Den of Vipers

in the end, we’re all the same. We all bleed the same colour, and we are all
just searching for something to make the truth of our souls disappear so we
feel like good people.
I’m not fooling him, he knows I’m awake, so I sit up and face him. I
refuse to cry, I refuse to beg. Not anymore. I did once, and I thought he might
actually stop. I know better now. He won’t stop until he kills me one day, but
until then, I’m just surviving from one day to the next with that truth hanging
over me.
“Get up,” he slurs. I purse my lips, but do as I’m told, knowing that will
get this over more quickly.
But every time this happens, something grows inside me, that anger
morphing until I have to bite my tongue to stop from hitting back, from
lashing out. I refuse to be like him.
He stumbles my way, swearing when he almost falls over. “I lost two
thousand tonight, you know whose fault that is?” he yells.
I should say nothing, just nod and take the hit like a good girl.
But maybe I’m not a good girl, maybe I’m just as messed up as he is.
“I’m guessing mine,” I drawl.
Dumb, real dumb.
For a drunk man, the punch comes fast, he’s big, and it shows in the
power behind his fists. It smacks into my gut, bending me over as I struggle to
breathe. My stomach aches even more now than just hunger pains.
He grabs my hair, making me cry out as he jerks up my head. His crooked
teeth flash in the dark, his face blurry from my tears. He snarls at me, his
rancid breath wafting into my face and making me gag. “Yours, you fucking
little shit.”
I’m so busy trying not to vomit—the last time I did, he broke my arm—
that I don’t see it coming. He throws me into the wall, and my head hits it
with a sickening thud. My body goes limp as I slide down it, pain fracturing
through my skull until I can’t see.
I can’t hear.
Then it all goes dark.
Gasping, I jerk upright. Sweat covers my entire body as adrenaline rushes
through me. I lift my hand and press it to the back of my head where the dent
still rests from that night. Fuck, that’s why I drink before bed, to keep the
nightmares away.
Blowing out a breath, I blink my blurry eyes to clear the sleep from them,