It was time to change, to make things right.
When I looked around the old cabin, I realized it was more a prison than a home—a prison I had created. Since I was going to live an eternity anyway, I determined right then and there that it wasn’t going to be in this stuffy cabin, and it wasn’t going to be without joy. The thought of what I was about to do terrified me, but I knew no other way.
I waited for darkness to reclaim the sky before I set out into the woods. With the kind of emotions I was about to invoke, I needed to be as far from the cabin as possible for fear of any damage I might cause. My leg tripped over a log, and I almost fell.
Pick up your feet. Don’t stop.
It took every ounce of strength I had to keep walking through the forest that smelled like dirt and wet leaves. My life was difficult enough to live the first time, but to deliberately relive it again made me physically ill.
I looked up, hoping to see the moon, which had always comforted me, but tonight it hid itself behind angry clouds. A bolt of lightning split the night sky in half, and a roar of thunder came right after, shaking the ground beneath my feet. I pushed forward as far as I could until I collapsed by a mossy stump. I leaned against it and wrapped my arms around my knees. It was time. Face my past so I could move on to my future.
I closed my eyes and remembered, starting with my earliest memories. One after another, they flashed before me: my father standing near my bed, dangling a venomous snake in his hand, my mother’s “quiet” room for days on end, the beatings for refusing magic. I remembered it all.
The memories seemed to last for hours, and during the more painful ones, I sobbed uncontrollably while struggling to breathe. I was so consumed with the pain that I almost forgot to do as Nora asked: to remember how I responded to their abuse. I didn’t have to think hard. My refuge had always been Eden. Whenever the pain became too unbearable, I’d disconnect my mind from my body and travel to my secret island where my parents had no power over me.
My memories and thoughts came to a grinding halt. They had no power over me. No matter what they did to me, they couldn’t touch my Eden. Eden was my own, and only I could control it. It was like a switch had been turned on, and suddenly everything seemed brighter. My parents never had any real control over me. Nothing they did could change who I wanted to become. They were as insignificant as the spider that now crawled up my leg. I flicked it off into the darkness.
I took a deep breath. Cool air flowed freely into my lungs, and my chest felt lighter as if someone had cut several tight bands from around it. I didn’t know if what I was experiencing was forgiveness or not, but I did know that I no longer cared about what my parents had done. This process was easier than I thought it would be. Maybe it was because my parents never pretended to be anything else. For as long as I could remember, they never claimed to love me. They made their intentions known to me at a very early age: we were not to have a normal parent/child relationship. This is where I had failed. I expected my parents to love me simply because I was their child, despite what they constantly told me. What a fool I’ve been. I almost smiled.
The dark clouds above the canopy of trees cracked, and the first drops of a spring rain fell through. It felt good on my skin and gave me added strength for what I needed to do next.
I could’ve stopped right then and refused to remember the rest, refused to forgive the rest. My parents weren’t the only ones who had hurt me. It was Boaz and his friends, specifically Liane. My whole body filled with hate as I remembered. The rage came upon me in great waves, but I didn’t try to stop it—I unleashed it.
Chapter 29
The black magic, darker than night, raced from my fingers and toes, spreading across the landscape and up the trees as great finger-like appendages in search of its next victim. The cold blackness killed everything it touched. Budding flowers wilted to ash, wisps of grass turned brown and dead, and unsuspecting insects and animals rotted within seconds.
I remembered every moment, every second, with such clarity that I felt as if I were watching my life play out on a movie screen. My whole perspective changed as I saw Boaz slowly manipulate me into using magic. It was his gentle voice, his tender touch, and his eagerness to please me that caused the blinding shroud to come over my eyes. I chose to ignore his darkness that was always right there on the surface, waiting anxiously to come out.