Slowly, putting one foot in front of the other I made my way home.

Quaking in terror wondering what I was going home to.

My nose still hurt but my headache had subsided a little having been exposed to the warming sun.

I stopped and looked down at my shoes. I wondered if the blood splatter would disappear and just blend in with the other dirt spots.

I heard some cheerful chirping above so I looked up.

I could see birds borrowing shelves of air and singing their cherubic songs. 

How I wished I could've been part of that flock and be free. 

There was the door...that dreaded front door to which I must force my hand to reach out and turn the knob.

I finally thought "Well, if I'm going to get it again, I might as well get it over with."

The doorknob seemingly turned of its own accord before my hand reached the knob.

There he was standing inside the open front door. Startled and already jumpy, I stared at him with big moon eyes.

"Get in the bathroom and let me look at you," he said.

I complied. It's best to comply and save myself some grief.

I sat down on the toilet while he examined my nose he then took a cloth and ran it under warm water then began to wash my face.

He finished without saying a word about the incident. He examined my nose once again and decided that I looked normal enough.

"Wash yourself, put your dirty clothes in the laundry and get yourself something to eat." He said.

It didn't escape my notice that my mother wasn't home like she wasn't the night before.  Either that or she came home and left again. Who knows, I never know.

I can't just say that I have considered her a maternal figure or my mother very much at all by that time.

But, I have this faint hope clause within me that says "Maybe this time my mother will say or do something".

I decided to try one more time even if it meant I may be punished. I waited for her to come home. I asked her to come into the kitchen for a moment. I wanted to tell her about it so I looked her in the face. I said, "Mum, he punched me in the face last night. Hard enough to make my nose bleed".

She sighed and responded, "OK I'll talk to him". Days went by not a word was said for or against.

I approached her again and asked, "Did you talk to him?" She said, "Yes, he told me that if you hadn't ducked, you wouldn't have got a fist in your face."RIDICULOUS!!!"

That was the most outrageous and stupidest thing I ever heard!  I also knew in that instant that she was lying. 

She never said a word to him.   

I was devastated and hurt beyond words even though I knew it was a real possibility that she would disappoint me, the hurt was no less. 

One of the worst incidents between me and my stepfather and she betrayed me...again. She left me to to stare right into the eye of the wolf again.

I did not react in any way whatsoever to this realization. I just lined up all the lies in my head she told me, all the lies in my head he told me and all the false promises.

Like getting new bedroom suites if we kept our rooms clean.  That's crap...we've never had proper beds, why would they start now?

Our summer vacations were always the same. He'd make the same statement at the beginning of every summer, " This is not a vacation, this is work time.

But these were lesser things in the grand scheme of it all. I bear the scars of her betrayal every day. Both physically and emotionally.

It wasn't very long after this that a close family friend of my grandparents on my mother's side passed away.

We didn't get to see a lot of family members for obvious reasons but at the funeral, I could do so.

I talked with many relatives.  Talked about our family and friends and commiserated with the pain of losing a loved one.

My Aunt bless her soul, the one who gave me real clothes to wear, took me aside to speak to me.

"I think you should know what your mother's been saying," she paused and looked me in the face. "She's saying that you girls are mentally disturbed and are suffering from false memory syndrome. Pay no attention to any stories they may tell you."

Oh, the fury. Oh, the bone-shaking fury!

If it wasn't enough to deal with the physical and emotional abuse. Now we had to deal with the false reputations our parents gave us.  I could not stop my limbs from quivering or my mouth from falling open and uttering the words I tried so vainly to keep to myself.  I clapped the hand over my mouth and strode out of the church, out the front door and into the parking lot.

I took many gulps of air to control my anger. I could feel despair welling up inside of me but the fury held me up one more time and stiffened my back with a sure belief that I would never let them beat me.