Page 36 of Sanctuary After Dark

You can't glue something together if it shattered beyond all recognition.

There wasn't any hope for me, and I knew that now.

I've been such an idiot.

Crawling up the mattress, I pulled the blankets over me as I curled into a ball. Grabbing Whisper, I tugged her to my chest and buried my face into her soft grey fur on her head while I let the sobs wrack through me.

"You're pathetic. Useless. You can't do anything right, Eli. I don't even know why I keep you around anymore. If it weren't for the money I made off of you, I would toss you out on the street. You should be grateful I put up with your shit. Even your family didn't want you."

Flinching at each word that was tossed at me, I tried to shield my head from his fists that were coming down on me. The pain radiating through my body as I lay there on the floor while he stood over me.

"P-please… D-Daddy… I'm s-sorry..." I whimpered, trying to appease him so he would stop hitting me. I was already bleeding from the cuts the last John had left on my collarbones, chest, and thighs. Now my lip was bleeding from Daddy smacking me across the face.

I don't even know what I did to make him so angry. I know that the John had paid extra to cut me. He told me so while he was doing it. I was good and had barely cried when the knife cut through my skin.

But he was still mad.

He was always mad at me.

"Shut the fuck up!"

I cried out when he grabbed my hair in his fist and yanked so hard that it made my eyes sting with more tears. I blinked through them to see his blurry face in front of me, filled with rage.

"You're disgusting. You probably begged him to fuck you raw, didn't you? Begged for his cock like the nasty whore that you are! I'm surprised you can even feel anything anymore in your used-up hole."

"I… I didn't! I p-promise! I kn-know the rules, Daddy. P-please… it hurts..."

Daddy sneered down at me and pushed me back to the floor, where I fell in a crumpled mess. Sweat, cum, and blood covered me. The cuts on my body stung, and my body was screaming at me from his blows.

"You think that hurts? Oh, you have no idea what pain is, you little bitch. But you're about to find out."

He grabbed me by the hair again and tried to pull me up to my feet. My legs buckled though from how weak I was. I couldn't remember the last time I had had a decent meal, you could see my ribs at this point.

"Get up, Elias!"

I struggled in his grip and tried to pull away from him. Tried to shield my disgusting body from him and get away from the pain.

"No! P-please, no!"

"...Elias..."

"I'm sorry! I'll be g-good!"

"Elias… wake up."

I thrashed and tried to pull away from the hands grabbing at me. I didn't want to hurt anymore. I wanted to be good. I promised him that I would be good.

"Elias, sweetheart. Wake up. It's just a nightmare."

I whimpered and pulled away, blinking a bit and focusing on the room I was in. The two looming forms in front of me made my breath catch in my throat as fear coursed through me more.

My chest burned, breaths coming too fast, too shallow. My hands shook, heart racing, the nightmare still clinging as if it wouldn’t let go.

Like he wouldn't let go.

I could still see his face in my mind. The sneer he always seemed to wear when he looked at me. The pain radiating from where he had hit me. There was so much pain from so many parts of my body that it all seemed to blend at some point.

The bed felt too big. Too open. The two figures standing before me, blurry but still there, caused me to panic more. Scrambling out from under the sheets that were soaked with my sweat, I squeezed behind the chair in my room and into the corner. Curling up into the smallest ball I could, with my hands over my ears as I repeated the same words over and over again.