Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: Hope (05/04/06)
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TITLE: Life Renewed | Previous Challenge Entry
By Crystal Coyne
05/08/06 -
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I stand naked in front of the mirror, my body plastered with dried blood and bruises as vibrant as a salt-water aquarium. I suck in my breath, the pain nearly unbearable, as I begin to poke at this bump and that, making sure nothing’s broken. I count myself lucky that I’m not in the hospital, that I’m coherent, and that I finally have the sense I need knocked into me. Literally.
He said it would be different this time. He said he was sorry. He said that he loved me. He said he would die without me. He said…so many things.
Yet here I stand.
He was right though. This time was different. This time his fist found its way to our son. No matter how awful he was, no matter how many times he hit me, or even what he said, I was certain he would never hit our child.
I was wrong.
We had a good couple of weeks filled with flowers and kisses, phone calls and romantic meals. It all ended abruptly with a thud to my face after he declared I was worthless and ugly and how he deserved so much better. My fault, I heard between assaults. It was always my fault.
My little boy used to hide in his bedroom when the shouting would start, then he began to stand timidly in the corner, now he decided that being seven, he was old enough to defend his mother. Tears pour down my swollen cheeks at the image of my precious son, seemingly lifeless, thrown across the living room like the clichéd rag doll. His tiny body now rivals mine, nearly mark for mark.
Carefully slipping on a tattered robe, I quietly tiptoe to my son’s room. My husband isn’t home, but I can’t shake the overwhelming feeling of walking too near a sleeping bear: one wrong move and I’m done.
After checking over my son the same way I did myself, I breathe a great sigh of relief. We will be okay physically but can we ever truly recover? The time has come, I decided, pushing away thoughts of failure and fear. I know what I need to do, what I have to do for both of us.
I kneel down and rifle through my son’s closet, finding the shoe-box I buried deep in his toy-bin a few days ago. My hands tremble with adrenaline as I open it and gaze at the contents: a simple business card and a wad of money. I had been secretly stashing money for years, determined that my son would have a future. Now the two thousand seventy-one dollars would give us both a chance at a new life.
Rushing back to my bedroom with fresh urgency, I discard my robe and pull on an old shirt and jeans. I don’t have any time to spare but there is one thing I have left to do, some pressing need more vital than all else. Dropping to my knees and clasping my hands together in earnest need, I begin to pray. Deep emotion like I’ve never felt overwhelms me as I ask God for forgiveness from my many sins, asking him for the strength and courage I need to endure an unknown future, and to be bold with what I know to be right.
Reluctantly I rise, not want to break away from such an indescribable connection, but knowing the time is at hand. I feel fresh, new and completely invigorated. I can do this.
Scooping up my son, I walk to the nearest pay phone almost a mile away and dial the hand-written number on the back of the business card I stashed away. When a husky female voice answers, I tell her I’m ready.
Five minutes later a plain blue sedan picks me up. The driver smiles at me and hands me a package containing two bus tickets, a new driver’s license, new social security cards for myself and my son, money, and a Bible.
We drive away to a new life with a new identity and a new hope.
I open the Bible. Thumbing through the New Testament, my eyes fall upon a verse, seemingly speaking right to me. Phillipians 4:13, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me”. Thank you, Jesus.
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You did a nice job of completing the story within the word limit, and still leaving me wanting to read more.
I wish more women had the courage that your character/you had.