Page 49 of Made to Sin

“Answer me,” he yelled.

I didn’t get a chance to comply with his demand as a fist landed on the side of my temple, slamming the opposite side of my head onto the concrete. The inside of my head felt like it was a telephone pole in which a kid had repeatedly hit a metal pipe at. It vibrated until I couldn’t hear the sound of my own thoughts.

“You don’t want to answer? Fine.”

His nostril flared. Before I knew it, another shadow of his fist landed somewhere on my cheek. More punches. More kicks. My husband was ruthless when it came to his anger problems.

I was helpless, laying there and staring at the cracked concrete while taking his abuse.

Sometime during my blurring haze, it stopped.

The remnants of his hissy fit were the inflamed bruises on my skin and the specks of blood seeping through the ground. There was a time I used to be scared of blood, when I used to faint at the sight of it. But if there was one thing Marco accomplished in this marriage, it was helping me to get over that fear. Now, seeing the crimson paint on my body was as normal as seeing my own skin.

With the little strength I had left, I pushed myself off the cold floor and limped inside. I refused to look at the pity from the surrounding workers. There was nothing they could do anyway. I already knew my life was a sorry mess.

“Let me run you a bath, meu bem,” Maria softly said as she assisted me up the stairs. She didn’t have to witness the incident to know it was because of Marco, the abuse happened too frequently.

I meekly nodded, grimacing as even the short movement stung down to my bones.

Maria mixed my water and added the necessary bath salts to heal my wounds while I peeled the bloody clothes off my body.

“Call me if you need me. I’ll be outside.”

“Thank you.”

She gave my slouched shoulders a light rub and left.

I slipped into the porcelain bathtub and instantaneously sunk into the warm embrace. Then, for all the tears that I hadn’t shed yet, I sobbed. I sobbed so hard I couldn’t tell if it was water or me that washed away the dried blood.

It would be so easy, so fucking easy to give up. To drown and never face Marco or my demons again.

The cowardly thought pushed me to submerge myself under the foggy waters, waiting until there was no more air in my lungs. Despite the human instinct to flail or gasp for more oxygen, I squirmed to remain under.

Flashes of my life hallucinated in front of me as I started to feel lightheaded. Memories from when I was young with Mamma, memories from my wedding night, memories from my abuse.

Suddenly, like a bolt of lightning had struck me, I shot up and desperately sucked in a mouthful of air.

No, I couldn’t die.

Not yet.

My memories were tainted with the tragedies of life, not a single joyful thought floated by. In my last moments, I was still miserable.

No, I couldn’t die before I had a chance to live.

—

Emily and I’s conversations moved onto new gossip and mundane tasks, exactly how I liked it. I wished I could tell her the truth about everything like how she openly bared her life to me.

Selfishly, I enjoyed being just Katarina. A girl who could pretend she had a fulfilling marriage, a girl who could volunteer for fun, a girl who didn’t need the effects of cocaine to have fun.

I would rather freeze Hell over than let them see me as theCosa Nostrapuppet I actually was.

Foolishly, I should have known, I could never escape.

It was in the middle of the shift when I received a frantic call from Maria that Marco was shot dead by a group of Bartolos. Her words muffled as the blood rushing in my ears took over. My phone slipped, tears streamed down my face, and I dropped to my knees.

Marco was dead.

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