Lavender Nights — Chapter Four

MARIANNE

I repressed my anger, it never got the best of me because it never did me any good, like right now for instance — the stupid feign of innocence when I knew exactly what he meant. That I was practically akin to skin and bones. I knew that you could break me if you merely grabbed at me — if you squeezed my neck just right it would snap. I was a menace to look at, that’s why I avoided the mirror, anything that would remind me of the starvation I grew too close to because they made me. Because I had to be this way, anything more or anything less — I wouldn’t be needed. It turns out I left the cage just to walk into another trap, the man stared at me with this inclined hatred, an anger I reserved filled him as much as it did me. Except mine disintegrated as soon as I decided to be ungrateful, as soon as he pushed in me an unlocked fear. That my saviour would be an enemy in disguise. The hard ridges of his collarbone protruded as the veins in his neck pulsed with passion. My shoulders slumped as I felt the tears finally free.

“I’m sorry, I … I don’t know what I was thinking. I won’t question you again I promise.”

“Good, now come, sit and eat.”

Hunger gnawed at my body as I averted all eye contact and ate my meal in silence. He sat across from me forking at his food, tension simmered in the air with each clang of…