AllFreeNovel
Share Us
PROLOGUE
MAYA
Girls at my age fall in love in high school hallways. The boy and the girl accidentally crash into each other, the books spread onto the ground, hands touching briefly, eyes meet, a little smile forces its way to the teenage faces along with a shy blush and the first ray of love shows itself.
I fell in love twice, with the same person. But there were no books, no hallway, no smiles, or no blush covering my cheeks either time. The first time I fell in love it was a secret, something so wrong I was scared to acknowledge it, it was also the most intense thing I’d ever felt. But, I learned to live without it. The second was the real deal breaker because I knew there was no turning back from it this time. The second time I fell in love, there was blood, pain, a strange numbness, rush, and darkness. But also, there was the most familiar sound whispering into my ear.
“Stay with me, Maya.” His voice was gentle but in control, almost as if daring me to disobey.
I couldn’t. I’d never disobey him as long as he held me in his arms, as long as I could smell his intoxicating scent over the blood. He was back, and that was all that matters. I wasn’t alone anymore. For him, I fought against the darkness that was trying to cage me in, I fought to stay with him.
“She’ll never be back to this hole.” I heard him say as my eyelids close.
And just like that I irrevocably fell in love, again, covered in my own blood.
CHAPTER 1
MAYA
Earlier
I placed my apron inside my locker at the café when my morning shift was done. Stacey, the lunchtime waitress, had already taken my place behind the counter, serving the customers their orders with a smile as fake as her tits.
Putting my hoodie on over my head, I got out of the café. The traffic was busy at this time of the day. People were rushing to hit a diner and meet their friends on their lunch breaks.
I was rushing, too, not to meet a friend or having something to eat. I was rushing to be on time for my second job. Walking faster, I pushed my way between people and ignored the horns that were screaming wordless curses at me for not waiting for the green light. I was in a hurry.
When I finally reached the beauty salon, I changed into my uniform in the staff room. The cleaning supplies were ready for me to use. I found this job only last week. This part of the town was an upgrade for me. With no higher education and not enough experiences, I was applying for every position I could find.
As women paid to be pampered by strangers, I was working in the backstage,
cleaning the rooms they left. It was exhausting especially after a morning shift at the café, but it was at least distracting. As I scrubbed the surfaces to perfection, there wasn’t much room for me to think. It was also busy enough in the salon, no one was trying to make conversation which was fine for me.
The hours passed in cleaning chemical smells. After changing my outfit back to my own clothes, I knocked my boss’ office door.
“Come in.”
I entered Miss Daisy’s ridiculously pink office. Her face turned into that disgusted expression when she saw me.
“I’m here to get my weekly salary, Miss Daisy,” I said, ignoring her bitchy face.
She sipped from her teacup with floral design and crossed her arms over her chest. I counted to ten while she took her time before talking. Finally, she put a fake smile on her face.
“Maya, I’m glad you stopped by, I was just going to call for you. I’m afraid we won’t keep working together,” she said.
“Are you firing me? But why?”
“Don’t question me, little lady,” she snapped.
Gritting my teeth, I forced down all the curses. “Okay. Then pay me my weekly salary.”
“No, salary,” she shook her head. “You were on a trial week. You couldn’t pass it.”
“I worked a week in here. I earned it.”
“Enough discussion. Close the door as you leave,” she dismissed me.
I could’ve fought harder, I thought. Maybe I could’ve made a scene and called the police, but I wasn’t naive enough to believe that anyone would take my side. So instead, I swallowed everything down.
I was going to rise again. If this job didn’t work out, I was going to find a new one. I was going to make it, I always did.
I kept repeating the same pep talk I always gave to myself whenever things got rough. But every time I needed to repeat these words, my belief was fading. With emotional exhaustion, I dragged my body through the streets until I reach the bar. My third spot to make some money to keep living. Joe’s Bar was better than the other places I worked, not because it paid better, it didn’t, but because the boss gave free dinners to employees. Also, I had a small sanctuary behind the lockers to get an hour of rest before my shift starts. That one hour of silence and calm was such a luxury in my life.
***
My feet were killing me. That was what happened when you work for 36 hours in three different jobs without getting any rest. Thankfully, there was no shift at the café in the morning, and I was going to be able to get some rest.
After cleaning the countertop and drying up the glasses, I took off my bartender shirt that shows off more than it hid –almost see-through white shirt, knotted just under my breasts with deep cleavage– and changed into my sweatshirt.
“Good night, Maya,” Ryder, the only male waiter at the bar, said.
I only nodded, feeling too tired to talk. It didn’t matter though, he wasn’t my friend. He just pitied me because I didn’t have any friends, so it was his way of being the nice person. I sometimes wished I had a friend, only one, but there was no way I could have any. Not because I was unfriendly or rude, I was just sad, and the melancholy was dripping from my soul. People feel those kind of things, they say they’re always there if you want to share your pathetic life with them, they would make you believe like talking about your life won’t be a problem. In the end, they would put distance from you – they would start by not sharing things with you, they would become closer to others and the distance between you and your friend grows bigger and bigger. You only turn into a girl with too many problems. People want friends to have fun together, and that wasn’t something I could offer to anyone. So instead of trying to make friends, I gave up altogether. I was a loner, and that was fine.
When I got out of the bar, it was almost sunrise. The streets were empty, the sky began to lighten up even though it was cloudy. This was my favorite time of the day; me and the city alone, only my thoughts and the chill of the morning air. I walked to South Park, the place others forgot about and turned their faces to another side not to see what was happening in these streets. This place was like us –raw, in pain, and hopeless, the cancerous part of the city that needed to be cut out. But South Park was the only place I knew, the only place I could blend in and be invisible. Outside of it, I was a freak among people, but in here I was no one in the sea of no ones.
The smell that soaked me till my bones got stronger with every step – like unclean aquarium mixed with heavy industrial chemicals. There was shouting that reached to my ear from one of the houses, groaning from the homeless people on the sidewalk. This place was suffering, agonized. I stopped outside of my house, the place was run-down. I was sure it had better days; the time when the brick wall had a color, the garden was green, and people were happy. Now the walls were covered in moss, the garden was conquered by blackberry bushes that didn’t have any blackberry’s. Even they were dead, like the souls who lived inside.
I stepped into my house, sighing as I looked at the mess around the small space. Cheap beer bottles scattered everywhere, spoon and needles were on the coffee table I grabbed from next to a trash can. I heard a moaning come from my mother’s room and ran toward there with panic.
“Mom?” I called into the room before opening the door. When I did it wasn’t mom I saw, instead I came face to face with my dad’s naked ass as he fucked a woman that wasn’t my mother in my mom’s bed. It wasn’t the first time I caught him in action, he was using the place just for his fuckfest. He was never a father to me, but I still kept hoping he’d change after the last argument; we kept arguing, and he never changed. They were still fucking like I wasn’t there. Fuming, I had enough. I couldn’t deal with him any longer.
“Get the fuck out of my house. Now,” I shouted, throwing the clothes on the floor at them.
“Calm down, girl. Let us finish, and we’ll go,” he slurred, a stupid grin was on his flushed and sweaty face.
“I don’t want to see you ever again,” I said and shut the door behind me, heading toward my room to see if mom was there.
I walked closer to my bed when I saw her fragile figure. “Mom?”
