Before The Sun Goes Down

Frank's POV
I wake up to coldness and an aching deep-set in my face. The room is still how I left it, but the duvet is almost on the floor. I must have been tossing and turning during the night. I slowly get up, and I look out of the window and check for any signs of life. There isn't any.
I walk into 'our' room, and into the bathroom, wincing at my face. The bruise on it looks like Jessica's. Except, with mine, there are two bruises layered on one another, one more developed than the other.
My hair is all over the place, so I flatten it down before doing anything else. I look at the shower, but I shake my head to myself and walk down the stairs.
The house is silent, and I start to feel regret. I look at the front door, and try to open it, wanting to get out, but I find it locked. I curse, shaking my head and I walk into the kitchen. Nothing has been touched in it, and I notice nothing new. Apart from a piece of paper on the island in the middle.
I read it through, not really taking in the harsh words. Apparently I had a nightmare last night.
Frank,
You didn't even scream like that when I took you, darling.
I mean, I don't have to sleep, but some fucking peace and quiet is nice. You're pretty pathetic, y'know? You're in your twenties and you still have pathetic nightmares.
And you better not be a little bitch tonight and run away from me, otherwise there will be trouble.
I re-read the note, taking in all the details. On some of the words, the paper has torn from him digging his pen in so hard, there's a little rip in the corner of the paper, and the hand-writing is terrible.
Instead of shock or upset, I feel anger. The anger make me screw up the paper and throw it away. My hands shake as I do this, and I can feel the prickly sensation of tears in my eyes, though I don't know why. I feel sick.
I make myself some coffee, not even looking at food. I begin to search for my cigarettes, only to realize that I don't have any. Or a car to go and get any. Sighing, I walk outside into the back garden. Or should I say 'back-forest'.
There are trees everywhere, and not even just trees you find in America. There are, although I'm not entirely sure, several Oak trees dotted around, as well as tons of others I haven't seen before. The grass has recently been cut, but there isn't much grass, only a little strip when you come out of the door and into the garden. The rest of the ground is covered in leaves, twigs, logs, and it's really muddy in some parts.
As I sip my coffee, I walk deeper into the trees. It's peaceful out here. It smells fresh. It looks fresh. It clears my mind, and I forget about how bewitching Miles' eyes are. I start to build upon the things I've already remembered, but His name keeps escaping my grasp again.
I know he had black hair, then red hair. He has small teeth, and eyes like Miles'. Or Miles has eyes like his. I remember cutting his hair and dyeing it. I can't remember what color, though, or how short I cut it. I remember a long drive to somewhere that we didn't even end up getting to that turned sour.
I remember lots of little, unimportant things about him, but I can't remember a solid memory, or what I felt about him at specific times. I get fleeting little things that resemble a memory or a feeling every once in a while, but it's nothing I can hang onto and look into what it is.
I remember how warm I felt when I was kissing him, something I don't think I've ever realized until now, and now I can't even remember his name.
What I can't remember is how I met Miles. Which is strange, because I feel a sense of familiarity around him that you feel when someone knows you really well.
I walk further into the forest, unsure of where I'm going or where I'll end up. The way I'm feeling right now, a million miles wouldn't be far enough away. The words from his little message replay over and over in my head like a stuck record. They replay in Miles' voice, but in different tones. Angry, mocking, hateful, bitter.
Unknowingly, I start singing. I'm not even sure how I know the song, but I do, and the familiarity of it is like that of a distant dream. Or a forgotten person. It blocks out Miles' voice.
I don't even recognize my own voice. It sound pitiful in the forest, though, because the forest is so full of beautiful sounds like birds singing and water running, and my voice can't even compare.
Still, I carry on singing, changing songs every so often. I sit down on a tree stump and put my mug besides me on the floor. I sit for hours, looking around me and studying the nature. Like the tree opposite me. It's trunk is gnarled and slightly rotted, but it is beautiful. The colors, the texture. And the birdsong. It sounds so light and... happy.
I only snap out of my daze when I hear footsteps. I know it's Miles even before I see him. His footsteps are heavy. They thud, and the noise breaks the contentment of the place around me and makes it fall all but silent.
