Une histoire d'amour Américaine

This is a story... I have a lot of stories. I'm going to start sharing them... even if you all do start to think I am a weirdo. All are based on a true event, but the stories are not true as a whole. Sort of like Law and Order, there is some truth to the events, but they are fictionalized to be more dramatic and compelling. I hope you like my stories.

~ Amanda



She's sitting on the steps, arms wrapped around her knees, mouth agape, her cheeks flushed and wet. Unable to move, the fear has left her paralyzed. The scene that just passed has been seared into her brain with violent savagery. The smell of piss is overpowering her fear, snapping her back from paralysis. Her fingers start to curl, the nails are biting into the flesh on her palms, making them bleed. Her head is throbbing from the rage she feels, her ear drums are reverberating with every beat of her heart, the pressure is over-whelming her. Slowly moving her hand to her face, she wipes away the wetness, leaving a smear of blood from her bloodied palm. Standing up deliberately, slowly, quietly, she backs herself against the wall and starts to descend the stairs. Knowing that if he sees her, he will hurt her badly. Down the stairs, knowing which steps to avoid so there is no noise. Four steps down.... six more. Her arms are outstretched against the wall, hands flat for balance, her bare feet are freezing, her jaw is chattering. She stops and clenches her jaw, forcing it to stop chattering. This is her only chance, failure is not an option.

Three more steps, the smell of urine is getting stronger. The only sound is an occasional grunt. The stairs creek, she pauses and listens... cursing the old house. She has run up and down these stairs a hundred times before this night, she would play on these stairs, she would hide in this stairwell, now crying in this stairwell. She feels the carpet under her cold feet, curling her toes in it, feeling every fiber of the brown carpet prickle her toes and her arches. It seems like an eternity has passed, the occasional grunt can be heard again. She begins to move, avoiding the first step. After years of misuse, the step has been left in a weakened state, it creaks loudly with weight on it. Even the diminutive body of a young child.

She gets to the bottom of the stairs, and crouches in the corner, pressing her body as low to the floor as she can get and peers around the corner. Glaring at the figure she sees in front of her. His bare acne-laden back, with scratch marks down it. Some of the pus infected pimples bleeding and excreting their infectious waste. In the middle of it, a lone fingernail... enveloped by his skin, blood dripping down slowly. She looks away, tears welling in her eyes and fights back a sob. Her chest is starting to hitch, a tear descending over the ledge of her eyelid, falling down her smooth freckled face to the floor. She has to move. She has to go now, the opportunity is beginning to slip away from her.

Crawling, using her skinny, bruised arms to pull herself across the floor; her scabbed knees pushing against the carpet to propel her forward, she creeps through the doorway into the kitchen. The kitchen is lit up, bright as if the sun were shining like it had been earlier that day. It is the only light on in the entire house. It is kept on most of the time to keep the cock-roaches away and out of sight. The bright fluorescent light is spilling into the living room, where her mark is standing. Protected from view by the wall, she gets up and goes to the drawer, opening it slowly and methodically. Knowing exactly what she will extract from the drawer, she reaches in and finds the big wooden handle. The handle is worn, the wood has faded and lost its polish but the blade is still sharp. Looking at the weapon, she knows what she must do. After 4 years, she knows exactly what she must do; inaction means eventual death.

She moves toward the doorway of the kitchen, protected by the stove, crouching down to the floor she crawls back to the stairwell. Remembering the bear stew that had been simmered on this stove, the gamey wild taste of the bear meat in her mouth now. The angle of the stairwell corner allows her to be at his back watching him... waiting. She looks from his back to the floor and sees the piss stain on the carpet, a woman lying next to it. Her dark hair, matted against her head with sweat and blood. Her naked body in an awkward position, her fingernail bleeding where her nail once was. She is making no noise, the noise came earlier. She is hoarse now from all the noise earlier and his hands crushing her throat. No, she is quiet... she has resigned herself to her fate and looks upon him with intense hatred, his filthy excrement seeping out of her spread legs. Her right eye has started to swell shut and her nose is at an unnatural angle. She is wet all over, her belly, her breasts, her hair. The smell of urine is sobering, it is everywhere, filling the air with the rank odor. He is standing there, his arm tugging and yanking furiously at himself.

The girl begins to stand up slowly, she sneaks across the floor, lining herself up behind the man. The weapon is in front of her, her small hand closed tightly around the wood. Her heart is pounding and the lump in her throat is making it difficult to breath. Her eyes are burning from the tears from what she saw, she moves closer until she is only a couple feet behind him. The woman glances at her quickly, recognition in her eyes, acquiescence in a barely noticeable nod. 


Up close to this man, she can smell the bitter odor of Jack Daniels and the Old Spice after-shave that he kept in the bathroom. She comes no higher than his mid-back, he is a towering, large man. Looking at the fingernail embedded into his skin, she must exhale from her mouth quickly to avoid vomiting. Her throat raw from the screaming and sobbing earlier in the night. Choking down the bile that has arose, she lifts her skinny arms, gripping the handle with both hands to steady herself and brings the blade down ripping through the soft flesh of the man's back; jamming the handle with all the force she could muster. Immediately, she lets go of the knife and backs away into the closest wall. Sobbing uncontrollably, she remembers how much fun she had that day digging a hole in their backyard with a spoon, in an attempt to dig her way to China. Finally, comprehending the fact that it is not possible to dig from New York to China with a kitchen spoon.