C4 Chapter 3

Af – the angel of light.

The next day, Meredith dropped me off at CRC. She didn’t say anything, maybe for fear of jinxing my decision to go out of the house, but I know that she was over the moon that I wanted to come back to the center.

“I have a meeting in the town center,” she called as I got out of the car. “I’ll pick you up in the afternoon. Keep your cellphone open.”

I nodded and headed towards the grounds. Meredith waved at the guard standing on the gate, who immediately let me in. I walked to the side of the building, towards the path of trees that led to the woods.

Last night, I thought about the words that Hunter said to me. I felt like with the limited words he said, in the short span of time that I spent with him… he really reached out to my soul. He spoke the words I couldn’t say to Meredith… the words I could not even admit to myself.

I hated to acknowledge it, but Meredith was right. I needed to talk to somebody. And somebody who knew exactly what I was going through.

As I reached the garden, I saw Hunter sitting on the bench, lost in his thoughts again, listening to every little sound around him. I knew that he was aware of my presence even before I was standing in front of him. The minute I sat beside him, I heard his sharp intake of breath. Suddenly, I felt self-conscious.

Could he smell me?

I smelled my shirt and caught the scent of the floral perfume I sprayed on myself after I took a shower this morning.

I looked over at him, taking slow breaths, so as not to make a single sound. He was wearing a pair of jeans, a white shirt over a red jacket. His hair was disheveled like he just combed it with his fingers after he took a shower. He was wearing those sunglasses again.

“Good morning,” he said.

“Good morning,” I greeted chirpily. “How did you know I was here?”

“I could smell your perfume the minute you walked towards the bench,” he replied.

“It could be anybody,” I pointed out.

He grinned and shook his head slightly. “I highly doubt that. The sense of smell is the most powerful sense and most likely the one that’s linked to the memory. I remember your scent from yesterday. You smell like… you.”

“Er… is that a good thing?” I asked.

“You smell like sweet strawberries combined with a scent of freesia and honeysuckle,” he replied. “It’s always a good thing.”

He practically enumerated the scents of my perfume, my soap and my shampoo. Being blind must have turned him into a bloodhound.

There was silence. None of us spoke for a while. For the first time in many months, I actually felt that silence could be peaceful. Not the deafening kind that brought the memories of that tragic night back into my reality.

I actually felt like I could be me again. I didn’t feel like a ghost… with nightmares chasing me.

“How old are you, Allison?” Hunter asked, breaking the silence.

“Sixteen,” I replied. “And you?”

“Sixteen turning seventeen soon.”

I tried not to heave a sigh that would make him sense my emotions. But inside, I thought… how bad was it for a handsome, agile sixteen-year-old boy to lose the most precious gift of sight?

“Do you get visitors often?” I asked.

He shook his head. “They gave up on me. They only come when I call them… if I needed anything.”

“Who’s they?”

“My dad,” he replied. “My aunt and uncle. They just read my progress reports from here. And then they wait for me to call.”

“Are you… having any treatments in this institution?”

He shrugged. “The doctors check on my eyes every other day. But mostly it was just… counseling.”

“Why did you say that your parents gave up on you?”

He sighed. “Just my dad,” he corrected me. “We fought all the time. He wanted me to undergo some… more aggressive treatments. I don’t see his point.”

“Why? Don’t you want to… you know?”

“See again?” he asked. I didn’t answer. “Didn’t you just say yesterday that seeing was not always a gift?”

“Yeah… I shouldn’t have said that.”

“But you were right. If I am able to see again… I would see that my mother was no longer with me. And I would remember that it was my father’s fault she wasn’t herself when she drove our car into a tree.”

I felt a pinch in my heart when I heard him say that his mother was gone. Because it reminded me that he wasn’t the only one. Mine was gone too.

Two gunshots.

The first one was for my stepdad, so he could no longer hurt me. My mother saved me. She made sure that I would live and the months of physical abuse I went through under the hands of my stepdad would be over.

The second shot was for… her. Because she couldn’t live with the fact that she killed the man she loved the most.

I hated her for it. Even though I would always love her, I know… deep inside my heart I would always hate her for not being strong enough. For not thinking about me when she pulled that trigger the second time around. For leaving me alone… knowing I was not old enough to take care of myself and her sister was not capable enough to replace her in my life.

I didn’t realize it, but my breathing became heavier. I felt the load that was inside my chest. It had always been there. I refused to acknowledge it. Not when I woke up that day in the hospital. Not during those times they forced counseling on me immediately after I was discharged by the doctors. Not all these months when Meredith encouraged me to talk to her about how I felt.

But now… here with Hunter, all the pain, all the burden I hid inside my chest just resurfaced, refusing to be ignored anymore. And before I knew it, I was whimpering. I was feeling that blinding pain of losing my mother… being saved by her… and being abandoned by her seconds after. The emotional and physical abuse I went through under my stepdad’s broken mind and violent hands were nothing compared to the pain I felt when I woke up in the hospital an orphan.