I hold my breath, frozen to the spot, my hands clutching the tree stump. Barks comes away in my hands, the feeling of the rotten and wet wood makes me shiver. I can hear him muttering things, things probably about me. He's close by, and I think he sees me, because he stops dead in his tracks, then starts again, a little faster this time.
“Frank! What the fuck are you doing out here?” Suddenly he's in front of me, his eyes dark and menacing. I stare at him, silently. “Well?” His voice snaps me out of my stare, and I open my mouth and close it several times before I've even thought of the words to say.
“Um, I... I, uh, I... I though I would get some air?” He crosses his arms, not looking at me.
“Are you saying that the house is stuffy? Are you saying that you don't like it? You're saying you want to leave, aren't you?” He stares at me, his eyes becoming lighter, I try to look away, but I can't. Shooting up, I start frantically shaking my head.
“No, no, no! I love the house! The house is great; it's fucking fantastic, okay? I love it,” He stares at me, his eyes hooded. They look sad. “I swear, Miles. I love the house, and I love you.” He opens his arms to me, but I make no move to go to him, because I'm caught by his eyes. So, he pulls me towards him.
“Are you sure? If you left, I think I'd die.” He holds me tighter, slightly constricting my breathing. I ignore my discomfort and let him hug me, thinking over his words.
He'd die? Figuratively, or literally? Whatever he means, it gives me a bad taste in my mouth. A taste that won't go. Not even when we go back inside and he makes me a cocktail. And he's smiling.
The cocktail is the first alcohol I've had in months. And I don't remember how I remembered that, but I do. And I remember how alcohol isn't too good for me, and how bad I was when I was drinking it. But it doesn't stop me, and I barely taste the drink because I drink it so fast.
The bad taste doesn't go when I have another, or another, or another. I'm not even sure if the bad taste is from what he said or how fucked up everything is, as I've come to realize in my drunken haze.
He makes me something to eat after the first one, and I don't get drunk as fast, but I still get really drunk. I'm less tolerant to it than I was a few months ago, so I do get drunk faster than I would have, but not as fast as I would've if I hadn't eaten.
The alcohol makes me feel warm and light. It makes me feel as though whatever has happened to me and whatever will happen to me and what could happen to me doesn't matter. It makes my head feel heavy but my heart as light as air. It makes Miles seem nicer, it makes what he's been like over the past few days seem more faraway and like make-believe
I'm all smiles and laughter as Miles jokes around with me and he's nice. He tells jokes and I slur out the appropriate responses and I laugh when I think it's time for me to laugh, and I reciprocate his advances because I don't know what else to do. I can barely slur out any response to his words, and I can't see straight.
That's why when he asks me if I want to 'go to bed', I nod. I can't stop myself, when in reality, it's the last thing I want to do. My skin literally crawls with the thought of even kissing him for longer than a few seconds. And when he drags me upstairs, a smile on his face, I don't try to struggle away from him, because I wonder what he'd do if I did, and the fear of that alone stops me from doing anything but comply to whatever he asks.
And he asks me to take off my clothes, and he asks me to lie down, and he asks me to relax. I can't relax, though, and he slaps me. The hit lands right on my bruise. He asks me to shut the fuck up, but I'm not even aware that I was making any noise, so I try to stop, but it doesn't work, because I get hit again and he tells me, harsher this time, the same.
He asks me to drop onto my knees, and he asks me to suck, and he asks me to stop crying, and he asks me to get up, and he asks me to be fucking quiet or I'll gag you.
So this time, I do. I lie in the bed and let him do whatever he has to do, and I keep as quiet as I can. He gets a few more hits in, but I can't feel them. I can't feel the pain from what he's doing to me, I can only feel a tidal wave of everything and anything washing over me as he does what he did that night a long while ago.
I can't stop him, so what's the point in trying? What's the point of even thinking to try and stop him?
