Prologue

Maryanne is plagued by more than night terrors. Her Step-Dad Joe subjects her to far worse than nightmares ever can while her Mother pretends none of it is happening.

Prologue

1

Walking this road, listening to dry dirt crunch under my boots, I welcome the breeze with a frown as it carries a few tumbleweeds across my path.  In the distance flames lick the heavens; bright and destructive chaos swallowing everything within reach as unseen cries scathes my nerves.  What led me here?  Is any of this real?  One may argue reality is what you make it, but sometimes those within reality shape it for you as well as reform ideas you once had concerning yourself.

Razors and pills mask the pain while inane narratives carry the intolerant toward arcane agendas.

Difference in tastes, refusal to follow the crowd, and poverty are magnets for tribal savagery served by privileged Neanderthals.  Perhaps disagreement is in order, but having lived the life of someone whom survived said savagery can attest the notion.

A growl snapped my sentiments back to the present and as I swivel to my left an ominous figure emerges from a dusty mist.  Its elongated horns reach for heaven, its jaws a gapping gateway to certain death, and as it approaches on cloven feet its glare sharpens.

“Wake up,” it hisses.

2

I bolted upright.  Darkness enveloped me as it did every corner of the miniature room.  Beneath me the soiled mattress groaned in agony.  It took a moment for reality to register, but once it did I was doubled over, feet planted on the cold unforgiving concrete, and trembled.  Which was worse: nightmares or reality?  In my circumstance I chose nightmares every time.

“Wake up,” came the same growl only this time it was accompanied by a series of stomps and I tilted up head toward the ceiling just as dirt shook loose from the wood beams.  “Get up before I come down there and break your face!”

A soft laugh parted my lips.  I doubted the massive blob I addressed as Step-Dad could waddle down the stairs, but I didn’t care to take any chances and proceeded to stand.