violet akai . district four

He didn't mean to. There's liquor on his tongue, bitter as it dribbles down his chin and I'm hidden behind the large vase at the far corner of our living room. He's drunk, she's angry. That's how the fights always go. 'Cause she's got lipstick marks on her cheeks and bruises on her neck and girls aren't supposed to love girls cause that ain't how nature made us. 'Cause it's vile and makes him uncomfortable. My father's word is law and my sister's existence is in direct opposition. So he hits her 'til she's not. 'Til she's laying on the floor with blood pooling around her head and I haven't seen her move in the last five minutes. Not since dad spit on her body and went to his room.

I should go see her. Check her pulse. Make sure she's okay 'cause that's my big sister and she's the one protecting me when he gets drunk and he gets angry. Who takes the beatings when I've not shined the windows, when my hair ain't slicked back all proper and my toes are always an inch over the line but I never mean 'em to be. I'm trying to be perfect, I'm trying to be the child made of gold that he yearns to see when his eyes turn to me. Indigo is my big sister and I think she needs my help.

But I don't check on her. I can't feel her cooling skin. She fell to the floor and her neck is bent at an angle that shouldn't be possible. She's dead- as dead as can be and instead of being a hero she told me I could be I run back to my room like the coward I have become. Head stuffed beneath the pillow and eyes sewn shut and praying that I'll wake in the morning to her soft hands upon my cheek and it will all have been some kind of terrible, terrible dream.

She's not at breakfast and I know I'm alone now. Facing my father at two ends of polished birch and there's nothing but silence exchanged between us. His threats hang heavy in the air, command clear enough although he simply chews on a bit of burnt steak with a scowl on his face. She never existed. I will not acknowledge that I once had a sister, that I once loved her, or else I'll end up in the same patch of upturned mud.

He's all I got now. Cold and commanding, with fists clenched tight around my wrist and his nails leave bruises shaped like half-moons. I wear long sleeves because it'd get worse if anyone knew. He's all I got now, and I love him. Fear became synonymous to affection and any attention paid to me is preferable to his cold indifference whenever I dare disappoint him. And his standards are impossibly high. The mold to which I am shoved is strict. Unachievable. I try nonetheless.

The perfect career boy with a body crafted of steel. Handsome with clipped nails and hair not allowed to reach past his ears. Clean shaven and intelligent- with a girl of equal standard sewn to his side. And she will be perfect, understanding, subservient. A woman is not meant to raise her voice to a man and I think my sister was doomed from the very start.

And it's exhausting pretending. Being something that I am not because girl's lips taste too sweet and they make me feel ill. I kiss them nonetheless. I've fainted three times in the last month, I train all the harder. Yes, I fear my father- but son's are supposed to. He is the head of household, deserving of praise and unwaivering loyalty.

I wanted more than anything to be that for him.

Until I fell for a boy who was tasted like cherries and maybe that's cause they stained his lips a deep red. I fell for a boy who made me feel afraid, got me drunk off of his imperfections and holding him was like looking into a whole other world.

But I was stuck, with my palms pressed to its window. An outsider looking in.

Andy was the key, I think, but I threw that away too.

district four . sixteen