And when I wake up after it, I'm not sure how long after or, or when I passed out, and he does it again, I still can't stop him. It's not, an 'I don't want to,' or, 'I'm scared to...', it's more of an 'I physically can't, my body won't let me, my mind won't let me, I'm glued to my spot while he hurts me and I can't do anything about it, oh, I can't,'.
He finishes dirtying me again, gets off of me, laughs at me, and walks out, leaving the bedroom door open. I pas out again, and when I wake up, there's a horrible burning pain that makes me forget everything and just cry.
I can't even cry properly. The tears come in little bursts or they don't come at all. My body shakes with the sobs, but no noise comes out apart from a low whining. I lie on the bed and kind-of cry for hours. Daylight shines through the windows before I can even think about getting up.
The daylight does stir something in me, whether it's a tiny little bit of hope or it drags me deeper into despair. It makes me stop crying, and it makes me stand up. I wipe my tears with shaky hands and look around for my clothes. I want to be covered up, I don't want to look at myself.
I find a t-shirt, and I put it on, my face screwed up from the pain.
Then, I shuffle into the bathroom, missing the mirror and going straight for the shower. I turn it on, and get in it straight away. I tear the t-shirt off when I feel it sticking to me. I'd forgotten it was on. Standing under the spray, I start to shiver and my fingertips turn blue. I vaguely feel the cold, so I turn up the heat.
I stop shivering, but I still have a slight tremor in my hands. I scrub myself raw, I wash my hair several times. Then I lose whatever was holding me to the ground and stop thinking. My mind just runs blank as I stare at the tiles.
When I finally pick thought back up, the shower has been turned off and I'm completely dry, apart from my hair, which is still slightly damp. I look around me, for no reason in particular, and then get out of the shower and walk back into the bedroom. Looking through the wardrobe, I look at all the clothes disdainfully. All of them were bought by Miles. Every single article of clothing, including underwear.
I hate everything in this house, and the thought of wearing, eating, using anything he's bought makes me feel sick.
But, I can't walk around wearing nothing. I'd rather go back to Montcromary. Especially with him around. So, I pull out some baggy clothes and put them on, trying not to move too much. Moving hurts. I can't remember anything about last night apart from what he did to me.
Walking down the stairs, I burst out crying again. It's real crying this time, not the pathetic shit I was doing a while ago. I trip on the last five steps, my vision blurred so much that I can't even see. I lie at the bottom of them in a heap, my vision swimming after I hurt my head falling down.
Eventually, I drag myself up, and walk to the kitchen as a stumbling mess. I feel warm liquid trickle down my cheek and wipe it away. My hand comes away red.
The brightness of the color startles me, and I stumble to the sink to wash it off. I wash my hands for ages, and I'm so out of it that I don't realize that my hand isn't even under the water until I look down again, and the hands on the square clock have moved a lot.
All the while, I cry. It's slowed down some, but the tears are still there. The blood from my cut has stopped running, so it must have congealed. My head is chaos, thoughts running into thoughts running into thoughts. I can't think straight, and the room is spinning.
I end up standing in the middle of the room, near the island, just staring at the spinning, still running, water coming from the tap. The phone starts ringing, and without thinking, I answer it. I can't go very far with it, because it's attached to the wall, but it's the first contact I've had with anyone apart from Miles for what seems like centuries.
“Huh-Hello?” I hiccup in the middle of the sentence, and my voice sounds hoarse. There aren't any tears coming from my eyes any more, though.
“Who is this?” The voice is strange. It's like it isn't there and it is at the same time.
“I could ask the same quh-question.” The person on the other side huffs and is silent for a while.
“Is Miles there?” My face screws up, and I take the phone away from my ear and stare at it, like it would tell me why they are calling.
“Muh-May I ask why you want him? And, wh-who is this?”
“It's about business,” They pause, then chuckle. “You're Frank.” I bite my lip, growing more confused by the second.
“How do you nuh-know that?” They chuckle again, the sound eerie and echoing back and forth to me.
“Miles talks a lot about you. He is quite... taken by you. Could you please tell Miles I called? Say that it was Lucifer.” The line goes dead, and I replace the phone.
I don't really think about the phone call until much later.
