extremely painful.
She pushes me into my room and slaps me across the face, causing me to stumble. The door slams, and then, “Why did you do that, stupid, stupid girl?”
She slaps me again, and my ears ring from the pain. I grab my cheek,
continuing to scramble away from her as she backs me against the wall.
You’re bruising the apple, Francesca.
Her hands grip either side of my face, and her manicured talons dig into my
reddened cheeks.
Putting her face in mine, she snarls lowly, “You keep your mouth shut, do you
hear me? The men in this house will do everything to make your life hell until
you’ve been paid for. And you sure as fuck don’t hit them!”
She shakes me, “Tell me you understand,” she whisper-shouts, keeping her
voice quiet.
“I understand,” I cry, my cheeks hot and wet from the constant tears.
Francesca releases me angrily, tearing herself away and shooting a heated
glare over her shoulder as she paces the room. I slide down the wall, no longer
capable of holding myself up as sobs rack my body. A streak of blood follows me down, and I realize Rocco ripped open the stitches on my back. Spearing my hands through my hair, I grip the strands tight, willing myself to calm.
Deep breaths, Addie. Deep breaths.
Just breathe.
Breathe, little mouse…
Chapter 9
The Diamond
It seems when my life turns upside down, I always have a diary to offer me
escape.
I’m not sure how she managed to get a hold of a journal, but I find comfort in
Molly’s angry words. A young girl that was stolen from her life just as I was.
And groomed by Francesca, no less.
My mouth dropped when I read that Francesca has been doing this for at least
thirteen years now. How many girls has she watched be raped, tortured, and sold
off to demented people? How many did she hurt herself?
My stomach rolls, and my throat thickens with disgust as I take in the words
of a broken girl. She was full of life in a world that was determined to take it from her, and through each entry, I fall more in love with her. I feel her in every stroke of the pen, so I brush my trembling fingers across them and mold myself
into her harsh lines.
She’s everything I want to be.
When I come to the last page, my heart breaks, and millions of questions arise. As quickly as I had found some form of comfort, I’m now left desolate and empty once more.
Tears line the edges of my lids as I tear through pages, frantic and in need of
more of her words. But I find nothing but blank pages.
Did she ever make it out? Did she make it back to Layla and take her away to
find a new life? A better life?
I exhaust myself with questions that I’ll never get the answers to. At least not
while I’m stuck in here.
Defeated, I snap the journal shut, and manage to scrounge up enough energy
to roll off the bed and crawl to the open slot. Hot tears spill over as I replace the journal back into its hiding spot. And as I seal the wooden plank back down, everything I tried to not think about rushes back to me.
Nearly falling in my rush back to the bed, I curl up in a ball, clenching my fists, my broken nails screaming. My entire body quakes from the memories slaughtering any semblance of peace I found with Molly. With everything I have, I hold on tightly to the sobs shredding my throat in an attempt to escape.
I won’t let them.
It couldn’t have been more than a half-hour since Francesca stormed out of my room, and went to calm Rocco down, who, from the sound of it, went on a rampage and started destroying the house. I immediately tore off my soiled clothing, and dressed in a fresh pair, but it did nothing to soothe me while chaos ensued below my room. That’s when I remembered the journal in the
floorboards and found solace in Molly.
For an indescribable amount of time, I stare at the wall. If my eyes even stray
towards the dusty wooden floor, all I can see is an image of myself lying on the
ground with Rocco mounted over me. I watch the desecration of my soul, like an
out-of-body experience. Standing over the apparitions, unable to stop it from happening.
Desperately, I attempt to train my thoughts on anything else—Zade or Daya
—but the train derails every time, leading me back towards the beauty room.
They’re merely ghosts haunting the hallways of my brain, and anytime I reach out to them, they only fade away.
I squeeze my eyes shut, frustration mounting.
I should’ve listened. Yeah, that’s what I should’ve done. Allow a girl to be mutilated to save myself.
Shaking my head, I thump the heel of my palm on my forehead. How am I supposed to live with that? If I ever get out of here, how am I supposed to be okay knowing that I stood by while awful things happened to other girls, purely to save myself?
They stood by while you were raped.
They did. Do I hate them for it?
I don’t know. Kind of. There’s a morsel of inky blackness unfurling inside of
me, and I kind of want to kill them, too.
“No,” I whisper. I can’t expect everyone to be so sacrificial. I can’t expect a
girl who’s being abused just as I am to try and save someone else. Try to.
Because that’s the fucking problem. There is no saving them. Bethany is still going to have that mole cut out of her skin. All of those girls in there—they’re still going to be raped and tortured, no matter how many times I step in.
We're all just lambs waiting to be slaughtered, and getting myself killed isn’t
going to stop the wolves from feasting.
So, what the fuck am I supposed to do?
Zade’s voice whispers in my mind, and my heart clenches painfully.
Pick your battles. Be smart.
Easier said than fucking done.
I startle when my bedroom door slams open about ten minutes later, the
doorknob knocking into a perfectly round dent in the wall. There’s obviously a
long history of this door being kicked in.
Breathing heavily, I watch Rio enter the room, carrying a first aid kit and appearing calm as ever despite him kicking down the door.