by J L Park
“Jesus, Reed. If he’s broken skin, then he’s angry. This is your fault.”
I shoved him back into his room. “If you aren’t going to stop him, then shut up and go to bed.”
“You gonna stop him?”
“Only if you don’t want a sister anymore; he’d kill me. The only person who can stop this, tonight, is you.”
I walked away, trying to drown out the noise, as the door slammed, and Mother finally allowed herself to sob. I couldn’t comfort her, I’d tried before and she’d pushed me away, telling me never to get myself involved in these fights; that it was between her and Father.
The noise stopped for the night after Father stormed out. I shut my bedroom door, too wound up to sleep but too upset to read the contraband book I had hidden under my mattress for the moment. I hated that just asking him to give me a break earned her a beating. I wasn’t sure if she knew about the belt, she had never once caught him doing it, or seen the wounds on my arms.
It helped that physical punishment, a smack to the hand, and the like, were expected when raising small children in GreyBrook, so my behaviour could be corrected as a small girl much easier than it could now. In fact, if I thought about it, it wasn’t that my behaviour was changed, it was that my personality was hidden now, now I knew what was expected of me, to get through years until I could make Selection and move out.
Eventually, sleep came. After much tossing and turning, guilt tugging at me until I gave into the temptation of sleep.
Mother kept herself busy the following morning, cooking porridge on the stove. She cooked porridge after a beating, as it gave her an excuse to be bent over the stove and not greeting anyone at the table. She ladled out a serving for each of us, and then returned to the stove, her head down so the bruises on her face couldn’t be seen. She wouldn’t be attending work today, Father would give her apologies when he left for work. It wasn’t that uncommon an occurrence in GreyBrook, women often had a lot more leave relating to injuries sustained in the ‘pursuit of household duties’. Just another cog in the “women can never work as hard as men and are therefore lesser” mantra the men in GreyBrook muttered to themselves. Jameson tried to get my attention as he left for school I waved him away. I waited until they had both left for the day.
“Mother?”
She half turned away from the stove, shock on her face that I hadn’t left yet.
“Reed, you’re supposed to be on your way to school. Please, go. You’ll anger your father if he finds out you were late.”
“Mother, I’m sorry,” I said softly as I reached out and touched her shoulder.
She flinched at my touch, so I snatched my hand away. I didn’t want to hurt her. She said nothing for a moment. When she did, her voice was thick with unshed tears.
“Don’t. You don’t have anything to be sorry for. I questioned his decisions, this is my fault.”
“But, if I hadn’t annoyed him in the beginning, he would have hit you. Mother.”
She sighed, turning her bruised face to face me. I bit back a gasp. Both eyes were black, her lip split. I shook my head in shock.
“No, Reed. This wasn’t about you. This was him. This was me. Don’t you dare take this on board as your fault. It wasn’t just the questioning of his decision, there is more you know nothing of. Please, Reed, just go to school. This isn’t something you need to fix.”
I nodded, unable to speak around the lump in my throat at the site of my Mother’s face. I turned to leave as she grabbed at my arm. The whistle of pain through my teeth gave me away.
“Reed, what is this?” She pulled up my sleeve, exposing the bruising and cuts on the back of my arm. I glanced at her, struggling to meet her eye.
“I got a few questions wrong,” I stopped, thinking through my words, “Actually, I got them right, but not fast enough or with a bit added in I should not have said.”
She peered at my arms, pulling at the other sleeve, noting the dressing that elbow.
“Reed, there are scars.”
“I know.”
“How long?” She looked defeated, as though she thought she’d been protecting me from him, and was only now discovering she hadn’t.
“Since a smack on the arse or hand wouldn’t change my behaviour. Basically, since my mouth decided to run away on me on occasion.”
She smirked, she’d heard me several times saying things that I should never have gotten away with.
“So, about 13?”
“Jesus, Reed. I’m sorry. I thought…” she trailed off, “Please tell me you don’t let him do that to you to protect me? I couldn’t stand that.” She shook her head, then nodded, then shook her head again. “No, not really. Some of it, I thought, maybe he’d leave you alone. But I see now I was wrong.”
“It's okay. I’m just a slow learner, Mum. If I learnt to keep my mouth shut, at least long enough to let the lesson finish, he’d stop. I’ll get there.”
She nodded, pulling my sleeves down to cover my elbows again.
“Time you get off to school, love. He’ll have more to punish you for if you’re late again. I’ll make your favourite for dinner. Not the pie, the pasta dish.”
I grinned, pulling myself up on tiptoes to gently kiss her cheek before I ran out the door, running up the path, getting into the school gates just as the final bell rang. I grinned, I’d made it in time.
Whilst the situation with my mother didn’t repeat itself for some time, the lessons for me around Selection Day continued. Most of the time, I managed to hold my tongue, my arms bearing the marks when I didn’t. Finally, he felt I was no longer a dreamer and let me finish my homework and study in peace. Jameson still scowled at me from time to time, still blaming me for the beating Mother had received after my initial lesson. I tried talking to him about it, but he’d push me away. In the end, I figured that he was also blaming himself for not stepping in. I missed his laugh, missed having playful fun with him and with our parents. It wasn’t all about being strict, rote learning and behavioural correction. We had a lot of fun as a family, both of my parents had fantastic senses of humour, which had rubbed off on the two of us. It seemed to have been lost at the moment.
