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Chapter 1 - Blind Rage

The ringing in Lucy’s ear continued even after she had regained consciousness. She slowly blinked her eyes open. She felt numb, as if all her energy had been zapped out of her. She made to open her mouth, but the sharp pain in her left cheek made her wince. She massaged her cheek, then dropped her hand to the ground. Her eyes were fixed to the ceiling.

“John, stop. Why are you like this?” she heard her mom scream.

Lucy sighed. She must not have been knocked out for long seeing that the beatdown was still ongoing. She tilted her head to the side and her eyes fell on Lacy. She was seated at the end of the room and was rocking back and forth with her knees pressed to her chest and her head buried between her knees, humming a painful noise.

As Lucy made to get up, her eyes caught her mother’s legs dangling energetically over the side of the bed. Lucy stood up and she finally saw why. John was on top of her, ripping her shirt apart.

“John, don’t do this in front of the kids, damn it.” Rita rasped, fighting his hands off her body.

Lucy clenched her teeth in anger.

I’m going to kill him, I swear.

She charged at him again. This time she jumped him from behind, wrapping her arm around his neck as she screamed. John tried to get her off him by swinging from left to right, but she held on tightly. She had been trying to suffocate him but now she was holding on, lest she fell and injured herself.

“Lucy,” Lacy cried.

“You fucking bitch!”

Grunting, John grabbed Lucy’s arms tight so she couldn’t let go if she wanted. Then he started staggering backwards, picking up pace as he backed up towards the wall.

He’s going to squash me.

“Let me go. Let me go,” she screamed.

He ran into the wall with so much force that Lucy’s head bounced off the wood. When he let go of her arms, she slid off him and crumbled to the floor. The pain reverberated through her, and for a brief moment she couldn’t breathe. Without even glancing at her, John walked back to Rita on the ground and proceeded to slapped her in the face.

Lucy was just catching her breath but she saw the slap and heard her mother’s grunt. Pain faded at the onset of white rage. Drawing heavy breaths as she fought to her fours then to her feet, she knew exactly what to do. Standing there wasn’t going to help and watching Lacy cover her ears in fear further infuriated Lucy.

She stormed out of the room, breathing heavily as she headed down the hallway. The only thing that would teach him would be taste of his own medicine and luckily, Lucy kept the dose handy, safe in her closet.

She reached her room and immediately went for the closet. Inside it, behind the hanging clothes was her baseball bat. She grabbed it and ran back to her mother’s room.

“Lucy…” Lacy whispered as she slowly rose from the floor. She vigorously shook her head, tears spilling down her cheeks. “Lucy, please wait.”

Lucy did the opposite. She charged at John. She needed to be swift, else he’d see her coming. She visualized his head as a thrown ball, one she had to hit, and cleanly too. It was her chance at a home run, to take him out completely and she was going to take it.

Gathering all the energy in her, Lucy swung the bat and smashed it into the back of his head. There was a metallic thud, a small cracking sound and then the louder thud of John’s slack body hitting the ground. Lucy stared at his flaxen body for an unmeasured time, then the reality of what she’d done hit her. Her hands quivered like in a snowy storm and the metal bat fell to the ground with a loud tang. Every drawn breath felt like it scraped the insides of her mouth.

I’ve killed him.

The three women remained where they were, unmoving, all staring at his body in disbelief. Then Lacy started to shake violently, it looked like she was about to pee her pants. Rita was the first to snap back to reality. She rushed to his side and checked for his pulse and his breathing, while Lucy stood and stared. She was certain he was dead.

“Is he dead?” Lacy asked, in a nervous whisper, pressing her left palm to her ample bosom.

Rita raised a hand to signal patience. She placed her ear over his nose, then on his chest, before raising her head.

“No, honey,” Rita answered. “He’s still breathing and there’s a heartbeat.”

Blood started to creep out of the side of John’s head, so it formed a small pool on the ground. Lacy’s eyes widened at the sight, and she jumped to her feet and ran out of the room. Lucy could hear her retching in the bathroom. The sight was too much for Lacy’s weak stomach.

