Page 14 of No One’s Daughter

I pressed the heels of my hands into my eyes, trying to relieve some of the stabbing pain behind them.

Through the howl of the wind and the noise of the traffic, I could faintly hear the comforting sound of rain against glass, tapping rhythmically but it did little to drown out my anxieties. An uncomfortable truth gnawed at the back of my mind. My life as I knew it was over. Nothing would ever be the same again. I was so overcome with emotion that I didn’t know whether I wanted to laugh or cry, or better still, scream.

I didn’t know what was real anymore.

To make matters worse, the night refused to sit still.

Everything pressed in at once, from all sides. The scrape of a shoe half a street away, the uneven rhythm of someone’s breathing behind a door, the constant hum of electricity threading through the city like a pulse I had never noticed before.

Scents hung in the air—rain on concrete, stale beer, perfume long faded but somehow still clinging stubbornly to passing strangers. It was overwhelming, disorientating.

It was like the world had been in greyscale and was now in full colour for the first time.

My skin prickled, hypersensitive, as if every inch of it had been turned inside out. The brush of fabric against my arm felt wrong—too rough, too noticeable—while the cool night air slid over me. Yet, I couldn’t feel its chill. I absently dragged my fingers along my skin, trying to soothe the crawling sensation beneath it, but it didn’t help, nothing settled it.

​Everything was just wrong.

​But, beneath it all, something else lingered.

​My thoughts were still my own, I was fairly certain of that. I was still me. Though distantly I knew I wasn’t.

Every step was engulfed by shadows that had come to swallow me whole for what I’d become. For what I’d done. Even the wind whispered, mocking me, laughing at me. My thoughts were like inky pools soaking into paper—slowly spreading but impossible to control. My skin felt different, like it wasn’t mine anymore—it was that of a monster.

My fingers dug into the pockets of my jogging bottoms, searching for the familiar weight of my lighter and cigarettes. I really needed a smoke.

Maybe that would help.

I pulled the pack out, having finally found it, tapping one loose with more urgency than usual, then fumbled for the lighter.

My hands weren’t steady.

That hadn’t escaped me.

I cupped the flame against the lingering drizzle, thumb striking twice before it caught properly. The small flare of heat felt oddly hot. I brought the cigarette to my lips and inhaled, the tip glowing bright for a brief second before settling into a steady burn.

The first drag hit hard, sharp at the back of my throat, familiar in a way that bordered on comforting. I held it there for a moment before exhaling slowly.

Smoke curled into the air in thin, wavering streams, twisting and dissolving as the night sky swallowed it. I watched it as though if I really paid attention to it, I might forget about everything that had happened tonight, as if maybe I could drift upward and disappear too.

I took another drag, slower this time, letting the order of it settle me—inhale, hold, exhale, watch—eyes tracking the soft grey spirals as they vanished into nothing.

For a few seconds, it worked.

The tightness in my chest eased, just slightly. My shoulders dropped a fraction, the noise in my head dimming to something more manageable.

But it was short-lived.

​I winced at the sound of an ear-piercing scream, pausing on bated breath. My head spun to inspect my surroundings.

There.

I saw them then, two people at the far end of an alley. A larger man, hunched over a woman who looked… terrified.

I didn’t think.

In the next moment I had pushed him away from the woman and she gathered her scattered belongings and ran.

He made a disgusting gurgling sound then spat at me, cursing me. Then he was on me. Pushing me against the cold wall with his weight. “I paid for that whore,” he snarled, looking me up and down. “You’ll have to take her place.”