Hunter’s moon

Chapter 1 childhood

I lay a glance upon the Hunters moon and with one quick movement I look away trying desperately to push aside horrid childhood memories. I know I will lose once again and give way to the violent, cold, shivers. Become nothing more than a lost soul, a faithful prisoner of the Past’s wicked games. But for now I am safe. As long as I never speak of such things out loud. For, until an event is spoken out loud and acknowledge, it can be tossed just outside the limits of reality.

The harder I try to hold the memories at bay, the harder they come crashing in. Waves of fear and hate rake my body and left my knees useless. Kneeling now, with the heels of my hand pushed into my eyes, willing the starting images to turn into spotted dots. Begging for the past not to pull me in, praying to win just once. I realize I have lost once the images begin to form more vivid pictures.

I was eight that year. The sun was high and the wind blew so sweetly across my skin. I spent the day with friends. We climbed the old willow tree and traced our fingers across the dips in the bark. We played tag in the meadow, swam in the river and laughed every second. But all too soon the veil of evening fell over the sky and we were forced to return to our homes. I walked home slow and alone as I normally did. It was not as if I didn’t have caring friends, I just lived in the opposite direction. I had always wished one of them had lived closer, even if it was the boy who shoved bugs up his nose. I jumped as a loud awful noise came roaring through the lane. I dared not look back to find the source of such awful noise. My body froze with paralyzing fear once I realized it was my father’s car and acknowledge what would happen next.

I tried pleading with him “Please not again papa! Please!!!”

“Shut up!” He spat at me.

I remember thinking about running but I also knew better. I ran once…Never again would it happen. Partly because I feared another broken foot and partly because I feared he would do even worse things if I dared even think such thoughts again.

As I stood paralyze I allowed Fear to hold my hand and a waited my fathers return. I watched helplessly as his body and foul words fell out of the car. He stumbled over to me with a look of discusses and maybe even hate. I shivered as I tried to hide my scolding hot tears. Tears always seemed to please him but not in a good way. He grasped my elbow and dragged my body to the edge of the woods. I knew what was going to happen and planted my feet into the ground and started to wail for help. No one came. No one ever came…And yet I was foolish enough to try time after time.

“If you say one more word…!” He threatened as he tightens his grip to get my attention.

In an instant I hushed up and allowed him to drag me to the middle of the woods without a fight. It was dark and the only light that lit our path was the feeble light from the hunters’ moon. The red beams danced across the table that he had so neatly placed in the middle of the woods. A whimper left my lips the second I saw it. That night I could even quote the words he was about to say.

“Pick one.” He barked throwing me at the table.

On the table sat a wrench, a rod, a thick leather belt, fishing pole, and an object with a sharp edge. My body shock as I ran a finger over each of them while sobbing the entire time.

“Shut up! I swear I’ll I hit you with each one of those if you don’t shut the hell up! Pick one damnit!” He screamed as he took a step closer.

Quickly, I wrapped my fingers around the belt and turned around. Some nights I thought about picking something harder, heavier, and even deadlier just to end everything.

He smiled a wicked smile; A smile that some how was not a smile at all. For a smile to be a smile you had to be happy. I surely with a smile like the devils he was not happy. As I grow up I released he was happy, that he smiled out of pure madness and pure enjoyment.

Like ever other time he strapped me against the chair with my chest to the back side of the seat and my back left helpless to his wicked thoughts. He never once tried to silence my screams. After all, we where located in the middle of the woods. A place where no one could hear my screams, or at least where no one choose to hear my pain. Even at the age of eight I knew why he never silenced my screams; he wanted to be reassured that he was hurting me, breaking me. After twenty hits I was numb. He could go on for days and never hurt me again. I screamed because it was the first twenty that hit my flesh with the most force. It was those first hits that licked painfully across my back. At one point everything would fade away and I would be left with only my thoughts to comfort me.

Once he had drunk his fill of my pain he stepped back to admire his masterpiece. His laugh would send my stomach into violent convulsions and my teeth grind together. I swallow long and hard to keep the burning in my throat from consuming me. Loosening my grip on the chair allows the hand cuffs the rub against raw skin, threatening to allow another whimper to escape my lips.

“If you ever tell anyone I will kill! Do you understand? You think this is bad? Just wait!” He would warn.

