Forever Changed (2 page)

“I intend to shoot you where you stand, so that I never have to look at you
, ever again. I also plan to hunt down your precious daughter and do the same. I will find her and I will kill her!” My mother screamed this with so much hatred in her voice. I was terrified! Why would my own mother want to kill me?

My father looked at the door; he must have known
I was hiding in that closet. I looked into his eyes and I could have sworn that his eyes turned a pale red. He winked at me, assuring me that I was going to be okay, but I was not so sure. A tear rolled down my cheek, as I looked at my father with remorse and fear. I didn’t want him to die!

My father would not give my mother the
satisfaction of looking at her. He watched me, smiling, as my mother raised the shot gun a little higher.

S
he screamed, “You have hit me for the last time, you demon!” She pulled the trigger.

From there
, it was like slow motion. My father’s eyes bored into mine, he opened

his
arms wide, as if he were embracing the pellets, all the while continuing to smile at me.

The soun
d of the shot-gun was deafening, the kick threw my mother into the wall, and I watched in horror as the slug made contact with my father’s face! It took most of his head off, blood and brains splattered on the walls and the main entry door.

I kept hearing the same sound of the pellets coming from the shot-gun,-until I realized it was me making the sound. I was screaming louder than I have ever screamed in my life. I clamped a hand over my mouth, from fear that my mother meant what she said.

My head was spinning with so many questions.
Why didn’t my father try to take the gun? He could have easily missed the pellets with his speed. Why does my mother want to kill us? What did he mean about, I needed protection? My most important question was why was he smiling at me? It

was
like he knew something was going to happen, but what?

Looking down at my father’s dead body, I saw my mother standing
over him. She pointed the shot-gun at his chest and pulled the trigger. This time the kick of the gun didn’t throw her back into the wall, she had braced herself.

Blood splattered her white sundress, “One for
good measure,” she said while spitting on him.

She put her slender shoulders back and stood a little straighte
r. She repositioned the gun; slowly she brought her head up and looked straight at the door I was hiding behind. I started easing away from the door into the arms of the waiting coats. I saw nothing, but hate in her eyes. I knew then that she really was going to kill me!

Chapter 2

              I could hear her walking to the door. I heard the loud thump of metal hitting the hard wood floor. I listened to the scrapping sound of it being dragged.

My heart was pounding harder than it ever had.
I was terrified, I just watched my mother shoot my father’s face off and now she is coming after me.

I am only seventeen years old. I
have so much I want to see and do. And here she comes to take my whole life away, how selfish and self-centered of her.

             
The scrapping of the gun stopped and I heard the door knob rattle. I sunk deeper into the embrace of the coats. This was it!

             
“You better open this door now, little lady or I will shoot you through the wall!” My mother screamed in a sing song voice. I shivered, even though I was wrapped up in at least a hundred different coats.

             
“What’s it going to be? Make your choice!”

             
“My choice is to run forever, to get away from you! My choice is to have a mother who didn’t just kill my father, right before my eyes! My choice is to wake up from this awful nightmare!” I screamed at my mother, my voice a little higher than normal, coming out in a squeaking noise.

“Well right now the only choice you have is to get out of that closet and get out now,” my mother said
with irritation. “Come on Elizabeth, don’t you want to see your daddy?” Oh no, she just did not! The nerve of this woman, first killing my father and now taunting me with his dead body!!

I felt my blood pressure rise. I felt my heart pick up its beat. I felt tears spring to my eyes. I felt like my lungs would burst.
I saw a red glow and for half a second I wondered where it came from. Most of all, I felt anger and the need to hurt my mother.

Before I knew it
, my feet started moving. Instead of unlocking the door, I ran through it. Wood splintered and flew everywhere. Dry wall fell in chunks from where I took the door frame completely out of the wall. My mother was standing there just grinning.

             
“See, I knew you would be just like him! I knew you were more a part of him then me! Well, guess what missy? I may be just as terrified of you, as you are me, but I am the one who holds the gun in my hands. I brought you into this world and don’t think for a minute, I won’t take you out of it! I can take your life just like that.” She snapped her fingers, sounding afraid.

             
“Oh really, well mother, let me tell you something. Even though you hold a gun in your hands, goes to show how much you don’t know about them. A shot gun only holds two rounds and you have not reloaded.” I spit this out with such hate. It took everything in my power not to shove that empty shot gun barrel down her throat.

