Read Night's Promise for Free Online Page B

felt the pillow being ripped from her hands, she opened her eyes and sat up on the bed.
    “That got your attention, didn’t it? Now get your ass up and fix me something to eat.”
    “Leave me alone,” she said, snatching the pillow from him and pulling it close to her. Her body curled around it, protecting the item from him.
    Without a word of warning, Melissa’s face was thrown to the side, her cheek burning as though someone had just set fire to it.
    “You want to cry so damn much, I’ll give you something to cry about. This house better be clean when I get home, or so help me…” Travis didn’t finish his threat. He didn’t have to. Her cheek was already throbbing from his first blow.
    She waited until the front door slammed shut before she left her room. As Melissa cleaned the house, her mind was far away, on a picnic she and her mother had enjoyed a few summers past. When she finished taking the trash to the curb, she went straight back to her room. Pulling the familiar textbooks out of her backpack, she littered them around her, in preparation of her stepfather’s return home. She didn’t want to give him any other excuses to come into her bedroom, to think that she had “free” time.
    The next day at school, one of her teachers and the principal pulled her aside to find out about the large bruise on her cheek. Unemotionally, as though she were talking about someone else’s life, she told them what happened. Shocked and outraged, they’d called both the police and her stepfather into the school.
    Before her very eyes she saw him do a song and dance number.
    Watching him, she hoped the group was too intelligent to actually believe what he was saying. Her stomach knotted as the other adults clung to his every word, every little detail he fed to them. By the time he was finished, he had everyone in the room convinced she was acting out to get attention.
    Travis led her out of the school without so much as a harsh word. But when they got home, he slapped her face. Pain blossomed inside of her, but she didn’t cry out, she didn’t even whimper. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.
    “I better not ever get called back to your school. You made me miss half a day’s work, you little bitch. Get your ass inside that kitchen and make me some supper.”
    Keeping her mouth shut, Melissa did as she was told.
    In the weeks that followed, Melissa withdrew farther into herself. Whenever a teacher would look at her, or a friend would ask about her bruises, she would shrug and ignore them. She simply burrowed deeper and deeper inside of herself, hiding in the memories of a happier time, when her mother was still around to comfort and protect her.
     
    * * *
     
    The first thing Melissa became aware of as she woke was the tears running down her face. That realization was quickly replaced by a man’s arms around her.
    Panicking, she struggled, trying to fight her way out of the embrace and unable to stop herself from screaming. Her struggles grew stronger when she felt the bare sheet slide over her legs.
    “I need to study. I-I can’t fail this test,” she pleaded. When that didn’t work she screamed, “Get off me.” Her fingers curved and she slapped and scratched and kicked for all she was worth, her panic growing more acute when the arms around her grew tighter. Almost crazy with the need to escape this fate, she opened her mouth and began to scream, praying one of the neighbors would hear her. Uncaring of the punishment she would receive for the cops or some damn nosey neighbors interrupting Travis’s plans, Melissa prayed for a small reprieve.
    She prayed he would hit her hard enough that she would at least lose consciousness rather than be forced to endure his touch.
    A hand went over her mouth and, even though she knew she would pay for the action later, her fear of what he was about to do was too much for her to care. Clawing at the hand, trying to pull it away, she only managed to turn it slightly.