reached out his hand and Kacie took hold and went with him to the basement room.

" You're daddy and I used to play here all the time?" he reminisced, a wistful smile touching his lips.

"What kind of game?" Kacie replied.

"Boxing, hide and seek, pulling pranks on the people outside. You name it." He joyfully recalled.

" Let's play rock, paper, scissors. If you lose, you'll get a punishment. If you win, you get a price."

Kacie lost every time and she just started crying. Her uncle hugged her and suddenly kissed her and, before she knew it, her hand flew right at her uncle's face, and she ran as fast as she could.

Kacie didn't understand what had happened, her 19-year-old mind went blank and her body went numb. She felt like she was in a dream, like she was falling into a bottomless pit. When she got up to the living room, her uncle caught up and grabbed her by her arm and she was told to go like nothing happened, or something bad would happen, and she acted that way, like nothing happened because she didn't understand.

Kacie went upstairs and tried to talk to her sister about what happened, but she dismissed her right away.

"Kacie can't it wait? I'm busy with the chores and everything else all at once."

"But I need to tell you something" Kacie insisted.

"Not now, find me later." Tammy replied.

So Kacie went to her room and just laid there staring at the ceiling when all of a sudden tears fell from her eyes, and she just couldn't stop crying.

"Are you okay sweetheart?" her mother said.

"I'm fine mom, I just miss dad." wiping her tears away, Kacie replied.

The whole scene kept playing in her mind, she tried to make sense of what happened and asked "why did this happen to me? What did I do wrong? Why didn't I move or something?"

" You're so stupid!" Kacie was hitting her head, punching her heart and stuffed her face on a pillow, so she could scream.

She wanted to disappear from the face of the earth. This was a feeling that she would carry for a long time, a sense of guilt that maybe somehow it was her fault that it happened. Maybe she deserved what happened. Kacie fell asleep crying.

Years later, Kacie struggled to stay in a relationship. She would jump from one guy to another. If he gets too close, then she breaks up with him, saying the cliché line "It's not you, it's me, I need to fix what's wrong with me before I can love you fully."

Her family didn't understand the drastic change in her, their quiet, innocent little Kacie became rebellious and wild. She would sneak off late at night and go to parties and come home drunk. Everybody says it's just a phase, that eventually she'll grow out of it. If only they knew the reason behind her erratic behavior.

Kacie would find herself wide awake late at night and her heart would hurt so badly, she felt like she couldn't breathe. Grasping for air and desperate to make the pain stop, she grabs a blade and starts to cut herself, little by little, just to divert the pain she feels inside.

Then it hit her. She remembers another incident with her uncle that she thought was just a dream.

She remembered one afternoon as she was taking a nap in her room, she woke up with her uncle on top of her, swaying up and down on her body. Her clothes were still on her, but she was confused as to why or what he was doing.

Then it happened again, her body was numb, her mind floating, she pretended to have just woken up, and then her uncle suddenly said, "wake up sleepy head, your mother wants you downstairs."

She quickly got up and ran downstairs.

"What happened to you?" her mother asked.

"Nothing!" Kacie replied.

Then she ran as fast as she could, forgetting that her mother wanted her to run an errand for her, she just wanted to run, and so she did.

Her tired feet and body brought her to an empty field and as she was gathering her strength and grasping for air, she screamed at the top of her lungs while her whole being and her heavy heart brought her to her knees sobbing and still asking why it happened to her, what did she do wrong? How could her uncle do this to her?

Kacie lay on the grass for hours, she stared blankly at the sky, then she slowly got up and walked home. The walk home seemed endless, with every step getting heavier and heavier.

"What do I do now?" she asked herself, "What the hell am I going to do now!?".

As she reached home, before she opened the door, she composed herself, smile at a ready to pretend everything was fine.

She opened the door and her mom was frantic and panicking.

"Where were you? What happened? We were worried sick Kacie, you've been gone for hours. We were about to call the police for crying out loud! Kacie, answer me!" her mother worriedly asked.

"I was just walking around mom and lost track of time, I'm sorry, don't worry, I'm fine." "I'm going to bed now, I'm tired."

As she lay in bed, her thoughts ran wild. She thought of killing herself to end her misery. She felt so dirty and so worthless that maybe the world would be better without her, but then she remembered how devastated her mom was when her dad died. She couldn't bear to hurt her like that, so she did the only thing that helped her forget about the pain. She grabbed a blade and started to cut her wrist, so she could feel some physical pain because the pain she felt inside was making her numb. It's slowly tearing her heart apart, making it cold. And so she continued to pretend that she was fine...