One night, I presented the table with a board game we had played when Jameson and I had been younger. Mother smiled, pulling the lid off, pulling out the board and setting it up. Father stood, and made to leave, only commenting when he saw the dismay on everyone’s faces.
“I’m just shutting the shed down for the night, I won’t be out there tonight.” He smiled and did just that. For a while that night, not one of us had any thoughts on Selection, or what the rest of Pius thought of us. It was a nice break from the stressful drudgery that life had become.
“Jameson, have you made your decision for Selection, son?” Father enquired at the end of the game, sitting quietly sipping his tea.
“I have, Father. Thank you for your guidance. I believe I have made the right choice and hope they will accept me.”
“Luculentus?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Ah, good. You will be an asset to them with your technology skills, and the way you have fixed the radio and communicators several times even when I was confused as to what to do next. I am sure they will accept you. You will be a loss to Pius.”
“Thank you, Father.”
Father nodded, sipping again at his tea.
I watched him, not expecting him to ask me, but hoping all the same that he might. If I hadn’t been watching, I may not have seen the slight nudge Mother gave him with her elbow, causing his tea to slosh a little in his cup. He sighed, as I lowered my gaze to investigate the lines on my hands.
“Reed, have you?” he asked, with a modicum of the enthusiasm of his same query to Jameson.
I knew he didn’t care, as long I didn’t bring the family name in to disrepute. So, did I tell him what I thought I would choose and risk ruining the atmosphere of the evening, or did I tell him what I thought he wanted to hear? My mouth chose for me, yet a
gain.
“I have, Father. Would you like to know which?”
“If you wish to share.” Polite for 'Not really.'
“Ferox.”
His head shot up, as I knew it would, "Really?” he muttered, “What exactly would they want with a female like yourself? Why not Perdoctus?”
“They need us as much as any other section. Nothing else aside from maybe Arator fits me, I’m good at growing things. I thought I could give Ferox a go. Perdoctus isn’t something I could do for long, you know that - my mouth would get me into trouble.”
Why couldn’t I sound as convincing as I wanted, all I had succeeded in doing was looking indecisive. Which is exactly what I was, but I thought I would have sounded more convincing. In all my wanting for him to take a least a passing interest, I’d not given him a decent reason, just shown him I was as indecisive as he thought I was, and probably convinced him I was still a dreamer, despite all my hard work in hiding it. I sighed.
“I think you could have a decent go at Ferox, love,” my mother piped up, “You’ve always stood up for the underdog, and that's what protection is about. You might need to strengthen up a little more before you try out – but why not?”
Father scowled. Damn it, I had ruined the evening, again.
“Because she’s Pius. How many of us have Ferox taken? To go from healer to beater?”
I tried not to glance at Mother.
“From submissive to women in positions where they could be harmed? Remember that Raeburn girl? She died in Ferox after change. No, this will not do."
“Father. I do not wish to stay in Pius.”
“And you think you get a say?”
I frowned at him. This was one decision he had no say over, and he knew that.
“Yes. This is the one time you don’t get to decide for me.”
He scowled, moving away from the table, heading outside to the shed.
“Then, you need to get working, because if you end up staying here, you will not be welcome in this house,” he threw back over his shoulder as he pulled the door behind him and stayed out there until the early hours of the following morning.
Several exams, and a nerve-wracking oral exam later, I was staring down the barrel of Selection Day. It arrived all of a sudden.
I could see Jameson, confident in his selection, pacing the hallway and itching to get moving. The boys were to leave before the girls, so even though we were twins, Jameson would make his Selection before I could join the crowds.
Dressed in my Selection Day clothes, I hovered around the door, waiting for the call to join others on their way to Selection. Still not entirely sure how I would choose, or if I’d even be selected, I wasn’t exactly nervous. It was a big step, moving away from the way I’d been raised, to something totally different, away from my family. I snorted, thinking, who was I kidding? There were so many things I hated about being Pius, not to mention how my father parented - what he said, goes. Law meant it was almost impossible to answer him back, or disagree and so many things were wrong in this way of living, I could barely stand it anymore. Regardless of where I had chosen or not, I couldn’t wait to get there and get it out of the way.
The alarm sounded in the distance, and I exited my family home, walking down the path to eventually join the others. Quiet, pondering our own thoughts, we briefly acknowledge each other but walked basically alone. I gazed around as I walked, the cookie-cutter houses, all the same, different only with a few flowers in the gardens, or a little paint splashed around. As we got closer to the centre of town, apartment buildings - grey, lifeless buildings - sprang up, the paths becoming darker, alleyways off the main walkway almost black in places. I always felt a little unnerved in these places, but they existed at the edge of all the Section areas, I’d just have to get used to them.
A sudden movement to my left startled me out of my thoughts, glancing sideways - a flash of silver and a sharp tug on my arm and someone pulled me into the inky blackness. A sharp point pressed into my neck. Sharp, pungent breath wafted over my ear.
