Mind Rape
Half exposé, half fiction, this is a tale of the pains and confusion of growing up and the release imagination offers. Until it too, is corrupted.
It’s night time and there’s broken glass on the floor.
The light from the lantern gleamed off them and I caught my face in the shards, fragmented and distorted. I scowl in disgust and turn away. I never did like looking at myself. Seeing my face shattered and reflected back at me made me feel a little soul-filthy.
But even as the memory of my broken face on the floor throbbed painfully in my mind, I could not help but feel the pressure of what Mother would say and do to me now. Granted it was not my fault. I had not intended to knock the mirror down. It was dark and I was trying to light the lantern. I should have worn my coat or I wouldn't have shivered so much. It was cold after all. The sound would not have woken up the house but the absence of her family heirloom would be noticed.
I never liked it the thing. It was old and its shape like an eye, made it seem like it was peering at me all the time. Even now when it lay in pieces on the wooden floor, it was watching me behind my back. I shudder, unsure if it were from the cold or the thought of something insidious. An owl hoot made me jump. How much more fright could I take? My days were already long with Mother always switching from good witch to bad. Father was used to it but his passiveness was terrifying. He did not seem to care much and would rarely object to her insanity.
When he did speak to me, it would be to enforce Mother’s venomous words.
I paid attention to not cut my fingers on the glass. Mother would find another excuse to yell at me and I’d like to keep her ramblings to a minimum. I laid the pieces on the table first as I cleaned up, taking a strange satisfaction in this mundane task. I avoided making eye contact with the glass, the memory of my face still creeping me out. Maybe it was because I saw a lot of Mother in me or perhaps it was because Mother would tell me how ugly I was and how she wished she had not given birth to me.
I was sad all the time the way people around me were always happy. Their joy is a curious thing and for the longest time, It was surprising to me that their parents did not beat them or tie them to furniture and left them there for hours as punishment or spent the day telling them how useless and pathetic they are.
I always thought that was what parenting was about. Tough love I think Mother once said.
It made me stronger.
I would not cry like the other children when I hurt myself nor would I raise my voice in objection to something I did not like because there is no — what did Father say once? — logic to asserting your will over others.
Sometimes though, I imagine I live in a far away land, like in the books I like to read. They let me escape into a place that is better than this one. A world of color and blue skies where people don’t want to hurt me because they’re angry. Mother is always angry and she’s always ready to tell us how much she’s sacrificed for us. I grew up believing sacrificing was bad because Mother hated it. To sacrifice is to be like Mother so I resolved not to follow suit.
But now I see that it is not as easy. So in the worlds that I escape to, I would be a valiant prince or a charming rogue that would fight evil men and women to save the kingdom from cruelty. In the end, I would die, a heroic sacrifice to make sure goodness wins. I do not die all the time though. Sometimes, I get the princess and we would live happily ever after. We would have children and I would be a good father. We would not beat our children or tell them what burdens they are.
Unfortunately, not all my imaginations are nice and full of butterflies and sunshine. The good ones were rare and are a product of me somehow entering into a state of tranquility by dissociation because of the abuse.
Usually though after my daily beatings, or as Mother would call it, discipline, I would have…darker thoughts that were more alike with the world we exist in but far more dreary.
This world would be full of black clouds and ravens.
I would be standing in front of an old cemetery. The gate that hung off its creaking hinges could not stop a cat let alone a person from entering. There was an old oak tree that grew wild and mighty within and its thick branches spread out like gaunt fingers ready to strangle its prey and bury them here. Lightning would flash and I would glimpse a face in the old Oak.
It was terrifying but I would step through the rusted gate and lightning would flash across the sky. The God of the Oak as I had learned to call it, would rumble like thunder and a voice that sounded like nails on a chalkboard would invade my brain.
Who ye there that goes
With eyes shut and lips sealed
Who ye there that goes
Stop lest your blood be spilt
To enter the place of the God of the Oak
Three things ye must give
Your heart and your mind and your soul
Come closer now, no one will grieve
Ye are One no longer
It was here that I would lose myself. I would see myself moving and talking and gesturing but it was not…me. I was deep down, hidden. I could see but I could do nothing to control myself. My body was like a car and I was a passenger as someone drove me in my skin. It was not a good feeling when I would lie down on the graves and eat the dirt. It was awful and I choked. Sometimes tears came to my eyes but I would not cry. Mother would beat me more if I cried and even in this fever dream, I still feared her.
Was she the God of the Oak? Always angry, always demanding and always watching me with her judging eyes?
It might have been the sixth time I was here when a name popped in my head. Alistair Crow. That was who was driving me, only now it felt like he was me and I was someone else. Alistair loved to eat dirt and sometimes he would sit on one of the branches naked. I imagine it would have been painful because the tree was old and gnarled but I could not feel the pain, only see what he was doing. One time, Alistair dug up a grave and danced with a corpse until its head fell off. He laughed, poked out the left eye and threw it back into the coffin. He then posed the corpse like a demented puppet master before impaling it on one of the branches through its brain and heart.
I saw and wondered to myself, “How queer.”
Alistair liked to dress in black bandages. He would tear off my (his?) clothes and wrap himself in them so tightly that he would blanch at the pain. But he giggles like he enjoys it. I can’t help but feel that there’s something quite feminine about him.
The God of the Oak would descend a branch and I watch as the gnarled edges like fingers pull the bandage up over our eyes so Alistair and I are blind. Another would go over our mouths so we would could not speak. Our hands would be bound and there would be pin pricks all over our body. I do not feel this but Alistair does and through the cloth he screams at the pain, begging for it to continue whenever it stopped. This carried on for a long time and soon, I would get dizzy.
I would hear thunder rumbling and would brace myself for the Voice of the God but it would not come. The ground seemed to slip beneath our feet and my head swirled. I fear I may lose consciousness and even Alistair is finding it hard to maintain his composure. I can’t help but feel a third intruding presence taking shape in our mind. What does it want?
I try to concentrate but I can’t. I hear the thunder and the flashes of lightning through the bandage as my body is spun like a top. Alistair feels the pin pricks but eventually he stops screaming. He is now pleading to feel the pain but his voice is shaky. It has lost its bounce. I realize in horror that he is as confused as I am that he is losing control.
I hear a moan and a crash and I see a dark shape rushing at me and just before it hits me in the face, I black out.
I wake up on the floor, a single shard of glass remains and it reflects a side of my face. My distorted eye stares at me from the fragment and I blink at the reflection. I never noticed how brown my eyes were. They were kind of nice.
In the background, I hear Mother. She is screaming for me because I was not in my bed. I sigh and grab the last shard, cutting myself in the process and leaving traces of blood on the floor and on the table. I should clean it up but it is a little too late for that now.
The daily abuse can’t begin with the main star.
This was written in a state of flux, between reality and a dream state heightened by listening to The Carpenters’ ‘Close to You’ and Annie Lennox’ ‘Walking on Broken Glass’ that played on repeat.
