BLOODY TALE TOLD

I simply lay there, on my black blanket, out in the sun. I am in a simple white tee shirt, and black cargo shorts. I am listening to music loudly off my laptop with my headphones. Seemingly nothing is out of the ordinary, apart from the blood pasting the thin material of my shirt to the mangled flesh on my arms, as well as my upper abdomen. I am in the corner of my grandmother’s yard, hidden from view unless you came a looking. The blade I used is neatly tucked away in one of my many pockets. I have my hands neatly folded just below my breasts, and a soft serene expression upon my face. The sprinklers should come on soon, but no worries—I have already placed jars over the ones closest to me. I shan’t get wet. I just need someone to come retrieve me. And there goes the sliding glass door. It’s my uncle. I humbly ignore him, trying hard to suppress a satisfied smile at his light gasp. It seems I have shocked him. But than again, I am covered in blood. Sadly, it’s my own. He calls for my mother. She comes, and screams. The rest of the family emerges. No longer able to ignore them, I rise, peeling my arms away from my shirt with an audible shhtck. Ah, the blood is still wet. I refrain from lapping at my torn flesh. I do, however, run my thumb along one particularly nasty gash, covering it in blood before sticking it in my mouth. I look innocently at my mother, and the most sinister of smiles finds its way onto my face. I pause, then throw my head back and laugh. I laugh, and laugh, and laugh. It is the most psychotic, homicidal laugh anyone in my family has heard, yet it is the most reasonable. When I no longer am able to breath, I pitch forward, shaking and gasping. Everyone has stepped back. I calm, and soon look up. My face is that of a sweet but mischievous child, who has played a joke on someone. This isn’t a joke. I smile with my eyes lightly closed, and tilt my head slightly to one side.

“There once was a girl, and her reasons to cry, who spent all day with a tear in her eye. A smile t’was on her face, but she was at the end of her race. The time had come, the time had gone. Her life was naught, and far from some. Her death was near, though she held no fear. A budding flower she was no more; her soul shaken, her body sore. She now holds a silent killer, for her ‘father’ defiled her!” I said in a gentle sing-song voice, with extra emphases on the word father, my eyes still closed. I open them and look at her, menace in my gaze. Then I slowly turn my hands palm up, showing the extent of the damage. There was no skin on the inside of my arms from my elbows to the base of my fingers that wasn’t cut, bruised, gouged, poked, or peeled away entirely, and there was no place below the middle of my upper arm that wasn’t covered in blood, let alone dripping it. And this was on both arms. There were little fibers from my shirt glued into the wounds with my blood. My little sister cautiously came up and touched one of my deeper slices, and recoils in horror. Her small finger found its way in between the flesh, and no one had any doubts about the realness of the situation.

“I have a secret, a secret I say! Her man is the one who made me this way! A whisper here, a suggestion there, pokes and prods everywhere! He pushed and pushed until I gave way, and now there is a heavy price to pay! As long as it’s been, the memory is quite clear, for it is one that I must hold near! A grown up I wanted to be, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t see. The truth I denied, and so he lied. It was right, it was wrong, and so ends my song!” I sang cheerfully, than I passed out. I guess I lost a bit too much blood.