Drunken Measures

"Darla, you fucking bitch! Get out here!"

Oh no, I thought. He's home. I looked at the clock. It was two in the morning. Predictable, considering my father's alcoholic habits. I turned back so that my face was pressed into the crack between my mattress and the wall and nuzzled farther down into my blue comforter.

I could hear my mother, Darla, wailing for him to stop. My father was screaming something slurred and incoherent at her. There was a smash of glass, then things quieted down. My heart quickened as I heard the large size 10 books clunking toward my door. He rested his hand on my doorknob, I heard the small click it made whenever someone did that. I held my breath and waited for him to change his mind. His boots stomped away and I let out a breath.

I didn't feel my tears until I adjusted my blanket to cover my ears. My mother was crying, no sobbing in the kitchen. I cloaked my ears and switched my brain to a better place. I drifted off, thinking of flowered meadows and pretty white dresses.

__________

"Oh David, it's awful. He did again last night, but only to my mother. I'm tired of living in fear," I sighed into my boyfriend's chest.

"I've been meaning to ask you something," he said. He pulled his arm away from my shoulders and slid off the bench swing we were cuddled up on. He placed a hand into the pocked of his faded blue jeans and pulled out a small box. He got down on one knee in front of me.

"Oh, David," I breathed, my heart slamming into my ribcage.

"Loriana, will you marry me?" he asked softly, opening the small velvet box. It revealed a simple yet beautiful gold ring with a diamond embedded in it. Around it were two rubies.

"Yes, David, yes!" I exclaimed. I gingerly pulled the ring out of the box and slipped it onto my left ring finger. I jumped up in time with him.

"I love you, Loriana," he whispered.

"I love you, too, David."

__________

"Stop, stop!" my mother shrieked, "Please let Loriana leave first! Please?"

"Quit fucking begging, bitch!" my father yelled. I was frozen on our vintage looking couch, the one I'd loved since I was a child. I used to play here with my dolls when my dad went to work.

But now I was witness to a sick, twisted crime. This couch no longer held the innocence. My skirts flowed around me, becoming splattered with the blood my father caused to spray from my mother's mouth with ever punch that connected to the side of her face.

"Get the fuck off the floor!" he snapped. My mother weakly tried, but she landed back on the ground. My dad grabbed a fistful of her hair and dragged her back up to her feet. Her mouth was oozing blood. Her tears were slipping from her eyes, taking droplets of blood that met their paths.

I could feel the tears drip from my cheeks to my neck, cold as ice. I killed me to watch, it really did. But what could I do? I was never one for fighting and I couldn't do excessive amounts of push-ups in school. I would never be able to fend him off myself.

My father smashed his fist straight into my mother's nose, sending her flying backwards. She landed on the ground, not making a single noise of protest.

"Clean up this fucking mess Loriana. I'm leaving," he spat. I waited for the front door to slam before I ran over to my mother, snatching her up into a hug. I cradled her as we cried together.

"Mommy, mommy. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry..."

__________

"I can't believe my baby girl is growing up," my mom whispered, her voice swelling with pride. I lifted my arms as she pinned up one of the sides for sewing. The silky white fabric hung down my body, shapeless as of yet.

"I know, momma. I still can't believe he asked me," I sighed, my mind briefly returning to that day when David asked me to marry him. My heart pounded happily, like it did every time I thought of it.

"Don't be. You're beautiful and you've got a good heart. You've lived through pain," she told me. "That's a good thing, dear. To even it out, God's gotta give you happiness," she described after seeing the skeptical look on my face.

"God..." I trailed off. "Why has he given you all this suffering, momma? What did you do?"

"I had an easy life as a child, dear. Lots of love, lots of money. You could say I was spoiled. So God led me to love a poor man who didn't have much love to spare," she explained. "Hold these skirts up, dear. I need to make sure the petticoat fits."

I pulled my skirts up, watching my mother in the mirror. "But if father had a hard life, why is he so...why is he like he is now?"

"God rewards those who take hardship graciously. Your father...he took it to heart. It made him a cold man, Loriana."