After the phone call from someone named Lucifer, I sit down and do nothing for a while. I barely even breathe. My chest moves up and down only when I feel like my lungs will burst, and I like the light-headed feeling it gives me. Like being drunk.
My eyes are closed, and I can see the light through the thin skin. The light is tinged a red, pink color. It's pretty, and I wish I have a camera built in my eyes. Or perhaps not, because I guess I'd have a lot of pictures of what happened last night. Like when I was on my knees in front of him and he was zipping down his zip and he was thrusting his thing into my face and I was gagging and crying and moaning, not out of pain but out of the absolute disgust and shame and pain I was feeling.
And there would probably be a few videos of what happened. I bet Miles would love that.
But I have to stop thinking about that, because I'm shaking right now and my breathing is being voluntarily messed up. So I stand up and pour myself a glass of water and sip it until it's all gone. The motion of the glass being brought to my mouth, the sipping, the bringing the glass away and swallowing is nice. It's repetitive, it's calming.
I listen to the birdsong. I listen to my own heartbeat. I listen to the still-running tap. I listen to my own crying and decide that I sound like a wounded animal. I listen to my own wet eyelashes batting together when I blink, which is often.
What I don't listen to is my brain. It's telling me to run away, it's telling me that Miles is poisonous, it's telling me to ring a very familiar number that keeps ringing through my head. I ignore the pleas, instead letting myself be dragged deeper and deeper into the bottomless pit of negative feelings.
It would be so easy, though, to run away. I could pack some stuff. Stuff like food, clothes, money. I could call a cab. I could disappear and go live somewhere like Canada. But, it would also be so difficult. I have a feeling that Miles would find me, and in his primal anger, he'd do something worse to me than just rape.
So, I will myself to be strong. To not look into his eyes again. It's his eyes. It has to be his eyes. If anyone else hit me, I would have left them. But he hasn't just hit me, he's done so many other things to me. Why can't I leave him? Because of his eyes, that's why.
It's all so strange. He came into my life and shook things up, he made me trust him, he made me come and live with him, and now he has done this. I think, though, if I saw him and his stupid eyes, I would fall back into his arms and he'd be free to destroy me again.
And this cycle will go on for the rest of my life until I put a stop to it or he kills me because he gets bored. Or, I kill myself.
That’s a definite option.
My mind is still screaming at me to call this number. It keeps running around my head. It keeps tolling at me like a church bell at someone's funeral. I can't escape the thought, even when I think I am. I walk up to the phone that is attached to the wall, and I dial the number.
And it just keeps ringing. And ringing and ringing. I take the phone away from my ear and go to replace it, but I hear a noise that sounds different than the ringing. It sounds so different to when I last heard it, but it's a voice I grew to love so much.
“Hello? Hello?” I bring the phone back up to my ear and listen to the glorious voice. “Hello? Hello?” He sounds impatient now, but I have a smile on my face. “Fine, I'm hanging up.” And the line goes silent. The smile slides off of my face and is replaced by a horrified, wide-eyed look.
“No, no, no,” I re-dial the number and bring the phone up to my ear, where it moves slightly from my hand shaking. “Please answer. Please answer. Please answer.” I repeat this to myself, the mumbled words running into each other.
“Hello?” His voice sounds tired, annoyed, and bemused all at the same time. Again, I'm struck silent by the voice and can't seems to answer with proper words, so I whimper instead. “Um, hello?” He sounds concerned now.
“I'm, uh, I'm suh-sorry.” The line is silent for a while, and I start to think he's hung up on me. But, no, instead there is laughter.
“Great fucking joke, mate. You know what? Fuck you.” My mind kind of recoils at this and throws itself around. I think I'm confused, but this is such an overreaction to it that I'm confused over whether I'm confused.
“A juh-juh-joke? No juh-jokes.” My whole body is shaking. I feel ill.
“No, this isn't a joke, you're correct. I don't know what it is, but it isn't real.”
“Wuh-what isn't?” Another laugh, but this one is bitter and twisted.