It wasn’t too much for Lucy though. She knew exactly what to do. Finally breaking out of the shocked spell, she pulled her phone out of her pocket with shaking hands and punched in 911.

The call was picked immediately.

“911, what is your emergency?”

“I uhm… there is an unconscious man on the ground,” Lucy managed to say.

“What’s your name, miss?”

“Lucy Adams.”

“Okay, do you know who the man is, Lucy?”

“Yes, he’s my stepfather, John Stewart.”

“Do you know what happened to your stepfather, Lucy? Can you tell me?”

“I hit him across the head with a bat,” Lucy admitted. “A metal bat.”

“Alright. Can you tell me your address, ma’am?”

“It’s 206, Steers Palm Drive, Davie, Florida.”

“Okay, help is on the way, Lucy. The ambulance will be there in five minutes.”

Lucy dropped the phone and resumed staring at John’s unconscious body. Lucy recognized the thoughts that were running through her mind when she smashed his head. She wanted John to stop breathing. It scared her that she hated someone so much that she wanted him dead.

“What were you thinking, Lucy?” Rita bellowed, rising to her feet. “What were you thinking?”

All of a sudden, her mother looked like she’d aged ten years. Her eyes, which had been wide with panic, were now darkening with rage. Her cheeks were pink but incongruent with the red blotches on the skin of her face. Her lips were chapped, like she was dehydrated. Her hair was a mess, fiery red strands poking out in all directions, blood stains on some.

“I wasn’t.” Lucy cleared her throat. “I saw you on the ground, and I-I wasn’t thinking.”

“You could have killed him,” she roared.

“I wasn’t thinking!” Lucy reiterated, louder this time. “I saw him on top of you and I guess I lost it for a second. I just wanted him to stop.”

Rita pulled in several hacking breaths, and her eyes reddened and filled with tears. She lifted a clenched right fist to her mouth, as she turned back to look at John’s unconscious form.

“I always ask you to stay away,” Rita said, sobbing. “You started turning the other way, why did you interfere now, Lucy? Why?”

“Because he touched Lacy, mom. I would never have interfered for you. I’m done doing that, remember. I was trying to protect Lacy, not you,” Lucy lied.

Rita quickly wiped the tear from her cheek. “You had no right!”

“I had every right,” Lucy retorted.

Lucy started boiling again, furious at her mom’s irrational protectiveness toward John. Lacy walked back into the room. Her face was flushed. She’d done a great deal of puking. She stood in between Lucy and her mother, probably to stop what looked like another budding fight.

“Guys,” Lacy said weakly. “Please don’t fight, we can fix this. All we have to do is get a shovel, dig a shallow grave and bury his body. Then we can move to Mexico and start a new life there.”

“What are you talking about?” Rita asked.

Lacy sniffed. “I know it sounds scary, but I’ve seen it done in many movies. A life on the run can’t be so bad. I don’t want to go to jail, mom.”

“We’re not going to jail, Lacy,” Rita told her.

“But Lucy might. We need to stick together, mom, we can’t just leave her.”

“He’s not dead, Lacy,” Lucy said. “At least not yet.”

“Oh,” Lacy blurted, before heaving greatly and slumping to the bed. “Well, that’s good, I guess.”

“This is what you’ve always wanted, isn’t it?” Rita said, turning back to Lucy. “How does it feel now that you have accomplished it?”

Lucy’s heart sank to the bottom of her stomach.

“Is that really what you think of me, mom? All I ever wanted was for John to stop using you as a punching bag. For him to stop yelling at us at every chance he got and for us to be comfortable in our own father’s house.”

“I don’t expect you to understand,” Rita replied, stepping away from her.

“Right, I guess it’s pays to hurt your own children as long as it keeps him warming your bed.”

“Do not speak to me like that, Lucy,” Rita said with a trembling voice. Her eyes were watering and it appeared she was going to cry.

“What have I said?” Lucy shrieked. “We haven’t had a regular conversation about anything in weeks, mom. Isn’t that weird to you?”

