My life sucks. The semester is over and I had to return to this hellhole. The only good thing about the first half of my freshman year is that I got an A in Comp I. Not that I deserved an A, I didn't. I still flush with embarrassment when I think of how I got that grade! How many students can actually say they challenged their teacher to wrestling match for a grade? I did just that. I lost the match, but she still gave me an A! One day I will challenge her again. Next time with no pressure. Just she and I. Things will be different.
But that’s in the future. Now I’m spending the Holidays with dear ole dad here in the armpit of the world. I hate this place. I hate the tavern my dad makes me work in. And I hate my dad. Someday I’ll leave and never come back. I have dreamed that I will leave in a blaze of glory. But I know dreams never come true, and that they fade with time.
But here I am. Working in this dreary, rundown bar. My father makes me dress like a whore. He hates that I wear my hair long on the top and sides and shaved in the back. He hates that I dye my hair different colors. It’s died green and red in honor of the upcoming Christmas holiday. He hates that I have piercing all over me, and he hates my tattoos. He hates that I wear black makeup. But he loves having me home. He can fire his most recent barmaid and make me work for a third of what he paid her. He loves me because he can make me do things that he would never dream of making any other woman do. But he hates me because I know that he killed my mother. I just can’t prove it.
So here I am working late one Friday night. I’m dressed like a slut even though it’s about thirty degrees outside. The Bastard is making me wear a white cutoff t-shirt and a pair of pink spandex biker shorts. He won’t let me wear my combat boots, so I have to wear a pair of leather sandals that he gave me. The men like my attire because when they “accidentally” spill their beer on me, they instantly know I have no bra on. Dear ole Dad doesn’t care that they paw at me like I’m a side of meat. He likes it when they grab my ass. The lewd comments have no effect on him. He says they buy more beer when I’m working.
There was a large crowd in the ole Starlight Tavern tonight. And once again I was the center of attention for the most obnoxious drunk rednecks. I was carrying a tray with a pitcher and four mugs. As I walked to the customers’ table, a leg shot out from under another table and caused me to trip. When I stumbled, the tray I was carrying fell sending a full pitcher of beer and four mugs crashing to the floor. I heard the people around me laugh and I heard my father yell that I was a clumsy, stupid bitch. I was pissed because The Bastard takes the price of everything I break out of my pay. I looked at the guy who tripped me and I called him an asshole and a few other choice names. He laughed and called me a freak. We got into a brief argument, but before I could punch his lights out, I was grabbed from behind and tossed to the floor on my butt.
I looked up at the person who grabbed me and saw this trashy woman with bleach bottle shoulder length hair. She was about 30, 5’5” and 130lbs. She was wearing a black tank top pulled tightly over her braless C –cup breasts. Even though it is below freezing outside, she was wearing a pair of way too short daisy dukes. The trailer park trash queen was wearing a pair of scuffed ox-blood cowboy boots with which she aimed a field goal kick at my forehead! I dodged just in time to save myself a serious headache! I scrambled to my feet and tried to turn and run, but she grabbed my by my hair and pulled me back. She shoved me against a table, and said for me to stay the fuck away from her boyfriend (apparently the man who tripped me). She slapped me hard on the right side of my face and drew back to do it again, but quickly stopped and walked away. As I rubbed my stinging cheek, I saw the reason she stopped. Two sheriff’s deputies had walked through the front door.
I looked around and saw my attacker and her boyfriend leave the bar through the backdoor. They either had drugs on them, or they were wanted. The deputies walked around for a little while and drank some coffee. They left around closing time. I helped The Bastard clean up and prepare to close. By this time he was well into a full-blown drunk. As always when drunk (and sometimes when sober), he began touching and kissing on me. When I pushed him off, I got the second stinging slap on the right side of my face.
I snuck out the backdoor when The Bastard finally passed out. I really wish something bad would happen to that son of a bitch. But I know it would take an act of God. I’m not brave enough, and no one in the county would mess with him. In despair, I struck off towards home. I had made up my mind that I would throw some things in a bag, leave, and never look back.
As I walked down this lonely one lane dirt road towards home, I became aware that someone was following me. I stopped and looked back and saw the trailer park queen who had attacked me earlier in the evening and her boyfriend. The blond said that we had some unfinished business. She then said she was going to beat my ass, tie me up, and let her boyfriend “make a woman” out of me. It was freezing cold, and I was scared to death. But one thing was sure, I wasn’t going to let this creep rape me! I squared up and kicked him so hard in the crotch that he raised six inches off the ground! He landed in a sprawling heap and rolled around whimpering and gasping. He wasn’t going to be raping anyone for awhile.
Because I was wearing sandals, I think I broke one or two of my toes. But that was the least of my worries. The queen took one look at her boyfriend on the ground and launched herself at me. She rushed into me with such speed and fury that I couldn’t retaliate. She punched me in the face and battered me to the ground. Once down, she straddled me and continued her assault. She slapped and punched me for about two minutes, then tired. Before she got up, she grabbed the hair on both sides of my head and rammed the back of my head brutally into the ground several times. I felt no more pain because I, thankfully, blacked out.
The blackness soon gave way to a brilliant light. I felt like I was soaring above my body, light as a feather, on wings of a dove. The air was no longer cold, and it carried a long forgotten fragrance from Christmases long ago. The heat off grandma’s woodstove from a time long forgotten. I saw images of my Mother. I miss her so much. I always wanted her forgiveness for not stopping the nightmare. But that seemed like it was never going to be possible. Not before now. As I gather matches and kindling for grandma’s woodstove, I want to make my mother safe, warm and happy. I look at the smoke rising from the kindling and I yell at the top of my lungs, “Momma, I hope I finally made you proud!”
I awoke in the hospital three days later with a nurse and a sheriff’s detective hovering over me. The detective asked if I remembered anything about the robbery at the tavern. After giving him a bewildered look, he said he was sorry about my father. He said he died when the men who were robbing the bar burned it to the ground after nearly beating me to death. At first, I was shocked, but then the realization hit me.....
For the first time in my life, I was finally free!
