Enforced (Book 1)

Chapter 13

I woke up the next morning and began getting ready to go meet Benjamin. I picked my discarded dress off of the floor and put it into my clothes hamper. I pulled a clean dress out of my closet, pulled it over my head, grabbed my medical bag and a blanket from my closet, and headed down stairs.

My dad was waiting at the bottom of the stairs for me. He had a broom and carpet cleaner in his hand. "Clean this up." He demanded, thrusting the cleaning supplies at me and gesturing at the broken beer bottle.

"You threw it at me, you clean it up." I responded angrily.

The vein in this forehead bulged. He grabbed the back of my neck and shoved me onto my hands and knees. The shards of glass dug into my palms and knees and began bleeding. I gasped and tried to stand back up by dad kept his hand on the back of my neck until I had finished cleaning the carpet. Once I was done, he released me and I gathered my things, threw my coat on, and sprinted out the door and to the shuttle stop.

When the shuttle stopped, I got off and walked to the pond. Benjamin wasn't there yet. I sat down and looked at my dress. The fabric was stained with blood at the knees. I pulled my dress up, took the tweezers out of my medical bag and began pulling shards of glass from my knees.

When I was finished, I rubbed antibacterial ointment on them and covered them in gauze. I had begun to get cold so I laid the blanket I brought with me, over my lap. Then I began working on my palms. I finished my left hand, put antibacterial ointment on it and wrapped it in gauze as well.

I struggled using the tweezers with my left hand to pull pieces of glass out of my right. I had just pulled out the fourth small shard and added it to the pile of glass next to me when Benjamin came strolling up to me. I looked up at him and smiled. "What happened?" he asked, worried.

"Oh." I thought about how answer, "Um, my dad dropped a beer bottle and it shattered and he made me clean it up. As I was cleaning it, I set my hands in the shards." I didn't mention my knees or the fact that my father forced me to the floor and into the glass, or the fact that in his drunken stupor my dad had thrown the bottle at my head.

I could tell that Benjamin didn't fully believe my story, but he didn't press any farther. He took the tweezer out of hand and gently began pulling the glass out. "That's quite a bit of glass for just your one palm." He noted, nodding his head toward the pile of glass next to us.

I looked away from him. He continued to pull glass from my palms. When he was done I put antibiotics on it and Benjamin wrapped my palm in gauze for me. "Thanks." I replied softly.

"You're welcome." He replied. "Now that I helped you, are you going to tell me what really happened? There is way too much glass in that pile for just your palms."

"I don't know." I answered, "There was a lot more glass in my other hand." Benjamin looked at me and I could tell that he still wasn't convinced that I was telling the truth. I changed the subject in order to avoid telling him what had really happened. I didn't want to worry him, and I didn't want him to think that I was some poor girl who was too weak to stand up for herself. 

"Where is your coat?" I asked him.

He looked down at himself and sighed. "I'm sorry, Bethany. They took the coat from me." He said, they meaning those awful bullies. "They said I didn't deserve it. I feel awful. You went out of your way to get it for me, and I lost it."

"You didn't lose it." I replied angrily, "It was stolen from you.  My father still has a few more coats he doesn't wear. I can bring you another one."

"No, Bethany. They will just take it again."

"I can bring it with me during the day and bring it home with me at night. That way when you're outside with me, you can have one, and they won't know about it, so they can't take it."