Archive of Our Own ^beta

I wasn’t just here as a toy

I had my own life, my own friends

The area around me might be loud and cruel

But it’s mine

Going back to that place every day

A cramped room where I rarely saw the light of day

Kept alive by the little sips of water they gave me, the little scraps they thought I deserved

They don’t know

I have more worth than they’ll ever amount to in their lives

Fists pounding the walls, tears down my face

DO YOU HEAR ME?

DO YOU HEAR ME?
DO YOU HEAR ME?

I AM MORE THAN YOU BELIEVE

No parents to call my own

Not that I care

They’ve abandoned a treasure they never deserved in the first place

My friends and I

All living in that little hell they call an ‘orphanage’

We call it the home of bribes

Where rich people come in and buy us like animals so they feel better

About helping the ‘poor children’

It’s amazing they don’t break their arms patting themselves on the back

But that’s ok

Because we make it so

Hanging out at the park

With all my smiling friends, I’m so glad to call them mine

Skating at the park

The wind in my hair

The sun on my face

No matter how much my stomach hurts

I feel free here

Untouchable

Unchained

Unrestrained

We hold hands and spin

As the rocks and dirt passes us by

Squeals as I fall

Dimples as I grab onto a friend’s hand

Lifting me up more than any adult had ever tried

Loud giggles under the bridge as they pass the bottle

Older kids with the stash

Older kids with the skills to steal a full pack of liquor

Older kids who decided to share their hoard

I take a sip and see stars

Bitter, nasty, and rancid liquid

And yet

I hold my hand out for another sip

To feel the rush

The taste of the forbidden fruit is truly better than I thought

Amplified by the flight of my fists

It slams into a boy’s cheek

A girl’s leg rams into my hip

I feel the pain and the shock

But I end up laughing rather than crying

They’ll learn in a minute

My knuckles bruising on their teeth

Cheering and hooting and hollering from the other kids

The ones who didn’t want to risk bodily injury

Or worse

A blow to their pride

Of course we won

Of course we beat them

So it was just a matter of time we were found out too

I raise my hand

And take the blame

Because I have fun with the others

So they shouldn’t have to bear the brunt of the blame

Back in the room

Nails dragging down on the walls

Feet kicked at the door

YOU CAN’T KEEP ME HERE

YOU CAN’T KEEP ME HERE

YOU CAN’T KEEP ME HERE

I want to throw my meager bits of food and water at the door

But that’s all I’m getting

I savor every dirty bite

Sips from an unclean cup and hard bread

This is all they’re going to give me

This is all I get

For now anyway

I eat it all quickly

So the taste doesn’t stay in my mouth

I relish the burning sensation on my eyes when I finally get to see daylight again

One day

One day

One day

Things change

They’re here for me

Clean and pretty white smiles that match their skin

Here to take me away

To take me to a better place

This is it

This is it

This is my ticket out of here

They don’t mind my mouth

They don’t mind my attitude and I

Begin to wonder

Did God really answer my prayers?

Or is this some sick joke on his part?

As they lead me out of the house before I even get a chance to settle in

I realize

This must be a joke

It’s one of these parents

They grin so wide

Their cheeks must hurt

Talk so loud

It must strain their voices

Since they must be used to their words being treated as divine order

I quickly realize they weren’t here to save me from hell

Just show me a whole new one

Dressed up a taken all over the neighborhood

Like a cute little doll

See here?

See that girl we have?

She’s blessed that we saved her

She’s lucky we came along

I only feel sick that they did

Soon it isn’t just the neighborhood

I’m dressed up

And they send me to school

It’s nothing short of ridiculous

Hair in a ponytail

Uniform pressed in all the corners

They expect me to be their good little girl

In a school that calls me outside my name

In a school that looks down on me

And hurls slurs at me everyday

The people at school learned and they learned fast

I am not one to fuck with

I will make you regret that last laugh

A few burned students here

A couple of bombs there

Laxative thrown into the cookies I made for the truly deserving

I was already on thin ice

I guess the smoking, fighting, and drinking was the last straw

EXPELLED

EXPELLED

EXPELLED

I’ve never seen a pair of people turn uglier than my adoptive parents

They tried to treat me as their little Cinderella

But they obviously forgot why I was expelled in the first place

It got worse though

When I didn’t just submit

The slurs at school were just a warm-up for what they said

Vile and foul words spilled from their lips

They’d go to church with me and their child in tow

Yelling at me in one breath

And saying a hail mary in the next

The husband was the worst

His hand trailing from my shoulder

Down my back

Right in front of their child

I push him away

My hands making a satisfying sound against his cheek

Never around his wife

Never around his wife

As much as I hated her

She was the only thing keeping his hands off me

Then one day

His wife wasn’t around

That was the day he threw me to the ground

Ripped off my clothes

I wasn’t strong enough to fend him off

I wasn’t strong enough to fend him off

I wasn’t—

“That’s right you dirty Latina

(Make it stop

Make it stop

Somebody

Please)

You should be grateful

That I’m even looking in your direction”

(Choke and die

You nasty--)

“Shut up

I’m trying to finish”

(Think of something else

Think of something else

Thinkofsomethinigelsethinkofsomethingelsethinkofsomethingel--!)

