Chapter 48

And behold, it stood upon the sand of the sea, and I saw a beast rise up out of the sea:

She wore an all blue one-piece bathing suit as she treaded in the three foot high, crystal blue ocean
water. Lynnette's hair was wrapped in a halo of lilies, and the tranquil smile that she wore upon her face
was reminiscent of that to someone who had just happened across the threshold of life and eternity
above the clouds. She allowed her hands to skim across the soft, warm water as she carried on
deeper.

For as far as her eyes would allow all she could see before her was wide, open and blue water. There
were no clouds to speak of in the sky, nor was there a boat or person anywhere to be found. She was
absolutely alone in the expanse; even her breath felt effervescent, like she had just tasted the greatest
sip of refreshing water that lingered inside her mouth unceasingly.

There were the events of the past weeks and days that somehow, someway were nowhere present
inside her being. The woman was a picture of isolation and rest. Even when her smile vanished there
was still a relaxed warmness melting inside her belly that caused it to tickle with every movement. She
looked down at the shimmering water to see goldfish swimming back and forth around her feet and
ankles.

The further out she ventured that was all the more clearer the air became. She breathed it all inside her
lungs until she couldn't inhale any more. Behind her was a sound. She could feel the waves nudge her
bottom half forward. She turned only her head around to see none other than a naked Arthur Bushard
coming towards her with a gentile grin gracing his handsome face.

Lynnette didn't cringe or even budge for that matter, she just turned her head back aroundwhile the
man came up behind her and fondled her chest and neck with his soft, strong hands.

The young lady closed her eyes and allowed the man's actions to carry her further away into the
blissful abyss. Soon enough, his lips met with her neck. She moaned in ecstasy as Arthur's luscious



mouth kissed all over her warm, goose-pimpled skin.

Lynnette took Arthur's hands off of her before turning around and clasping his face. Her eyes were still
shut as she pressed her lips against his in one passionate, tongue-induced kiss while the burning sun's
rays caressed their beautiful, black bodies.

Lynnette's eyes then opened. Lying beside her was Isaiah. She gawked all around to find herself lying
in her own bed inside her room. The woman, somewhat confused, continued to scan around before
catching her mother sitting in her rocking chair against the wall.

Her mother was wearing the most idyllic look on her face as she sat in her bathrobe staring at her. It
unsettled Lynnette more than she already was.

"I haven't watched you sleep since you were a little girl." Her mother quietly stated.

Lynnette ignored the comment before listening to water outside the window tap in a chorus. "Is it still
raining?" Lynnette rubbed her aching forehead.

"A little bit." Her mother sat up. "I think the flash flood warnings are all over with. I got tired of all those
beeping alarms on the TV, so I ended up turning the darn thing off after a while."

Lynnette managed to catch a glimpse of her blue pajamas that she was wearing underneath the
covers. She then glanced back over at the baby who was steadily snoring right beside her.

"I don't even remember getting cleaned up last night." Lynnette attempted to sit up on the bed, only to
realize that her entire body was nearly immobilized from head to toe.

"I found you outside last night on the front lawn." Her mother began rocking back and forth. "You were
just kneeling there. I don't think you were even hardly awake when I brought you inside. And, child,
your breath sure was stinking, too." She giggled.



Lynnette cracked a grin while still struggling to get up. But when she came to the realization that her
body just wasn't in any condition to act, she instead resigned to her fate and lied back down on the bed
underneath the old blanket that her grandmother made for her when she was still a little girl.

She was sore to the very bone. Both her and her mother stared at one another for endless minutes. For
Lynnette, just being inside the same room with her mom seemed normal for the first time in years, and
that thought alone caused her heart to race with anticipation as to what could have been around the
corner next.

"I never realized how restless of a sleeper you are." Her mother said. "At first I thought you were going
to hurt Isaiah with all your tossing and turning."

"I think I was dreaming of Jaws." Lynnette feebly quipped.

Lynnette's mother only grinned before saying, "That eclipse yesterday was something to see; if you
could see, that is. We all thought the world was about to end."

Lynnette rested upon her uncomfortable pillow while wondering in her head why she didn't happen
upon any harsh nightmares.

"God is funny." Her mother suddenly remarked.

Lynnette lifted her weary head and looked dead at her mom in the most curious fashion. "What?" She
frowned.

"It's funny how he seems to bring things back around full circle. I can't remember a single thing that's
been going on these past few days, and yet, here you and I are, right where we started back in
February when you came home from the hospital."



Lynnette recalled the event with perfect clarity, except rather than sitting in the chair, her mother was
seated at the foot of her bed. But she got the woman's message all the same.

"Mama, why didn't we go to church growing up?"

Her mother only turned her eyes away for a moment and kept them locked on the closet door to her
right.

"Your father and I got married, had you and your sisters, and then we both got complacent in our lives
to where going to church was such a burden. It didn't mean that we didn't believe in or love God, we
just felt that we worked so hard that we deserved at least one day to ourselves. But I look back now
and realize that...it may have hurt our girls."

Wanting to cry, Lynnette said, "I saw...I saw such an evil, mama. It's not that I never wanted to talk to
you about it, it's just that...I didn't know how to." Her voice cracked. "I didn't know how and where to
begin. It all started with Isaac, and then...then it just went downhill from there. I still think that I'm
dreaming even now. Am I even alive?"

Wilma sat and looked so fondly at her child as though it were the very first time she had done so.

"I know that I haven't been easy to live with these past few months. I know that I've caused so much
damage, but you and daddy have to understand that...I just don't know where to begin with it all."