“You aren't. Well, actually, I'm not. According to you, anyway.” I shake my head, my eyebrows drawn together.
“But I'm tuh-talking to you? Yuh-you have to be real!” I feel like a coiled spring, ready to snap.
“I am real. Perhaps you're not real.” I start crying now.
“I don't wuh-want to be real any muh-more. I don't wuh-want to be ruh-real.” I collapse onto the floor, my whole body trembling with my cries.
“Neither do I. Not without you, anyway.” I can see him in my head shrugging.
“Who are you? Please tuh-tell me. I nuh-need to know. I can't stuh-stand this any more. I kuh-keep trying to rem-remember your name, but I can't. Tuh-tell me it and let me write it duh-down.” He's silent, and I cry harder. I stand up and look around for a pen, and I find one. It is a blue-ink pen.
All the while, he's silent.
“My name? You don't know my name? I know your name. I know that you have scars on your arms and legs, I know that you used to love me, I know that while we were together, I felt my best. But you don't even know my name?” I look down at my arms. I see the white lines going across them faintly. Then, I start to get desperate.
“Puh-please, your name. I nuh-need your name. He could be back any minute. Please.” When he says nothing, I sniff and take a deep breath. “I'll leave you alone after that. I just need your name.”
“My name is Gerard Way, Frank.” My breath hitches. I scribble down the name across my palm in one, fast movement. And the tears start again.
It's him, of course it's him. It's my Gerard.
“How could I have forgotten that name? How? Thuh-thank you, Gerard. So, so muh-much. I'm sorry.” I wait a second before hanging, just to see if he would say anything. But, he doesn't, so I hand up and put the phone back. Then, I run up the two flights of stair and look up at the ceiling for the hatch to the loft. I need somewhere to go that is private. I don't know why, only that I have a burning need for seclusion.
I find it, but I can't reach it. I jump, even though that causes me pain, and I groan in frustration. I end up getting a sweeping brush and hooking it into the hook and pulling it down that way. It works, even though the muscles in my stomach feel like they're twisting around.
I scramble up the ladders, my body screaming in protest to the harsh, fast movements. I have to sit for a second at the top of them and catch my breath and let the pain stop stabbing. Before I close the hatch, I look around for a light. Being in the darkness is one thing, but being trapped in it is another. I find the light, and even though it isn't that bright, it will suffice. I pull up the ladder and wedge a random piece of cardboard in the hatch to stop it from completely closing.
But, I guess being trapped in here isn't such a bad thing. I'd be away from Miles for a while, at least, and I can stand the hunger.
I look down at my palm. The ink has smudged, but it's still legible. And beautiful. His name is beautiful. Gerard Way. How could I have forgotten it? How could I have forgotten the consonants and vowels in it?
I read and re-read the name hundreds of times. The letters blur under my gaze. Still, the name remains beautiful.
“Gerard. Gerard. Gerard Way.”
The words sounds so foreign on my tongue. It sounds so nice coming out of my mouth, though. I repeat the name a few more times, the name conjuring up pictures of smoke and cigarettes and love. But also heartbreak and fights and blood.
Our first meeting. He asked me for a cigarette and I gave him one. I think I might have hated him. No, not hate. I always loved him, in some small way. He was rude to me, and I think that was what I hated. Not him, never him.
We met a few more times after that before becoming friends, I think. One was a fight. It started out as dinner, I remember that much. I can't remember much about the actual fight, except that we both beat each over pretty bad.
And our first kiss. It made me feel warm. It made me feel something I'd never felt before.
And different memories fly back to me, some that make me wince, some that make me cry, some that make me laugh. It makes me forget about what happened with Miles, until I get to a certain part. Miles raped me before. In my own apartment, on my own couch.
The memories make me go cold, even my blood seems to run cold.
I remember Gerard finding me. I remember Gerard finding me lots of times. In a forest, on the floor, in the kitchen. I remember the last time I saw him. At the party, where he murdered Craig. But, although it seemed like a huge deal then, it doesn't now. I mean, it still does, Craig was my best friend for a while, and I miss him, but I miss Gerard more.
