Scarred

• Aishriya Lal, Grade 7
• Short Story
• 2022

The shrill callings of the cowbell rang within my fatigued ears. The foetid stench of the dampened floors seeped through my drowsy figure. I scraped my starless hair into a nasty knot. It was another day. I wished it hadn’t been.
I thought of her. She longed for a smile to spread on my sunken face. I smiled. For her. My life was now hers. I was to wake her dreams to life. Up above, a smile would tickle at her lips in doing so. A true one.
And just like that - the uniform wore itself upon my frail frame - like it had always done. I liked it. It hid my colour.
But my stooped face had always remained open to those eyes. Those eyes glinting with heartless menace.
*

My stained feet winded through the besmirched muck. The isolated grass crawled upon my untrusting spine - concealing me. The gnarled branches curled their fleshless fingers upwards where the vultures pierced the silver linings of innocent clouds - a plain reminder of the dying hope that brimmed the town.
*

The gates. Sooty rust writhing upon them. Gates that guarded a prison. A prison that I was to enter. The vile wind screeched - a warning. I trudged forwards.
*
The tarnished door ceased my steps - shielding my colour from their view. I liked it.

It opened. Words followed. Words that were forbidden to utter here. And yet he was. My sunken head welcomed the fuming spit that fired from his mouth.

I glanced below. There it was. My face. Clear of feeling.
My naked feet caressed the filthy puddle - shattering the sun into slices beyond number. Like my soul - chipped forevermore. Superiority flared through my soul. It lit out.
My colour wouldn’t leave me - not even when I was reflected - never.

CRACK.
It had sounded. I didn’t shed a tear. I didn’t scream. But I sank lower and shuffled to the table.
He chucked the black whip and smirked with a flair of superiority.
The pain then hit. Worse than ever. My spine seared and scorched - a rippling fire - as his menacing smirk helplessly remained in my mind.
I scraped my olive flesh in a feeble attempt to rid myself of that which had first scarred me. Scarred me for life.