Wilma continued to look on at Lynnette before asking, "Why did you stop writing your poetry?"

Lynnette slammed her head back down onto her pillow and sighed, "Mama, I don't have the will to do
that anymore."

"But I remember you told me years ago that writing poetry gave you the opportunity to express yourself
in ways that you couldn't say out loud. I never once said that you had to tell me every minor detail in



your life, but I never wanted to be cut out of it completely either."

Lynnette looked back at her mother with a baffled grimace, as to say her words had cut deep inside.

"I know that what you went through with Isaac was terrible, but, child, you've been through something
recently, too. I can see it not only in your body, but also in your soul. I have a feeling that what you went
through back in February, and last night for that matter, shook you so hard that words just can't express
it all."

"The funny thing is, it's not even about Isaac anymore." Lynnette sniffed. "This whole matter goes so far
beyond that man. When I say evil, I don't just mean something bad, this was something from hell. It got
Isaac, and it almost got me and Isaiah. Something came into this world...and it just won't leave."

"Then sometimes, little girl, it's up to us to make it leave." Her mother said in a stern, yet composed
manner.

Right then and there Lynnette's vision mysteriously began to blink in and out. At first she thought she
was going blind, but once her sight remained intact she realized that it wasn't a physical happening, but
rather spiritual.

"You're not like your sisters." Her mother stated. "There's a motivation about you that they don't have.
And that same motivation is what has caused you to survive all this time. God is with you, and he'll
continue to be with you."

Lynnette lifted her body up from off the bed before sitting on the edge. Her mother's words didn't have
to sink inside, they hit with such ferocity and suddenness that thinking about it was only a waste of
time. The little girl got it.

"Where's daddy at?" She muttered.



Exhaling, her mother replied, "He's in the room. I guess something happened to him, too. He doesn't
want to talk about it."

Lynnette, daring to exert her already damaged body any further, got up from off the bed and went for
the door with her mother right behind her.

"You should've heard the baby last night; he was singing 'Jesus loves me' in his sleep." Wilma
mentioned before shutting the door behind her.

Lynnette limped down the hallway, just two doors down before she came to her parents' room. The
door was wide open. She looked inside to see her father lying down in the bed, rolled over onto his side
to where she could only see his back.

She couldn't tell if he was awake or not, all she knew was that both he and her mother were not the
same people she once knew all her life. The man lying on the bed was just an unfamiliar husk of a
human being.

"He's been like that ever since I came around yesterday." Wilma mentioned. "I don't know what went on
here...but I am so damn glad it's over." She started to whimper. "So, so glad."

Lynnette just stood at the doorway and stared on at her long-suffering father while listening to her
mother behind her speak so delicately.

All the words, sights and thoughts were entirely too much to handle and grasp all at once. Lynnette
simply shut herself down like a machine right then.

"I...I have to leave for a while." Lynnette whispered.

A minute and a half passed by before her mother patted her back and said, "Then you do whatever you
have to do. And don't come back until it's done. Live to fight another day."



Lynnette listened as her mother walked down the stairs. She stood and watched her father with
mournful eyes for a bit more before turning and heading back to her own room. The instant she
reached her room door she leaned up against it and listened as the tapping rain spat upon the old
house.

Every muscle and fiber in her body wanted to open the door, but she relented as hard as she could
while moving her hands against the wood.

"Goodbye, little baby boy." She whispered so softly at the door.

Pulling away from the door Lynnette went inside the adjacent bathroom and shut the door right behind
her.

There was such a grim quiet inside the room that Lynnette figured at first that her hearing was fading
away. She stood before the medicine cabinet mirror without looking at her own reflection. She then
pulled up the bottom half of her pajama shirt and examined the lacerations that covered her stomach.

From her stomach she made her way down to her legs and feet that were marked up with bruises and
cuts. The young lady was a picture perfect collage of misery. Even her hands had scorch marks from
where she handled the piece of fire that she tossed at the siblings. But beyond all of the physical
malaise, there was Arthur who remained with her for endless hours later.

She could still feel his hands attempt to undo her pants. The aroma of the man's breath was such a
striking stench that Lynnette could smell nothing else besides it. Just knowing that he ate people
caused her to gulp down a huge glob of saliva.

Both of the creatures had their claws all over her at one point or another. Two things that should have
been relegated to a late night matinee were at one time right in front of her face. Just the very thought
of such an occurrence hit Lynnette with such a blunt force that the woman had to brace herself from
shaking all over again.



She was sick and tired of shaking. Fed up with running, and downright frustrated with being afraid. At
last, Lynnette lifted her head and stared straight at herself in the mirror for at least ten whole seconds
before opening the medicine cabinet door and taking out her father's shaving blade.

With the sharp utensil in her right hand the young lady blindly glossed over its shine from one tip to the
other before placing it against her left wrist. The will to have the blade break skin was there, but her
strength was nowhere to be found. It's not as if it took a mountain of muscle to open herself up, rather,
her own right hand just couldn't seem to perform the action of pressing it against her pulsating vein
hard enough.Soon, she found that both her right hand and the razor blade were shivering.

Lynnette kept on pressing it against her flesh, but rather than a gory split, she instead got only a trickle
that shocked her so much that she dropped the blade to the floor before stumbling backwards and
sitting down on top of the toilet seat.

There Lynnette was, ogling at her slightly bleeding left wrist that required only a small Band-Aid to
conceal.

All around her was the ever so unnatural sound of silence. Earlier, she wondered to herself just why the
nightmares hadn't begun yet; she wished to God she had never asked the question to begin with.

"Please...wake up." She murmured. "Just wake up already, bitch."


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