I don't know, it's messed up. I'm messed up. I need to be organized.
Gerard is real. I know that now, and I think I did know it all along. How could someone like him not be real?
Gerard is real and I love him. Two things that I'm one hundred percent sure of. Miles is bad. Miles is venomous. Two more things that I'm one hundred percent sure of.
How can I avoid his eyes? How can I not flinch and freak out when he tries to touch me again? How can I be in the same room as him? How can I pretend that I'm not effected, and how can I stand it if he tries it on again? More importantly, how could I resist it? He's too strong for me to fight him off, and if I try he'd get mad.
To these questions, I don't know an answer. I can't answer a single one with an answer that isn't impossible to do. I grow more and more helpless. I just keep looking at the smudged name on my palm. That name gives me hope. The tiniest, little bit of hope, but hope all the same.
Sunlight filters through something and highlights the name in an orange glow. I don't know if that means something is trying to tell me something, but I take it as a message. I don't know what the message is, either, but if I keep thinking about it I will.
I look up to what the sunlight is coming through and find a window. A small window, round with small stained-glass flowers around the edges, which is making the orange color. The light makes me smile a small, bitter smile.
I stand up, my fingers rubbing at the name on my palm, smudging it beyond recognition. I look around the loft. It's bare, there's barely anything in here. I was going to have a look around, but I decide to just go back down the ladder.
Moving has gotten a lot easier; it doesn't hurt as much. I still go down the ladder slowly, and I push it back up without as much effort as I got it down with. The hatch manages to close by itself, which saves me a job.
I slowly walk down the stairs. I wish I could blame my sadness on melancholy. But, no, I have a reason. And if I think about that reason, it makes me ill, it makes me shake, and it makes me cry. So I do everything I possibly can to stop thinking about it. It's always there in the back of my mind, and it probably always will, ready and in waiting for me to have an idle moment so it can seize my thoughts and paralyse me with it.
I think about everything I can to stop thinking about it. Like how many stairs I'm walking down, how many steps I've took since stepping off the ladder, how many times my heart beats. Anything to keep myself occupied.
Walking into the kitchen, I look at the phone. I look down at my palm. The name is almost gone, almost not there. The most important name in my life has just faded away. Just like the person did. Shaking my head, I walk over to the sink and wash the rest of the ink away. The bubbles from the soap get tinged slightly blue.
I turn off the tap and dry my hands on my t-shirt. The dark material turns darker. I count my footsteps to the back-door. Three. Opening the door, I walk out into the garden. The grass tickles my feet, but it doesn't make me smile. The house gets smaller as I walk away until I can't see it over the tree-line.
Finally, I smile. I feel better when I'm out of the house. Not great, but better.
Breathing in the clean air, I walk faster. I want to get as much distance between me and the house as possible before I have to turn back. I don't want Miles to find me again. Not out here, and not in there, if possible.
I pass the tree stump I sat on, and I walk way farther than I did yesterday. The trees get denser, so does the undergrowth. It gets darker as I walk, too. I struggle to see after a while, the trees completely block out the sunlight. And it's colder.
So, I turn back. But I seem to be going in circles. As I walk, I grow more and more anxious. Miles is probably at home. He's probably getting angrier, he's probably looking for me. Maybe he wants me to drop to my knees for him again.
I have to press a hand to my mouth to stop myself from crying out. I screw my eyes shut and stop walking and breathe evenly for a while. When I open my eyes back up, I'm a lot calmer. I look around me, to see if there's anything I recognize. There isn't, because I wasn't paying attention to where I was going when I walked out here.
I spin around a couple of times, and the direction I stop in is the direction I walk in.
I seem to be getting nowhere. The trees look the same, the foliage looks the same, the fucking ground looks the same. The only thing that's changing are the shadows. Even the birds have stopped singing.
Wandering around, I realize that I'm very, extremely lost. I don't have a phone, I don't have a compass. Even a fucking map would have come in handy. But, I come to a clearing. The clearing has footsteps in it. Two sets. And one of them matches my shoes that I was wearing yesterday. The other's are probably Miles'.
