Sneek Peek

It is official; I have begun work on writing a book. A memoir, to be exact. I have completed chapter one so far and expect to finish at least half of a rough manuscript by the end of the summer, under the guidance of a very supportive instructor. I am excited and more than a little nervous for this venture.

I don't know what, if anything, will come of this project but at this point I can only remain optimistic. Each one of you can help me greatly by kindly reading the small excerpts I will be posting here regularly and sharing these posts with your friends. The broader my readership, the greater my platform and, therefore, the better my chances of eventually publishing this memoir. Thank you all in advance, I appreciate the support.

Here is the first excerpt from chapter one, enjoy!
Thanks for reading,

Missie

In the Shadow of Blame

by Melissa (Lutz) Hart

Excerpt from chapter one: Everyone Was Hammer Dancing

                I watched as John, Mom, and Eric ate spaghetti, praying that they would take me to the hospital. I didn’t want to bleed forever and I wanted the pain to go away.

                As Mom cleaned up the dinner dishes, John took my hand away from my face and looked at my wound. My “boo-boo” he called it. The word sounded even more childish than usual coming from a muscle bound brick layer.

                “Pfft. You don’t need stitches,” he said. “God will heal you. We just need to pray about it.”

                He kneeled before me and placed one hand on my forehead and the other on my shoulder. I could see his eyeballs bulging beneath his lids as he sputtered  in tongues one minute and begged God to heal me in English the next.

                Later, as Mom came into my room to say goodnight, she sat on my bed and whispered to me.

                “I wish he would have just agreed to go to the hospital. Praying for a wound like that isn’t going to help anything,” she said.

                Who cared if he had agreed or not? Wasn’t she in control of what happened to her children? That was her famous claim, wasn’t it? That only she was in control of the decisions about her kids. So why the difference this time?

                Never one to keep my mouth shut when my opinion differed from my Mom’s, I asked as much.

                “Someday you will understand, Missy,” she said.

                No. No, I wouldn’t understand.

excerpt of "Faith Destroyed"

Recently, I was lucky enough to have one of my fictional short stories selected for publication in Reading Area Community College's literary publication, Legacy. I have decided to share part of it here for those of you who may be interested in reading it but do not have access to the journal.

Due to the fact that more than a few people have been disturbed by the content of this story, I will only be posting about half of it. If you would like to read the rest, please leave me a comment with your e-mail address and I will gladly send you the second half.

I need to stress that this content is dark in nature, stop reading now if you are easily upset. Also, please keep in mind that this is a FICTIONAL piece, therefore nothing in this story is based on true events. Some of you who are very close to me or have read my non-fiction writing may recognize certain imagery or dialogue. The writer writes with the tools she has collected, so yes I do tend to draw from my memory bank when writing fiction, but the events themselves are NOT based on any actual experiences.

Thank you for letting me share, enjoy!
Missie

Faith Destroyed

By Melissa (Lutz) Hart



Faith awoke to the sharp sounds of shattering glass right before the cat ran terrified into her room. Her heart sank and her tummy tightened.

Mommy is throwing things again.

                “It’s OK Gracie, I’ll protect you,” Faith whispered unconvincingly as she gently pulled her pet onto the dingy mattress lying on the floor. Cuddling Grace to her chest, she tried not to worry. The sun was only beginning to come up, and she wondered if she would be going to school today. She hated the days that her mother kept her home from school. Her second grade teacher was as kind to her as she wished her mother would be. She often secretly pretended that Miss Smith was her Mommy and tried hard to always do her work well so her teacher would smile and tell her how smart she was.   “Shhh kitty, it’s going to be alright,” Faith quietly said to the cat who had started to meow loudly. “Don’t let her hear you.”

                Crash. Another object met with something solid. “You goddamn bastard! You fucking drunk!”

                “See Gracie, it’s not us she’s mad at this time.” The small girl’s lip was trembling, but she knew well enough that tears wouldn’t make anything better when her mother was on one of her rampages. Tears only served to make Faith’s life worse because falling tears meant (I’ll give you something to cry about) a spanking with the belt.

“Faith! Get down here. Now!” Her mother screamed up the stairs. Still clutching the cat to her body, Faith got up from her meager bed and slowly made her way down to see what she was wanted for.

Faith’s stomach fluttered nervously as she walked the short distance from her barren room to the cluttered stairway.  Her feet felt heavy and weak, she had to force left in front of right, but her arms felt strong and her hold on Grace never faltered.

“I didn’t do anything wrong this time, Gracie, I promise.” Faith whispered into an orange tipped ear, “I’ve been a really good girl.”At least, Faith hoped she had been. Sometimes it seemed to Faith that the harder she tried to please her mother and step-father, the angrier they became with her. With every effort-laden step, Faith sent up a silent prayer that she wouldn’t evoke her mother’s wrath.

Dear God, please don’t let me get the belt this time.

Left foot forward.

God, Grandma says to ask you and you’ll listen.

Right foot forward.

Please God, the belt hurts.

Left foot.

 I promised Gracie we would be OK this time, God.

Right foot.

Please hear me, just this once, I don’t like the belt, it scares Gracie.

“What the hell is taking so long?” Faith’s mother yelled impatiently, breaking into Faith’s internal plea to a God who never seemed to answer the child’s requests. Faith quickened her pace and hurried down the stairs, expertly maneuvering around the scattered pieces of dirty laundry that littered the dark staircase.

Wordlessly, Faith walked towards the kitchen and stopped in the doorway with Grace still in her arms. Her step-father sat at the card table where Faith ate macaroni and cheese or a bologna sandwich alone every night while her step-father was at his latest job and her mother rested on the couch.