“And you think talking about it over an unconscious John is the perfect time to do that?”

“You’re speaking like I’m a terrible person, mom,” Lucy replied. “When, in fact, this all your fault.”

“Lucy, all you do is criticize me every time we talk. You always have a complaint, always shaming me.”

“I don’t shame you, I try to make you see reason. I have to baby you all the time because you cannot do what is right. You’ve been living in this hell for longer than you need to. Why won’t you just end it?”

“Why won’t you just stay out of it?” Rita sobbed.

“You guys!” Lacy yelled. “Would you please, stop fucking fighting already?”

“Watch your language, young lady,” Rita cautioned. “I have had enough of this. How can you both be so blind?”

Lucy wiped her own tears and made sure to appear stoic as she walked out of the room. She walked down the stairs into the living room and sat on the couch, waiting for the ambulance and the police to arrive. What she did was a crime, she knew it and yet she wasn’t sorry. What hurt her was that the person she did it for didn’t even appreciate it.

It was when she heard the sirens approach that she finally felt a burst of searing emotions. She started sobbing heavily and when there was a rapid knock on the door, she walked to it and opened it.

“Where’s the injured person?” a short woman in blue medical slacks asked her.

“Up the stairs,” Lucy whispered. “It’s the first room on your right.”

The woman led a team of four in, all of them paramedics with two carrying a stretcher. As they ran up the stairs, police officers stepped in behind Lucy. She turned around and noticed them scanning the room.

“Was it you who made the call?” the taller one asked.

Lucy nodded. She sniffed and wiped her teary cheeks with her sleeve.

“Yes, I’m Lucy.”

“You might need to sit down, Lucy,” the taller one said, sitting even before she did. His partner, a shorter, stouter version, gave Lucy a good look before heading up the stairs.

“So Lucy, can you–”

“Hey, Chad,” his partner called from the stairwell.

“Yeah?”

“You might need to see this,” his partner replied.

“Wait here for me, okay? Don’t go anywhere,” he told Lucy.

He tapped her on the shoulder and made his way up the stairs to meet his partner. Lucy was sure they were questioning her mother.

Mother is not going to cover me. She’s going to tell them I did it out of spite. I’m going to prison.

Lucy stared at the open front door and began to consider running away.

If I leave now, I might make it away. The odds are low but I can do it. Do I have a choice?

Instincts pushed her but her feet refused to move. She was too scared. No matter how much she tried, her hands refused to stop trembling.

The paramedics made their way down the stairs. They had John strapped to a stretcher. Lucy sat there, watching them carry his unconscious body out of the house. She was waiting for it, for the regret, for the remorse to take hold of her. It didn’t arrive. She felt nothing, no regret, not one bit.

The officers came down shortly after the medics had passed. They didn’t look so friendly and one of them already had his handcuffs out. The taller guy sat once again in front of Lucy while the other stood behind him, his arms crossed, a tight frown on his face. Their questions came quickly, and Lucy answered them as truthfully as she could. She knew where all of this was going.

“Lucy Adams,” her interrogator said, after the short session of questions. “I’m placing you under arrest. I think we both knew this was going to happen.”

Lucy nodded.

“Please put your hands in front of you.”

As the officers read her the Miranda rights, Lucy was startled by sudden screaming. She and the officers looked up to see Lacy fighting to get out of her mother’s arms. Rita showed strength and kept Lacy pinned to her. As the officers shepherded Lucy to the door, she looked back but her mother was looking away.

They approached the squad car and Lucy finally understood that she was really being arrested. She hesitated, refusing to move forward, but the officers were stronger. They practically carried her all the way to the car and stuffed her inside.

The car drove down the street and Lucy watched her house all the way, waiting for her mother or sister to pop out, but they never did. She looked ahead and let her head fall back to the neck rest. Perhaps because her life was going in a total different direction, Lucy began to recall the original plan she had for her future.

It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. She was going to take a year off schooling, get a job, and save enough money. Then she’d find a decent college, far away from home and never return.

She was supposed to go far away to college, not jail.

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