I loved hearing those words. Those words meant it was over. They meant I would be released and we would go home with him wearing a smirk across his thin lips. Once back home he would push me through the door in front of him as he prepared what to say because tonight the blood trickled down my back and onto the carpet.

“Honey, she fell out of another damn tree! Your gonna have to call the doc.”

“Hailey! God damnit! Haven’t I told you to stay out of those trees!” She yelled at me as she walked around the corner. She gasped as she got a good look at me. “How the hell did a tree do that to you Hail?” She wouldn’t even come to me she was so horrified.

A long slender finger pushed itself against my raw wound making me hiss with pain. I knew from where mother stood it look as if he was supporting me, holding me up and giving me the strength to tell her what happen. But I knew other wise. I knew the pressure would only be applied in greater amounts as I grasp for extra time. I wanted to flee his grasp and warp my arms around my mother and tell her everything. But I did not dare. Something inside willed me not to. Warned me she would never believe a word I spoke. The longer I took the harder his skin dug into mine and with in seconds tears where rolling down my cheeks and lies where rolling effortlessly out of my mouth. Her anger vibrated through out the room as she swore no one was going to take me to the doctors, due to my ignorance. She swore if this did not teach me a lesson nothing would.

I remembered how horrid the pain was as I peeled off my bloody shirt. I could not hold back the screams nor could I stop dancing around in circles with my eyelids held together hoping the pain would subside. My relief came once I emerged my battered body into the coldest water the tap would release. An hour later I pushed my hands against the bottom of the tub gathering enough strength to stand up and walk out of the crimson water.

The next morning I went to school hoping to just get by. All hopes ended when I would cautiously lean against the back of my chair and scream once the pain caught up with me. The teacher eyed me a few times before sending me off to the school nurse. Oh God how I loved that women. She was the only one who believed me, the only one that would give me something for the pain and allow me to sleep the day off. But even she would not say a word. She knew releasing the truth would get us both hurt. My father’s image was held to high in our little town.

Somewhere I could hear a buzzing noise. I clung to the faint sound hoping it would bring me out of my memories. It did just that. The phone was ringing with its loud, annoying, rhythm. I needed to get out. I needed to stand up and walk past the phone and go for a run. I needed to…It was too late. I had the phone to my ear.

“Hailey…?” A mans voice echoed through the phone. I froze because I knew that voice but could not pin it. Recognition came smashing into me as I realized it was my brother…

I said nothing, I hand not spoken to him in years,

Once again my memories came to drowned me in the past.

I was sixteen this time. Once again he had managed to drag me into the middle of the woods screaming at me as I made my picked. But this time something was different, I was different. Something took over my mind as I wrapped my fingers around the rusty old wrench. The cool steal had giving me courage and ideals that had never traveled through my mind before. I turned in one quick motion holding the tool above my head to gain force as it smashed into him… To be honest I don’t remember much after that. It comes in pieces…I remember being on top of him once his body had fallen against the Earth. I remember painfully that I continued making contact with his skull seconds before everything went white. Seconds before I went numb and the worlds voices where lost to me. I came to sitting on top of his gory body and felt nothing. I could not cry because I felt no remorse. I could not shriek because I felt no pain. I remember jogging back to the house and calling the police. Until I spoke to the officer my heart beat had not been in my throat beating desperately like a trapped animal. My mother despised my very existents after that day. She blamed me from wreaking her perfect life. My brother on the other hand did not know what to think. He and father would go fishing, play football, and do father, son things together. Although he was well aware father came home night after night drunk and angry, but being older than I he had moved out a long time before hand.

I won the court case with the help of the towns members. The school nurse was the first voice to be heard, after hers many others followed. But before I left the little town I still had to prove my innocents to one person. I needed him, my brother, to believe me. My last words to Matt, where not ones of love but directions to that haunting table that sat in the woods.

“Come on Hailey, I’m your brother, talk to me.” He pleaded

“How’d you get my number Matt?”

“My friend got it for me. Listen we need to talk.”

“It’s been what two years? And now you want to talk to me? Now you think everything is okay and all is forgotten?! Do you think now that you have something to say that I should be willing to listen?!” I screamed into the phone going a bit over board due to overwhelming emotions.

“Come on Hailey. Listen to me just this once! Throw your foul thoughts away and just listen to me!”

“Goodbye Matt. Have a great life and do me a favor, lose my number.” I slam the phone into its cradle as I rip the cord from the wall.