What the hell was happening?
“Scream, and I’ll slit your throat.”
I grunted my agreement, too scared to talk out loud, pulled further into the dark alleyway. Stumbling, the point pressed harder, drawing blood.
“Get in, now.”
A deep voice growled in my ear, showing me towards an open car trunk. I froze, pushing back against rough hands. What the hell? I didn’t want to get in, fear clenching my gut.
“GET IN!”
A rough hand shoved me from behind, pushing me into the dark trunk of the car, banging my head on the rim of the spare, leaving me seeing stars. Slamming the boot shut, I listened as heavy boots crunched their way around to the driver's door. Creaking, someone climbed into the driver's seat, and started the car, slamming the door shut. Speeding out of the alleyway, I had no idea where we were heading, and whoever was driving was finding the roughest journey there, as we bounced over bumps and potholes, my head slamming into the rim of the tyre, one time too many and I lost consciousness.
I blinked my eyes open an unknown time later with a thumping headache and a large, bruised lump forming on my forehead, I found myself in the pitch black dark. I was in a larger space than the trunk now, and we had stopped moving. As I tried to roll over, I found my arms tied up above my head, a rough, rope-like cord holding them in place. Underneath me, the cold hard surface I assumed was a concrete floor dug into my back. Moving my head, I couldn’t figure out whether something covered my head, or whether it just was that dark. I lay still, hoping my vision would adjust to the darkness, be able to work out what was around me, figure out where I was. Whilst waiting for my vision to clear, I strained to hear anything around us, birds, people, anything. Nothing. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, larger shadows in the dim seemed to be posts in the room it appeared I was in, but from my position restrained on the floor, I couldn’t make much more out. I lost track of time, dozing on and off, a reprieve from the headache.
Startled awake by a door opening, and a bright white light flooding the room, blinding me, unable to make out anything aside from a large shadow entering through the door, shutting it behind them, plunging us back into darkness. There was a small flicking sound, and a soft light emanated from a small lamp in the corner I hadn’t noticed in the darkness. Squinting, I twisted around trying to glimpse the person who was now making their way over, only able to see a shadowy silhouette.
“I see you’re awake,” the shadow spoke, deliberately, their voice deep. Even in the half light, I could see he was smiling, the lower half of his face visible under a hood. Aside from his deep voice, this was the first time I had confirmation it was a male, the stubble on his chin, a sick grin on his lips, bright blue eyes peering out from under the hood. I squinted, trying to make out other features, trying to place his face, as I recognised his eyes. Panic threatened to overwhelm me, as my body fought to get away from him, a small sound escaping me.
“Hush. Don’t make a sound, Reed.”
I swallowed. Dammit, I knew him.
His smile changed, as his bright blue eyes roamed over my body, a sick sneer giving away his thoughts.
I stiffened under his touch, trying desperately to move away, making him laugh, and tormenting me with a face that displayed his intentions clear as day. His hands moved away from me. Perhaps he was just teasing me, perhaps he was just making out he’d hurt me, maybe he’d just leave me here, but I doubted that even as I thought it.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
“Oh, fight it, love. It makes it exciting. Scream, no one can hear you.” He lowered his face to mine, “And, a fucking dyke like you, no one would believe you, anyway.”
He moved forward, as I turned my head away from him, trying to get away, or at least drift away in my mind. Somehow, my thumping headache helped me achieve that, by overwhelming my senses, allowing me to focus on something else, to drift away, semi-conscious, anywhere but here.
Until
he spoke again.
“Oh, I’m not done with you yet, Reed.” He stood, buttoning up his jeans. Leaning forward, he yanked at my shorts. Why did my thighs ache? Yanking the ropes off whatever had been holding them on the floor. He dragged me to my feet, pulling me to a wall I hadn’t seen earlier, hooked my hands over a post and pushed my face into the wall He then hauled my t-shirt up over my head, leaving it there so I couldn’t see anything but white.. I couldn’t see where he’d gone, hoping he’d gone for good. I wasn’t so lucky.
The pain was sudden and sharp, tearing the breath out of my lungs in a rush, as it flashed across my back from my shoulder to my hip. No sooner had I drawn my next breath, there was another sharp pain across my back, a cracking sound giving me a clue what was causing the pain. Through a haze of pain, I could tell he was ranting about something, clenching my teeth, refusing to cry out with each stroke of the leather whip. My back was going numb with repeated blows, a warm, wet sensation of blood running down it like sweat, a coppery smell in the air. My knees buckled with an extra painful stroke.
A giggle behind me gave away just how much he was enjoying himself. His arm tired after some time, and he hauled me off the post in the wall, throwing me to the floor, untying the ropes.
“Don’t you try anything,” he muttered, “Or I’ll make it worse.”
I grunted, refusing to speak to him. He left me lying on the cold concrete floor, against the wall where he had beaten me, and strode to a door, slamming it shut behind him. The graunch of metal on metal set my teeth on edge as he locked me in this small concrete prison.
Everything hurt. I rolled to my side, trying to stay off my back, but causing my other injuries to call out in pain. It all came rushing back. I pulled my knees to my chest, freeing the sobs I had been holding back.