He shoves my head to the side and gets off

And that’s it

He pulls away

And tears stream down my face

It isn’t the last time he does this

I’m not strong enough to push him away

Eventually it ended

Dear God

It finally came to an end

Thrown out of the house with only torn clothes

“Don’t you come back, either, whore.”

Gladly

I make sure to rob all of the houses down the street and in the neighborhood too

And I only wish I could’ve taken everything they had too

But I can’t—

(I can’t go back there

Never again

Just the thought makes me wanna hurl

Oh God no

Never ever again)

So I keep going forward

Then I saw this nice little city

A pile of festering trash disguised as a functioning town

Stilwater: Voted the nicest place to visit since 1976

What a load of shit

Here was a place that I found myself

Sleeping in the alleyways, dumpster diving for food

It wasn’t too bad, really

Here you could hear the gunshots going off on any corner of the street

People were run over daily, no matter what clothes they wore or who was behind the wheel

The snooty assholes who turned their nose up at me I never bothered going after

I usually saw their dead bodies minutes later

Or they were running away from someone wielding a knife and a grudge

Nobody got off easy here

Whether you wore a sharp business suit

Or a pair of thigh high boots and just the bare essentials not to be arrested

Anyone could die here

I don’t know why they ever bother to try and keep the city clean

Might as well let it stay red for how often blood gets spilled

One day

When I was starving, yet again

In need of clothes because winter was setting in

The chill of autumn cutting at my skin

A man with a crooked smile offered me food

I didn’t trust the way he was eyeing me

I didn’t like the way he’d lick his lip as he stared at my legs

But he promised me good food and clothes

So I went with him anyway

And boy

Did he deliver

Food abounds!

Whatever I wanted, he gave me

Nothing too lavish or expensive

And he gave me new clothes too

Even though I didn’t like the way he tried to push me towards scantier clothing

It was a good few days for me off the streets

I should’ve paid more attention

To what he slipped in my drink

I woke up

Bleary and confused

A hand on my mouth to keep me from screaming

Shirt torn, shallow wounds on my legs

(Not again

Not again

Not again

NOT AGAIN)

He kept me awake for all of it

Then when he was done

Knocked me over the head

And dumped me in the trash

(Maybe that’s all I was

Trash)

All I could really do was what I always had

(Pick myself out of the trash)

Get up

And keep going

(Was it really worth it though?)

Then I realized

If I was going to stay alive

I needed cash

(Don’t think about it Luana

I don’t wanna think about it anymore

Fingers on my breasts

Legs open

No one’s going to help me

No one

No one cares

Maybe my parents had it right the first time)

And if so many people seemed interested in my body

(This time

This time

This time

It’s gonna be on my terms)

I might as well use it to the fullest extent as possible

(If they want ass they better have cash

Because now I have my own way of doing things

And they’ll end up dead if they pull some funny shit)

And things started going well

I finally had money

Although it wasn’t the cleanest

I could actually start taking care of myself

But then….

But then…

But then…

(NO)

A small bulge

A round curve of my stomach

(NONONONONO)

Just another reminder I didn’t have as much control as I thought

I find the pills

I have the needle

I am not having this baby

I refuse

If I have to go down with it

Then so be it

(Are…things...supposed to be…this hazy…? I can’t feel my--)

I wake up to that annoying beeping

(Someone turn that shit off

I’ve been hearing it for hours

I swear to God

I’m going to raise hell if I hear it one more time)

The hospital

I’m in the fucking hospital

I didn’t even know Stilwater had one

Go figure

(At least the little parasite is gone…)

Soon I’m on my feet again

And the first thing I do?

(My bat smashing down on his skull

A wet squelch

The right side of his head starting to dent as he uses the last of his life begging me to stop)

Please show me mercy

Someone, help)

I kill the fucker that got me in this mess in the first place

(He’s long since dead now

I can see little chunks of brain on the wall

Hands bloody, fingers missing patches of skin

The chest caved inwards as though he was trying to hold his breath)

Only

Little pieces of lung were showing

And his legs were bent unnaturally to the side)

I make sure to beat the fucker from sunset to sunrise

(I walk out of the alleyway covered in blood

Into the light of day

No one even gives me a second glance)

I don’t bother to stick around the lady who called the hospital

Last time I ever trust a random stranger again

And that was when my career in prostitution began

Things were relatively simple to be honest

People wanna get off and the other women and men who worked in the business

Were very free with their tips and tricks

On how to get that money on the side

A few clients later
I found out about street racing

As I was the candy on one of my client’s arm

It was amazing

The sheer speed

The beautiful colors

The tight turns

This was what I wanted to do

Drive off as fast as I could

Wearing sunglasses and a handful of money

One stolen car later

I got to live out my wish

As I walked into the bar

With a fake ID and new clothes

I decide

It certainly wouldn’t hurt to buy a drink

For the person tied up

In handmade bandages