I follow the footsteps, the areas around me not becoming any familiar. And then all of a sudden I'm out of the trees and I can see the house again. There isn't any movement inside the house that I can see, so I hurry in. I make my footsteps quiet, though. Just in case.
Searching around the house, I find no-one.
I breath a very deep sigh of relief and walk back into the kitchen. I make myself a coffee and drink it slowly. The warm liquid heats my fingers and body back up, but not my heart. Then, I wander around the house, leaving my cup in the sink to wash later.
I must walk past the tightly-shut bedroom door several dozen times, but I can't find the courage to open it and walk back into the room. But then I remember that the sheets are dirty. And I imagine myself being forced to sleep in the bed, on the sheets with the reminder of last night all over my skin again.
The door opens quietly, and I stand in the doorway for many minutes before actually making myself walk in the room. The air still smells like sex. It smells like hurt and pain as well, though. I open a window with my trembling fingers and take deep breaths of the fresh air.
I decide that I'm probably going to need gloves before I touch the bedsheets. The bathroom cupboard has some when I search through, so I use them. And I find bleach, so I strip the bed and put the sheets in the shower before pouring bleach on them.
I don't care if it ruins them.
Once they've been soaked in the bleach for around thirty minutes, I run the shower over them, then pick them up and carry them down the stairs. The washing machine gets filled with all of the bedsheets in it. I wash them five times on a rinse wash, then I wash them twice in a normal wash.
They go through the dryer, and come out warm. No amount of warmness they're emanating can change the fact that they've had someone be raped on top of them, though.
I think the sheets know this somehow, because they stop being warm and cool down quickly. I wash my hands before touching them and I wash them four times after touching them. Then, after I've put them back on, I run out of the room and slam the door close. I hadn't realized how much the room effected me until I was out of it.
I'm fever hot, my hands are shaking and I think I'm crying again. Not to mention my breath is rattling in my chest.
Slowly, I back away from the door and walk back down the stairs. I find myself willing that I fall down them and die. I don't, though, unfortunately.
Miles comes through the door just as I'm walking into the kitchen. Something inside me reacts like a scared horse, and I bolt away from him and out of the back-door that I accidentally left open. I get as far as the second line of trees before I feel something tugging at my hair and I'm on the floor.
My hands immediately reach for my hair. Everything slows down and speeds up at the same time. The pain in my head intensifies because he tugs my hair backwards. I feel my neck crack when he does. A flaring pain stabs through my side and I can't breathe suddenly. He's kicked me. I didn't feel any ribs crack, so that's good.
“You trying to run away from me? Huh?” He kicks me again, and I arch my back and cry out. I sound like a puppy. “Nobody runs away from me, you little fucker!” I hear him grunt as he pulls my hair again. I feel his hand give and think that he's pulled my hair out. I think I'm right, because he lets go of my hair and I sit up.
I manage to look up at him briefly before I feel something in my nose crack and my mouth fills with blood. I spit it out, gagging on the taste. The after-taste is much, much worse. I think he'd kick my face. I'm not sure, though.
“You like that? I'm sure you do, you twisted little fuck.” I get another kick, this time to my legs. I choke on blood as my mouth fills up again. I can feel the liquid drip down to my lips and I spit at the same times as I gag.
“Stop!” The word comes out as though I'm gargling water. The pain from my nose and head and legs and stomach is enough to make my vision swims and for my body to stop supporting me and slump to the ground. Miles is really strong.
Stop, please, oh God, stop.
I hear distant laughter. I hear another thud and I feel another flare of pain in my side followed by another in my head. I cry out again, but my words are once again distorted by the blood still filling my mouth. I spit out the blood, and my mouth stays pretty clear of blood until he hits me again in the face and it half-catches my nose and makes another stab go up my face from it.
I can hear him talking, but my brain can't translate the words and they sound excited and garbled.
Then my hair is being yanked again but this time I'm being pulled, in the direction of the house, and any chance of freedom I felt while running away is snatched away from me in the form of my hair being pulled out by him.

Notes

Sorry this took so long to update!