I felt Hunter’s arm around my shoulders. He gently pulled me to him so I could rest my head against his chest. And there… for the first time in probably months… I cried.

“Mama… where is Papa?” I remembered asking my mother when I was five years old.

She laughed. “You’re special, Allison. God created you so you could be all mine!” she replied, kissing me all over the face and then tickling me until I tapped out.

I know now that she tried so hard not to make me feel like there was something wrong with me. And how much she wanted to make me feel complete even though my own father walked out on us the minute she told him she was pregnant.

“I love you, Mama,” I said to her in my tiny voice.

“And I love you very much too, my little angel.”

“Sssshhh…” I heard Hunter’s soothing voice against my ear.

I pulled away from him, wiping my cheeks with my fingers. Hunter did the same to his although he tried to hide the fact that he was crying too.

“She took… took her own… life,” I stammered. “When my stepdad threatened to kill me… she didn’t have a choice but to pull the trigger. So I would be here today. So he could no longer hurt me. For months, he was physically assaulting me. He would beat me up and I remembered hiding under the bed whenever he came home. My mother was helpless to defend me sometimes.

“We loved him. And he would always feel remorseful when he sobered up. But one night, it went too far. In his poisoned mind, he saw me as a demon that he needed to torture and kill.” I looked up at Hunter, who was listening to me intently. “You asked me yesterday what was wrong with me. I have a scar on my face. He used a chemical on me… claiming that it would reveal the demon residing inside me. It burned my skin. The wounds may have healed. But the scars would always be here to remind me of that fateful night.” I took a deep breath and suppressed a sob from escaping my lips. “My mother was strong enough to kill him to protect me. But unfortunately, she wasn’t strong enough… to live with it.”

Too many months I held these emotions in. And now that I finally cried… I was afraid I wouldn’t know how to stop.

“I… haven’t cried since that night,” I sobbed. “I try not to think about it. But every night, it all comes back to me… when I sleep, the nightmares haunt me. Sometimes, I was scared to sleep at all.”

Hunter reached out for my face. I took his hand and guided it so he could touch my cheek. His touch felt warm against the cold, dead skin of my scar.

“This scar was not supposed to remind you of what you lost that night. It was supposed to remind you of what your mother gave up just so you could live,” he said in a soothing, calm voice.

I shook my head. “I hated her for it. How could she leave her little girl behind? We weren’t rich but we were happy. And I had everything I ever needed. Now… I have nothing. Just my aunt, who was too young to raise a kid on her own.”

Hunter touched my scar again.

“I look monstrous,” I muttered.

“I’m sure you look tough.” He gave me a reassuring smile.

My tears subsided and Hunter released my cheek. He turned to the direction of the lake. He heaved a heavy sigh and said, “My mother found out that my father was having an affair. She had been drinking when she picked me up from school. Then she started crying in the car, telling me bits and pieces of how my father had been cheating on her for years. She lost control of her emotions. Unfortunately… she lost control of the wheel, too.”

“You were in the car with her?”

He nodded. “I lived. She died. I wish I did too. There was nothing left for me here. A few months after my mother’s funeral, my father proposed to his mistress and brought her home. Now, you see… how could I come home? I could not… would not… bear to be under the same roof as my father and his new family. I came to this town because my uncle lived here. And he told my dad about this place. They figured it would help… fix me.”

“Did it?”

“Not even a little bit,” he chuckled humorlessly. “And honestly… I just lost the will to try. The perfect family I once had was gone… but not before I found out it wasn’t really perfect after all.”

“Do you blame her?” I asked him. “Your mom? For what happened to you?”

Hunter fell silent for a while, contemplating on his answer. “It was easier for me to blame somebody who was there to hear me curse and whine—somebody I could punish. So I never thought about blaming my mom for what happened to me… to us. Because none of it would have happened… if my father was not cheating on us in the first place.”

“I haven’t thought about my mom in a long time,” I admitted sadly. “I didn’t know whether I should thank her or… blame her. Love her or hate her.” Tears rolled down my cheeks again. “All I know is that… I wish she never left me. I didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to cry. But I’m getting tired of being strong sometimes.”

Hunter nodded. “I know exactly what you feel.” He felt for my hand and gave it a squeeze. “Allison… you can be weak here with me. And I would never judge you or expect anything from you. Know that the things you feel about losing your mom… I feel the exact same things too. So you don’t have to worry. You’re on friendly grounds here with me.”

I smiled and I wished he could see it. It had been a while since I talked to someone who understood me… it had been a while since I felt like I really had a friend.

“Thank you,” I whispered. I leaned my head on his shoulder and I felt him put his arm around my back. I did what he said. I allowed myself to be weak… even for just a little while.