The top of the table was strewn with a night’s worth of empty bottles and an overflowing ashtray.  His head down and an empty beer bottle clutched between both hands, he did not speak. There was anger in his tensed back and stiff shoulders, she could tell. She could not see his eyes, but she knew they would be bulging out of their sockets the way they tended to do when he was madder than mad, which was any time he did not get his way. According to her step-father, life was out to get him and things never went his way, so he was mad a lot.

Her mother was on the other side of the table. Leaning against the countertop behind her, her left arm was bent back and propped casually on the peeling brown laminate. Her right arm was held up in front of her, moving only when she brought the cigarette she held in her hand to her mouth. This was her mother’s usual stance in the kitchen. Faith would have mistaken her mother for almost calm if it wasn’t for her eyes glaring at Faith’s step-father. Her mother’s eyes seared through the unmoving figure at the table as if trying to burn him with pure will.

“Put that damned thing down and get the broom,” her mother said, not looking at Faith who was standing small and silent at the kitchen entrance. “You’re going to clean this up.” She pointed to a mess of broken green glass, still staring down the man at the kitchen table. “And put some shoes on, I can’t afford to take you to the doctor if you get cut.”

                Faith looked hesitantly at her mother. “But Gracie will get hurt if I put her down.” As soon as she said the quiet words, she knew it was a mistake. Her mother’s venom filled eyes finally broke focus on her step-father and snapped towards Faith.

                “You. Fucking .Defiant. Child.” Her voice was clipped and dangerous as she snubbed out her cigarette. “I said clean up the glass, and you’re going to clean it up.” She then lunged towards Faith, grabbing the cat from her daughter’s tight grip.  “The fucking cat can go outside. Maybe she will get hit by a car and then you will learn to do what I tell you to do.” Her mother walked with angrily rigid steps over to the door at the side of the kitchen and effortlessly tossed the cat outside. The cat screeched in shock as its body hit the ground.

                Tears began to betray Faith as she watched Grace scramble to her feet. The door slammed shut as Faith’s voice also betrayed her, “NOOO!”  Her voice husky with tears, she ran to the door begging her mother to let Grace back inside. She knew she shouldn’t, she knew she would get the belt for arguing with her mother, but sometimes Faith felt something come over her and she could not fight against it. Her chest tightened, her body felt stiff and electric and would not listen to her head. Fear of the belt and her parents wrath was not enough to keep her from fighting back, fighting for what she wanted, what she needed. She felt like another girl at times like this, as if she wasn’t herself but just a voice inside someone else, begging her to listen to her mother and not fight back.

                That other girl wasn’t listening to Faith again.

                “Mommy, Mommy, please. Please let Gracie come inside, I don’t want her to get hit,” Faith said, pleading with tears flowing unashamed down her pale face.  She yelled, “Please, Mommy, I’m sorry.” Her voice was high with desperation as her mother blocked the door with her body. Faith pulled unsuccessfully at the door knob, trying with all of her childish might to overpower her mother’s strength.

                Her mother’s hand shot out and caught a handful of Faith’s uncombed hair and yanked her away from the door.  She began to scream back at Faith, “Sorry? You’re sorry? I’ll show you sorry.”

                “No. I will,” said her step-father. Speaking for the first time since Faith had walked into the turbulent kitchen, his voice was too calm, eerie almost. Faith stopped fighting against her mother’s hold and looked towards him.

 Still sitting, he had turned in his chair to watch the scene at the kitchen door. His eyes blazed and his jaw clenched, unclenched, clenched again. His fists around the beer bottle now held in his lap had the same rhythm: clenching and unclenching, clenching again.

“I got this Bill, finish your damn beer and let me take care of it,” Faith’s mother said, her voice spitting with distaste.

Faith watched as her step-father began to shake in anger at her mother’s dismissal of him. She knew it made him mad when her mother didn’t listen to him. He was much scarier than her mother, and he hit harder. The other girl who sometimes over-took Faith’s better sense slowly drained away as Faith quickly moved her head to avoid the beer bottle that had flown from her step-fathers hands.

The bottle had been nearly empty, only a few drops splashed onto Faith’s cheek before it shattered against the wall behind her. Her scalp stung from the hair that had been pulled when she yanked away from the hands still entangled in it.

“I SAID I will,” her step-father bellowed, rising from his chair and knocking it over. He moved towards Faith, she tried to sink away from his grasp but he caught her by the wrist. Where was that other girl now? Why did she only ever appear long enough to get Faith into trouble but was never there to help her get out of it?

 Hatred seeped from her step-father’s pores along with last night’s alcohol. “I’ll show you both sorry,” he said as he tightly squeezed Faith’s arm and jerked her away from Faith’s mother, leaving strands of hair streaming from her empty hand.

                “Ow! Daddy, you’re hurting me,” said Faith. Her voice was still pleading, but weaker, now. Her face was drenched in tears that would not cease. She knew what would come next, what always came next:  (I’ll give you something to cry about) the belt.

                “I’m not your Daddy,” he said. His eyes were bulging out of their sockets farther than Faith had ever seen them bulge before. She had a momentary fear that they would fall out of his head and land right on top of her. Cringing with this thought, she tried to pull away but his hold on her was too tight and she could not escape. “Your daddy didn’t want you or your mother and now I’m stuck with both of you,” he said as he pulled harder on Faith’s arm, moving her farther away from her mother. “Well, now I’m going to show you both how sorry you really are. Sorry little bitches, that’s what you two are.” He began to unbuckle his belt with his free hand.

(Ending available by request.)