Page 17 of Creep
He froze at her touch, hunched over with his arms dangling by his side while his daughter clung to him like a monkey. He stood with a stupefied look on his face for a solid minute before he got himself together and wrapped his arms around her.
I gasped, completely surprised. He hadneverhugged either one of us before. He usually preferred to act like we didn’t exist. My heart clenched in pain, wanting affection from him, but knowing it would never happen.
Thinking about Holley makes my heart ache. I miss her so fucking much and she’s only been gone for a few days. Has it been days already? Or is it still the same day? I don’t even know, with everything that has been happening. I haven’t talked to her since the morning she left, which was also the day Vincent showed up. Hopefully, she hasn’t tried to call me because I don’t even know where the fuck my phone is and she would worry if I didn’t answer. She doesn't need the stress right now. Not when she’s trying to get settled. So, for right now, I can only hope she’s doing okay.
I strain my eyes trying to see if I can find my bag but it’s fucking useless in this darkness. Clouds must be thick in the sky for there not to be much moonlight shining in.
The urge to cut again seeps into my veins, and I rub my arms together against the rope in hopes of satiating the feeling. At least temporarily, but it does nothing for me. Growing more frustrated by the second, I yank my arms up against the ropes a few times, making sure to pull hard. The chaffing from the rough rope creates enough friction for my cuts to seep open easily. Blood beads in a few different spots and begins to drip down my arm.Fucking finally.
Tugging harder, I cause even more cuts to split open and start bleeding again.
But it’s not enough. I need more.
Getting creative, I twist my wrists from side to side as I continue to tug and Ihit the motherfucking jackpot.Blood gushes out of the worst of my cuts, which just so happens to be my most recent one from the bathroom earlier. A feeling of ecstasy washes over me, the force of it so strong, I close my eyes.
Pain.
The pain.
The fucking numbness.
I don’t know what’s wrong with me. All I do know is cutting myself is the only fucking way I can keep surviving. I need this pain and I need the control it gives me. I know it’s ironic I need to hurt myself to deal with the pain in my life, but it’s just the way it is. One pain masks the other and makes it a little more fucking bearable. But more than that, it’s about thecontrol.
When you lack control in every aspect of your life, you search for something that is purely yours and yours alone. Mine just so happens to be my own pain and it’s something I’ve come to accept over time. I used to feel ashamed of myself, for this need I have, but not anymore. This is my normal. Everyone has their own way of dealing with the baggage life gives them, and my method is more unconventional than most.
Hiding it from Holley has been a major challenge over the years. She has questioned me a lot about my attire, asking why I always wear hoodies even in the middle of summer when the temperature can reach over eighty degrees. I’d blow her off by shrugging my shoulders and saying I liked wearing them. Over time she grew to accept my answers as the truth and left it alone.
Lying here now, I realize how fucking dumb I was, expecting her to never catch on. But then again, she never did, did she? Maybe she never cared enough. Maybe she never cared at all. After all, she did leave me to go to a college all the way across the fucking country, ensuring we wouldn’t see each other in person for a long time.
I obviously don’t have the money or the option to go there and I know she doesn’t have the money either. The only reason she was able to make it there to begin with was because the flight there was included with her full ride scholarship.
How could she leave me? I can’t help the blistering rage simmering in the pit of my stomach. I wasted my entire fucking existence to protect her, solely surviving to take care of her. It all feels like a huge fucking waste now. What did protecting her give me other than a life full of pain and torture? I can’t even remember a time when I wasn’t covered in bruises and scars. I’ve been covered in both for so long, I don’t know what I look like without them.
After that night outside, the night everything changed for me, that’s when Ben first started slapping me around. Over the years, his open handed slaps turned to closed fists. After he got tired of splitting his knuckles against my body, he took to kicking me, to fuckingbeatingme, within an inch of my life.
I vividly remember how he would swing his leg as far back as he could before swinging the fucking thing forward to connect to my ribs. My stomach. My back. It really just depended on his mood and how high he was.
He was always in a bad mood and high out of his mind.
The majority of the time, whenever he put his hands on me, I would be in bed for days after, trying to heal enough to go to school without drawing notice to the fact I was black and blue. Every shift of my body felt like a sledgehammer being swung over me repeatedly and made it pretty fucking hard to move, let alone go to school. I can’t even remember how many broken bones I’ve endured. I only ever went to the emergency room when it was an injury too severe to be bandaged up myself.
Every emergency room trip we took was the same. My mother would accompany me, never leaving my side to make sure I didn’t say a word about what had really happened—not that I ever would. They threatened Holley the same fate as me every time, so the unwelcomed company was always unnecessary. They knew that, but I know they liked thinking they could intimidate me.
I shriek when a banging sounds against the door, yanking me out of my torturous thoughts.
“Essa. Open the goddamn door. I’m about sick of your fucking shit.” He beats his fist on the door again as if I can’t hear him.
“How can I do that when I’m tied to the bed, dumbass?” I genuinely can’t help but goad him. I always did the same with Benjamin too. I knew running my mouth would make things a thousand times worse, but it’s like my brain to mouth filter malfunctioned, and I’d spew shit I knew I shouldn’t, even knowing I would later regret it.
“You do realize if you make me break another one of my doors to get to you, you won’t be able to move for a fucking week, right?” The threat evident in his words, his tone dropping decibels in his anger and becoming rougher, sexier.
“Well, it sure as hell wouldn’t be the first time, so bring it on, baby. I’m sure you can’t hurt me more than I already am.”Again with the filter malfunction.
At this point, I’m not even surprised when I see the door bust open, smacking against the wall with a thundering crack. Vincent’s body takes up the entire doorway, looking like the fucking Hulk after he smashed something. A smirk pulls at the corner of my lips thinking about comparing him to The Hulk, their similarities not too far off in this moment.
He stalks over to me, not sparing me another glance. Reaching down, he grabs my arms and yanks them up, causing a few more lines of blood to run down and drip onto the bed.
“I thought you didn’t want me to bleed on your bed, Vincent.That right there,” I gesture to my arms with my head, “is kinda causing blood to drip all over the place.” He grunts in response.Fucking grunts like he’s some caveman incapable of using words.
