>>34/prog/ hugged her little sister tightly as they both held their breath and hid under the covers.
/prog/ was old enough , or at least cynical enough, to know that it made no difference, that their brother would find them anyway, but /jp/ was not. The two girls lived in a nightmare marked only by different types of fear.
Neither remembered exactly how they had come to live in this place, and longed to leave it and return to their mother who, while not loving, was not cruel either.
/prog/ had her suspicious, though she would never admit it, that her mother was dead. She was correct. The girls had been sent to live with their father and half-brother. Their father was rarely around, and when he was, he seemed to find his son's treatment of the girls amusing. He resented little
/prog/ and /jp/ for the crimes of their birth. He had stuck around for
/prog/ for a bit, but lost interest until his mother showed up at his door one day and begged for help. By the time she left again, /jp/ was growing inside her and he wiped the whore from his mind. Until the state showed up and forced him to accept custody or pay fines he couldn't afford. So he took his anger out on the scared, defenseless children who wouldn't stop crying for their mother.
But for all the neglect and authoritarian coldness that he displayed, his son, /g/ was the true monster of the house. Before the girls had arrived, he spent his free time in his room, sniffing super glue. Soon after arriving,
/prog/ had wandered into /g/'s bedroom. The day after that, their father took her to school personally, and reminded her that she had gotten those bruises by falling down the steps. It was a tough lesson for
/prog/ to learn, but /g/ also learned a lesson about himself and what made him feel powerful. Every week or two, their father would have another story ready. /jp/ walked into a door.
/prog/ burned her hand on the hot stove. /jp/ cut herself playing outside. Oh how clumsy his two little sweethearts were
! The teacher knew what was really going on, but she was busy, and didn't want to intrude in case she was wrong. The tyranny of /g/ continued, and the girls were completely without ally in a cold world.
/prog/ heard /g/ open the door softly. She couldn't see it, but on his face was an ugly smile. Not a smile of happiness, but one of power. One of a predator who knew that his prey was absolutely helpless, and that he could afford to savor the hunt for as long as it amused him. /jp/ must have heard it two, because she gripped
/prog/ even tighter.
``Oh where, oh where, could my darling little sisters be hiding?''
/prog/ was once again paralyzed with fear. She had promised /jp/ again and again that she would protect her, but night after night, her spirit failed and she again cowered in fear. What really ate at her was the fact that deep down, she wished that she could be spared, even if it meant that /jp/ got the focus of his sadism that night. It humiliated her and shamed her, and her courage withered even further. She felt /g/ grab the blanket and jerk it off of them as fast as he could. The blanket was little protection, but it did provide a small sense of security to them, and the loss was a blow every bit as hurtful as /g/'s fist. /g/ took a deep breath.
``You smell like candy, /jp/''.
He grabbed her legs and pulled her close to him, and leaned into her face, and stared into her eyes. /jp/ was crying, but she had learned not to fight. She looked away from
/prog/ and into the distance and sobbed as quietly as she could.
/prog/ had stood witness to this sordid act before, and as victim. He ran his hands gently up her skirt. It was no true gentleness, of course. His simply liked tormenting /jp/ with the surprise of when the pain would start. In some ways, he found making them anxious and filling them with dread to just as fulfilling as their pain.
``If you smell like candy, what do you taste like?''.
It wasn't that
/prog/ was trying to lie to /jp/ about protecting them. She had made plans and even prepared to act. But her action never came. The moment was never right. She was always scared. Watching him hurt her little sister tonight, she also felt an emotion that she had felt so constantly she simply stopped noticing. She was angry. Tonight was /jp/'s birthday. She was not just angry at /g/, she was angry at the world for the injustice of it all. Why was they subject to this when all the other kids were not. /a/ never had to wear long sleeved shirts in the summer to cover bruises on her arms. /food/ never had to lie to the doctor and say that she dislocated her arm while climbing a tree.
``I bet a bad girl like you taste sour. I'll just have to check''.
As
/prog/ experienced this flood of emotions, she was no longer even seeing the brutalization happening in front of her. And then, she was calm. She wanted to do it. Now was her time, the time to do what she had planned too, before her courage failed. She slowly, but deliberately, moved her hand to the tight space between the wall and the bed. She felt around until her hands felt the cold plastic of the kitchen knife she had hidden there. She gripped it tightly, and experienced a single pang of fear reenter her. Steeling herself once again, she looked for a place to strike. The neck was too small, and she would only have one shot. A deep instinct told her to go for his ribs. And so, as fast as her tiny body could move, she jerked the knife from its hiding spot and lunged towards the monster.
``Say `I'm your little slut'. Go on, say-''
He was caught completely off guard when the knife entered three inches deep into his left lung, just below his heart, and he didn't know what was happening. He let out an obnoxious scream and fell backward and dragged his body as best he could to the far wall.
/prog/ watched him squirm there with a mixture of fascination and disbelief at what she had done. He could be hurt after all.
``You fucking cunt, I'm going to kill you and your fucking sis- Oh god, it hurts, get a fucking doctor! I'm fucking dieing! Please, fuck I don't want to die! It hurts! Please, call 911! I'm sorry just please help me now you little fucking slut or- Please!''
He sobbed and whimpered, and pissed himself. He was not just bleeding to death, he was slowly drowning in his own blood. His screams was not very loud anymore, and he could barely talk. He had seemed so powerful when he was lording over them, but he seemed so weak while as he lay in a pool of his own blood, piss, and tears, begging for them to save him. His pleas were no louder than a whisper and his eyes were gazing far into distance when he gave one last twitch and his face lost what little color that it had left. He never moved again.
/prog/ hugged /jp/ and covered her eyes and led her out of the room. She had never thought this far ahead. In truth, she had never imagined that it might work. They sat on the couch and held each other. What would happen now?
/prog/ was a murderer, and if no one had wanted to help her before, who would believe her now? Even if their father didn't kill them both, she would never see /jp/ again. She would be sent to wherever bad girls are sent, and /jp/ would go back the social workers. Her life was probably ruined, even though she had done what she had done for the most righteous reasons. The only thing she could do is try to believe that the sacrifice of her future would be worth it.