             
“You think I don’t know that? I need you alive girl! Who else is going to help me clean up this mess?” She said waving her hand toward my father’s dead body. She looked at the blood all over the main entry door, the floor, and the walls, where my father’s brains and blood still slid down. And I have no idea how I did it, but also at the mess, from the door frame I ran through.

             
I became sick. “How could you ask me to do this? How can I? Why would you take my father away from me?” I asked my mother, trying to hold back the tears and the bile that was edging up the back of my throat.

             
“You have no idea who your father was,” she said through tears, “I barely knew who your father was. What I did know about him, is something I don’t want you to turn into. I love you, Elizabeth. I am not going to kill you; I am going to change you.”

             
“Change me into a killer like you?” I asked sarcastically.

             
I watched as the hurt reached my mother’s eyes, “You have no idea what you are talking about Elizabeth. One day you will understand that this was for your own good. Until then, let’s get this mess cleaned up.”

             
I just stood there looking at my mother. I was so confused! During the time, I was debated with my mother; she had reloaded the shot-gun. She now aimed it at my chest and had her finger on the trigger

             
“Go grab the shovel and start digging! Now!” She screamed. My fear replaced my anger. I did as I was told and ran toward the back door. I had to go dig my father’s grave.

Chapter 3

              It was storming, when I went outside to grab the shovel from the storage shed. The lightning was striking low to the ground and the thunder rumbled loudly. The rain poured and for a moment I stood there soaking it all in. I was hoping that the lightning would kill me where I stood.

I imagined it striking me, making my skin turn
black and causing it to smell like burning flesh. I chuckled a little when I imagined my dark hair sticking up everywhere, like in the old movies. I couldn’t help myself and started laughing hysterically at the thought. The hysterics slowly faded and turned to tears.

             
I picked up the shovel crying as I started lifting shovel after shovel full of mud out of my father’s grave. I continued for over an hour the mud made it extremely hard to get as deep as I should have. Of all nights to kill my father, she would pick the one where it was storming.

I was soaked to the bone and had
bloody dime sized blisters on my hands, but I didn’t care. All I cared about was my father. I had cried so much that I was shuddering and shaking. All I could do was think about him.

             
“Elizabeth, you have been out there digging for over an hour, are you not done yet? Get moving, before his body starts smelling up the house,” my mother screamed, over each clap of thunder. I rolled my eyes, thinking how I would love to take her head off and dig her hole.

             
I walked out of the garden. On a pretty day it’s magnificent, with flowers, vines, and trees blooming everywhere. I love this place. My father and I would work all day out in this garden, planting new flowers. I decided that this was our special place that is why he needed to be buried here.

             
I headed back to the house and walked through the back door. My mother watched me and tried to hand me a glass of water. I just stood looking at her.

             
“Don’t you think I just had enough water?” I asked icily.

             
“I just thought you could use a drink, you still have a lot of work to do,” she said, while dumping out the water in the sink. “Anyway, go finish burying your father. When you’re done with that nasty work, get the mess cleaned up before the maid comes. I am going to go soak in the tub, it has been a long day. Goodnight Elizabeth, I love you,” she said sweetly.

             
I just looked at her with no emotion on my face or in my eyes, except for one. Anger!

Chapter 4

I watched my mother walk up the stairs and listened for the door to clos
e. I washed my hands and made me a sandwich. I was starving from all the digging I had done and I was only part of the way done with what I needed to do. I was exhausted and very angry.

How could she leave me to all of this mess? Ugh, I prayed she died in her sleep

tonight. I prayed hard, too! What kind of mother would do this to her own family? There are so many questions that needed answers. With renewed motivation and a full stomach I was determined to find them!

Carefully
, I started taking everything out of my father’s pockets, which contained three thousand dollars and a piece of paper that he had rolled up with a rubber band. I didn’t think anything of it and just stuffed it into my own pocket.

I rolled his body gently over and removed his wallet from his back pocket. I opened it and the first thing I saw was a picture of him and me. It was taken a couple of weeks ago. I am a photographer and I am always taking pictures. I had been playing on the computer and had made that picture with ‘Daddy’s Little Girl, Always.’ It was the only one in his wallet. A fresh wave of tears flooded my eyes while looking at it.

Of course
, he had his driver’s license, insurance cards; our social security cards a few different bank cards, and about five credit cards. There was also a check for four thousand dollars and he had three thousand dollars, in cash, in his wallet. That left me with ten thousand dollars all together. I placed his wallet in my pocket.