Chapter One

A Chapter by Kelley Quinn

“If you hate me so much than just kill me!” I screamed in Daniel’s face. “What?” He asked, anger taking over his other expressions. My tears were about to burst from me, but I managed to keep them in and calmly state, “Daniel, you say you love me, but then the next moment you’re slapping me across the face. What am I to you??” He stopped for a moment, actually looking like he was thinking. “I love you, Raina. You know that.” “No, I don’t. I feel like I am worthless. Like you don’t care about me at all.” Daniel’s hands formed into his fists, and I could see his face cloud over. Oh no. This is when he got really scary. I closed my eyes and braced myself for the pain that was going to come.
It never came. But I kept my eyes closed, not wanting to open them. I heard Daniel sigh, and I peeked a little bit through my eye to see what was going on. He still had his fist balled up, in a striking position, but his expression wasn’t anger, but confusion. Maybe sorrow or sympathy mixed in. I opened my eyes all the way, and reached my hands out to him.

“Daniel, please, don’t do anything. I have bruises and cuts from you. I’m sick of telling my mum excuses. Just tell me...why do you do these things to me?” He sighed again, avoiding eye contact. “Raine, I-I...I love you. But. But I just...” “Just what, Daniel? What? You love me so much that you want to hurt me? If you loved me you wouldn’t do this to me.” Daniel finally looked up and met with my eyes, he looked so lost and hurt. But there was no way I was going to give in to his cute face. I knew what he would do to me once I let my guard down.

“Raine, I can’t help it. Sometimes. I just. I lose myself in your eyes. You’re so beautiful. And I have anger issues. And. And. I just.... I love you. I’m sorry if I ever hurt you.” I rolled my eyes. More excuses. I heard this every single time he hurt me. “Daniel.” I said, trying to keep my cool. “Look.” I pointed to my arm; it was a dark purple. He laughed. “What the hell is your problem??” I nearly screamed. “Raina, what did you do to yourself? Trip on a rock?” And then he laughed again. I could not believe him.

“Danny, how could you laugh at this?? This is what you did to me!! Last week! Or do you not remember when I wouldn’t agree to come to your house with you and you pulled me into your car by my wrist?” Daniel stopped laughing and just looked at my arm and then said “So.... you bruise easily. Besides, I remember no such thing.” I was about to scream, but I kept it in. At least I could control my anger issues. “Daniel! How could you not remember me screaming for you to let me go? Or telling you that you were hurting me? How?” Daniel shrugged, “I don’t know. Anyway, want to go catch a late night movie?”

-Later-

We didn’t see a movie. That would be just falling into his trap once more. I couldn’t take this. Not at all. Daniel was simply ruining my life. I loved him to death, sure. And he loved me, but he expressed his love harshly. Beating me for no reason. He even raped me once last year. In fact, tomorrow is going to be our second year anniversary. How could I have let this go on for so long? Oh yeah, because I’m a weenie, and I’m scared that if I break it off with him he might hurt me.

I was in my room sitting on my bed, and it was midnight when the phone rang. I grabbed for the phone, keeping my eyes locked on the magazine I was reading. “Hello?” I asked the phone. “Hey, baby, since we couldn’t catch a movie tonight, how about you and me meet up at the park tomorrow?” I sighed. He knew my weak spot. I loved going to the park. “Sure, Daniel. Why not?” “Ah thanks, Rainey. This means a lot.” Um, Okay? Don’t know why it would. “Alright, bye.” “Bye.” He said, with a smile in his voice.

I hung up the phone and pondered why he was so excited to go to the park with me. Maybe he was trying to change? Nah, that couldn’t be it. But what if...

The next morning I woke up and checked my clock: 10:30. “Ugh” I said, remembering my date with Daniel. I pulled the covers off and went to my bathroom to take a shower. While I was in there, I remembered that we had never really planned on a time to meet up at the park. “I’ll just give him a call after I get ready.” I said to myself.

I got out of the shower and wrapped my towel around me. I breathed out a sigh and looked at the mirror. Wiping the fog away, I stared at myself. My caramel brown hair was already starting to curl. My hazel eyes looked tired without any eyeliner on them, and my semi-thin body looked very curvy in my towel.

I pulled my eyes away from the mirror and walked into my room, drying myself off. I pulled on my panties and bra, and started deciding on what to wear. I picked a pair of dark denim skinny jeans and a red shirt with an elephant on it. As I was notching my belt up, my phone began to vibrate on my bed. I walked over to it and checked the caller ID. DANIEL TOREN flashed on the screen. I rolled my eyes and forced myself to click the answer button.

“Hello?” I asked, hesitating. “Hey! Raina, I completely forgot to tell you what time to meet up at the park today. Sorry, babe.” “It’s okay. So what time should I be there?” I heard him switch the phone to his other ear and said, “Mmm...Probably about 1:00?” I glanced over at the clock on my side table; it read 11:15. “Alright. I’ll be there at 1. Bye.” And then I hung up, not wanting his voice ringing in my head for the next 2 hours.

I blow dried my hair, and then began to straighten my huge, unruly curls. That took about 30 minutes, and when I was finished it was 12:00. I put my straightener down and looked at myself in the mirror again. I had a bruise that was healing very slowly on my left cheek near the end of my ear. I lifted my hand up to touch it, and winced in pain. I inspected the rest of my body, finding several other scratches and bruises. Ones on my legs, arms and even some on my breasts. How could I have let him do this to me? I couldn’t look at myself anymore. It was too painful.

Reaching for my eyeliner, I noticed a long scratch rimmed with a bruise on my wrist. I pulled my hand back to look at it more closely. I couldn’t remember at all how I got that one. My memory felt like it had been put through a paper shredder over and over. I could only grasp onto bits and pieces of what happened. Something about Daniel of course. But there was someone else there... that had sort of urged him onto his anger. I tried to remember anything else. The only thing I could get a hold of was Daniel lost control and threw a knife at me. Whoa. Now that I thought about it, I did remember that.

Daniel, his friend, Caleb, and I had all been in his living room playing fuse ball. Caleb and Daniel had been competing against each other and Caleb had won. Being the competitive one, Daniel had challenged him again. After a short while, Caleb had won again. Daniel, who was devastated, could not get a grasp on this. He had started yelling and running around the room. I had tried my hardest to calm him down, but he got so angry that he grabbed his pocketknife off of the table and had ran after me with the knife.

I hadn’t known what to do. I just screamed and ran as fast as I could in the little area. Caleb was running after Daniel and trying to grab on to him. I was crying by then and I had been so frightened that Daniel was really going to harm me. Right before Caleb had tackled him to the ground, Daniel threw the knife in my direction and had sliced me right in the wrist.

A water droplet ran down my cheek and reached my hand up, touching the tear that lay on my cheek. I met my eyes in the mirror, and let my tears fall. How long would I let myself by abused by this boy? I shook my head, not wanting to let my mind say the answer that I already knew. Never. I was such a wimp. There was no way I would be able to stand up to Daniel and tell him how I felt. So many times I had tried, but he’d either lose control, or I’d back down before it got too serious and he’d hurt me again.

I began to apply my makeup before I started to let my mind get too deep into the thoughts of our relationship. “Let’s see...I think I’ll mix black and pink eyeliner for a dark purple look.” I said aloud, hearing my voice shake, and just now realizing how scared I was to be alone with Daniel at the park. Why would I be though? There were other people there, too. I shouldn’t be worried. But I was.

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