AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Chapter 9
Birkley
Ishould have listened to Parker. I should have let him take care of me. I should have never gone back to that house I once called home. I was able to make it up to my room and quietly shut the door when I got home, but I should have known I still wasn’t safe. Like always, dad wasn’t home, just mom. I got dressed in some sleep shorts and a tank top before my phone started ringing. I smiled when I saw it was Juju and answered it. I was barely able to get the word “hey” out before my mother came bursting into the room. She was screaming and yelling at me.
“How could you let this fucking happen? You broke your wrist! You didn’t even call me or your father from the hospital. I had to find out through one of your fathers' MISTRESSES that you were injured,” she screams.
Shit, I forgot he was seeing a nurse at the hospital.
“There is no fucking way you will get into Juilliard with a broken wrist like that. You have ruined your future. Everything that I have worked for. Everything I’ve sacrificed for you, it was all for nothing!”she yells.
“It will heal, mother. I will be fine.” I try to calm her down, but I should have just kept my mouth shut. She walks up to me and slaps me across the face. I can feel her long nails raking across my cheek. My head whips around, and I’m too dizzy to see the hand coming at me again. I take a few more slaps and hits before she grabs my hair and starts dragging me through the house. She gets to the front door and pulls me out of it.
“You want to be a whore? Go live with your trailer trash boyfriend. You no longer live here,” she tells me before slamming the door in my face. I have nowhere to go and no cell phone to call Parker or Juju. All she left me with was the clothes on my back and Parker's jacket he wrapped me up in earlier.
Slowly, I get to my feet, thinking about where to go next. I look behind the house, remembering Parker finding me there all those years ago when I ran away. Maybe, just maybe, I can make it to him this time. I don’t think his house is too awfully far from here if he could walk it when he was seven. I’ll head that way before it gets dark.
That leads me to now, sitting on a fallen tree, shivering and completely lost. When I realized the woods behind my house were no longer familiar and a lot thicker than when I was a kid, it was already too late. I’ve been lost in these woods for hours now and have no clue which way to go. I can't even remember which way is back home. My face stings from the hits it took, and I think my left eye is swollen. I want to lie down and cry, but I know I need to find a way out of here.
So, again, I stand up and start walking. I walk and walk and walk. My legs are scraped up, and it has gotten so dark I can barely see in front of me. I lift my foot in my next step, but it gets caught on something, and I go down hard. I feel my head bang against something before the blackness takes me.
Why is it so cold? I’m shaking, but I can't open my eyes. They are so heavy, but I swear I hear people yelling. Are they yelling my name? I try to lift my hand to my head. My head is pounding so hard, and I don’t know why.
“Birkley, fuck Kitten. What happened? HELP!” I hear Parker's frantic voice, but I can't move. I want to reassure him I’m fine. I don’t like the scared tone of his voice, but my mouth won't move. I repeatedly try to open my eyes, but it feels like bricks are weighing them down. I’m so tired, so exhausted, and before I know it, I’m out again.
The next time I wake up, I can hear a beeping noise. It grows louder and gets more annoying the longer I lay here. I try to open my eyes, fully expecting not to be able to, but this time, it works. I open my eyes automatically, realizing I'm in a hospital room, lying in a hospital bed, and Parker is asleep in the chair next to my bed. I don’t know how I got here, but I recall the incident leading up to this. I was kicked out of my house. I have nowhere to go. What am I going to do?
“Kitten, calm down. Hey, Birkley. Look at me, baby,” Parker's voice breaks through the panic as he carefully wipes the tears from my face.
“She kicked me out. My mom. She told me to leave and never come back.” I start crying again.
“We’ve already fixed that issue. I called the cops on your mom, babe. I recorded the minute I heard her come into the room. They heard everything, including her hitting you,” Juju says, coming to stand on the other side of my bed. I didn’t even realize she was in the room.
“We all talked about it, and my mom and dad agreed. You will come to live with us until you graduate,” she tells me, and I can't help but smile sadly.
“What about after graduation? I know you already have plans with Brody,” I ask, squeezing Parker's hand tightly. That’s when he finally speaks up, and I notice his voice is scratchy, and his eyes are bloodshot.
“After graduation, we are getting out of here. My brothers and I have a plan in place. You will come with me. Unless…” He trails off, dropping his eyes.
“I want to be with you,” I tell him automatically. Knowing in my soul, I will go wherever he wants to go.
“What about Juilliard? You've been working for it your whole life,” he says, and I can see the pain in his eyes. Maybe it's the pain of losing me, but I also see his dedication to me. He would let me go if he thought that it would make me happy.
“I was bullied and beaten into it every day of my life. It was never my dream, and the more my mother brought it up, the more resentment I got for that school and every instrument placed in my hands. I want to be with you. I don’t know what I want more than that, but I can figure that out later. I just want to be with you, helping make your dreams come true,” I tell him, tears falling past my cheeks.
“Kitten, you have been and always will be my dream. Nothing else is more important than you. When everyone else forgot about me, you saw me. You brought me back to life, the real me. You will forever be my dream come to life. I love you, Kitten.”
He kisses me, and I know we may have come into this world full of trials and obstacles, but we fought against it all. Together, we rejected them.