__________

"What the fuck is this?!" my father bellowed, storming into the living room where David and I were talking on the couch. He held up the white wedding dress that my mother and I had only just finished. I jumped up.

"Timothy, please! Give me the dress!" my mother begged, tugging on the dress. Without looking, he back handed her across the face. My mother staggered violently into the wall. Her nose had already started to bleed.

"Daddy," I whispered, walking over to him on my bare feet.

"Don't you hand my that 'daddy' shit! What's this dress for, cunt?!" he screamed. I flinched back.

"It's for my wedding!" I yelled back. The house went dead silent. My mother's face sported a look of horror. My father's face switched emotions so quickly that I couldn't tell what he was feeling. He settled on a deep red color, making him look absolutely furious.

"Your what?" he hissed quietly.

"My. Wedding." I stated defiantly. I knew this was a mistake the moment the words slipped out of my lips. All the dreams of white dresses and weddings in flowered meadows were gone. Every fantasy about love and family and children all fled from my mind.

"Your wedding?" he asked. I opened my mouth, but no words could be choked out. A tear slid down from my eye. "Answer me, whore! Your wedding?"

"Yes, my wedding! Because I hate it here! I hate you!" I screeched. My father said no words to me. He slowly walked closer to me, raising his hand. He brushed a piece of black hair from my neck gently, then locked his large hand around it. I tried to gasp, but he had cut off my airways. I meekly tried to pry his hands away but he was too strong. I was too weak.

Daddy, I mouthed. I'm sorry. Please let me go.

He couldn't understand what my mouth was silently telling him, I'm sure he assumed it was some bad name. That's probably why he picked his daughter, me, up by her neck and threw me up in the air. I flew backwards. My white tutu wasn't enough to break my fall, and neither were the couch cushions.

As my body connected with the couch, my neck snapped violently sideways. Things went black very quickly.

At that moment, something in my body disconnected. I went flying out from my body. Suddenly, I could see myself on the couch. There was blood steadily streaming from my mouth and nose and there was something about the position of my neck that gave me the chills.

"Loriana, Loriana!" David cried, "Please, come back! Please don't let this be true! Please be alive! Call an ambulance, goddammit!"

My mother was already on the phone, her words hardly audible through her sobs and my father's threats. My body just lay there helplessly. David started trying CPR, breathing into my lungs, followed by him pushing on my chest.

David, honey. That's not gonna work, I wanted to say, but no words came out. I was just there, floating above my body and watching the scene of chaos from a more peaceful, disconnected place.

David held my hand all the way from the couch to the ambulance to the hospital. My mother sobbed, alone, in the middle of the floor, crying for her daughter to come back. My father was led off in handcuffs to a police cruiser. I floated from David to my mother, trying to comfort each of them. They couldn't hear me, though.

I was there with them when the doctor proclaimed me dead. I was patting them on the back as they sobbed into each other's grasp. They felt nothing.

__________

My funeral was something to behold. I never knew I was so cared for by the people of our small, rural town. All one hundred and thirty three residents showed up. There were very few who didn't cry as they looked at pictures of me. They sobbed over my beauty as I lay in the wooden coffin in the wedding dress. David and my mother only wanted to hold my hand.

__________

On the planned date of our wedding, June 16th, I was with David when he placed the cold metal of his father's revolver into his mouth.

"I love you, Loriana."

The blood that splattered from the back of his head passed through me. His body slumped forward off of his bed. I rubbed circles on his lifeless back, waiting for him. He never came for me. People who commit suicide didn't do to the same place as those who were murdered.

__________

So I stood by my mothers side from that day on, watching as she became sick with a cold that evolved into much more. Her will was weakened by my death. She had nothing to live for but me. Her younger sister was holding her hand. I sat on the couch cushion next to her.

As her eyes became maddened with a fever, she looked straight in my direction.

"L-Loriana? Is that you," she croaked out.

Yes momma, it's me, I whispered.

"I love you, honey. I can't wait to see you again."

She died on the same couch I did.