The alarm wasn’t supposed to go off yet.&nbsp;I looked at the clock on the kitchen wall and felt the colour drain from my cheeks. Thy alarm from upstairs had been turned off and I could hear him moving about. “No no no.” I whispered angrily to myself. I had taken too long and been too slow, but there was still hope. I placed the contents of my hands into the open backpack that was resting on the kitchen island. I bent down to pull my trainers on and gasped at the pain. I was sure my ribs were broken. I couldn’t stop to catch my breath. It was now or never. I pulled the backpack onto my right shoulder, opposite my aching side. I could feel the tears prickling in my eyes. With a deep breath, I moved towards the door grabbing the car keys off their hook. I stood with my hand on the door handle. I froze. I couldn’t do it. He would kill me if he found me. I placed my spare hand on my flat stomach. But I must do better this time. He cannot find me. I heard the shower start upstairs. I took a deep breath and tugged on the handle. The door opened and I stepped outside to new hopes and dreams. A new me.I’d been driving for a couple of hours before I needed to pull over for a break. I’d been feeling sick since the beating. A mixture of nerves and fear, and you.The service station was still fairly quiet. I browsed the snack section of WH Smiths, picking up sandwiches, water, and salt and vinegar crisps. Just before I got to the till, I grabbed a pack of ginger biscuits for the journey too. The young girl scanning my items kept staring at my bruised face. I found myself smiling the same old smile and using the same lame excuses that I always had made. The same excuses that my parents had argued with me over until I couldn’t bring myself to call them anymore. The same excuses that my friends had rolled their eyes at and caused them to slowly stop talking to me. I ate my sandwich back in the safety of my car, looking out over the dreary carpark of the motorway service station. My sickness was ebbing away with something in my stomach. I sighed as I placed the empty packaging on the passenger seat. I checked my bruises in the rear view mirror.“You should be dead,” I told my reflection. I was in a sorry state. The whole left side of my face was a colourful mixture of purple and red. My bottom lip was split open, the blood crusting in a straight line from top to bottom. My eyebrow was also sporting a fresh scab where it had been split open as I had fallen onto the coffee table. I tried to crack a smile, the irony of my split head actually coming from a fall. Finally, the lie had become the truth. Well, part truth. The rest of the bruising was from his fist, of course. I tried to gently stretch my side. It was painful and I screwed my face up trying not to cry out. I touched the tender area that had taken the full force of his shoe, and I completely broke down. I let the tears that I had been holding on to for hours, flow freely down my battered face. I cried for the pain of my broken body, I cried for my broken mind. I cried for the people I had lost. I cried for myself.&nbsp;I must have cried for thirty minutes or more. I cried until I had nothing left. I was spent. My ribs were hurting even more than before. I drank all my water in my mad rush of thirst. I was ready to hit the road again. I needed to put as much distance as I could between him and me.It was around lunchtime when I needed to stop again. I was feeling tired. I had lain awake most of the night. Mainly because I was in too much pain to rest. My newly beaten face had been throbbing and I was trying desperately to alternate the ice packs I was using to curb the swelling. Then when pure exhaustion should have kicked in, I was formulating my plan. The realisation that I needed to just walk out of the door and leave with whatever I could carry, came on strong. This time I had more motivation and determination. I had a strength growing inside of me. So, I had prepared my clothes, found an old rucksack, and sat waiting ready on the sofa. I thought I had given myself more time, but his damn alarm had gone off. However, I had all I needed. I allowed myself a nap in the car park of the fast-food restaurant. I had checked the car was locked three times before I curled up in the back seat, the tinted windows keeping me safe from prying eyes. Once my watch alarm sounded and I remembered where I was and what I was doing, I turned my phone on. There were fourteen missed calls and thirty six WhatsApp messages. I didn’t even want to open them. I also had a few SMS messages informing me of my numerous voicemails and finally that my voicemail was full. I turned it straight off. I didn’t want any contact. He couldn’t find me, he couldn’t find us. I had to do better this time and keep you safe. I couldn’t fail you like I had failed your brother. I remember the hard kick to my stomach over a year ago. The kick that had started the bleeding. At that time, I hated myself more than anything in the world. I was a complete and utter failure. As I sat on the bathroom floor feeling the life leave my body, I had even laughed at myself. A witch’s cackle had escaped my mouth knowing that from that moment I deserved every single thing that would be thrown at me. I let out otherworldly sounds thinking of the girl who had told her teachers at school she wanted to travel the world as an environmental scientist, I felt like that was another life, a different me. I was on the bathroom floor losing blood, not even capable of protecting the life I was creating. I never thought I would come back from that moment. I had decided, right then, that I was worthless, a failure. I had let this happen. From that day, I never fought back. I lay there and took every punch, every kick, and I enjoyed the physical torture. It was the only thing that made me feel something. Until eleven days ago. I woke up and felt sick. I hadn’t felt anything for twelve months and twenty-four days. But I felt sick. I had no idea that my period was late. I hadn’t been tracking them. From that moment I knew I must do better this time. I started staying out of his way. I was cooking all his favourite meals. Anything to keep him in a good mood. It was going well. But last night he drank too much with the curry I had prepared. He started to question why I seemed to be changing this last week. Why I was being distant. The irony. I felt like I had been coming round from a twelve-month coma. Nothing I said could have stopped him. As I lay there, feeling his shoe run into my ribs all I could think of was you. You didn’t deserve this. You needed to survive for your brother, yourself, and for me. You had been pulling me back to life. I couldn’t die with you. The afternoon was long and miserable. The rain was beating against the road, yet I kept putting miles between my life and me. I had no idea where I was going to go. I kept thinking about ringing my parents. The last time we had spoken, seven months ago, did not go well. My mum had been sobbing and my dad shouting. I had felt nothing after my dad had told me not to call again after I had refused their offer to return home and escape my marriage. When I stopped at the next service station, I had decided that I would call them tomorrow from a payphone. It was mid-afternoon and I knew I needed to find somewhere to spend the night. So, I brought a map and marked where I was, and I decided I could go one more hour before needed to call it a day. The weather was getting worse, and it felt like it was night even though my watch only read 3pm. I couldn’t chance opening my phone for Google Maps, so I marked on the map where there was another service station about an hours drive away with a premier inn. I had enough cash on me for a nights stay and breakfast. Then I would call my parents. Hoping more than anything I had not completely ruined everything. I couldn’t even bring myself to think what I would do if they turned me away. I got back in my car after another coffee and sandwich and set off into the worsening storm. These fifty miles would take me slightly longer than the previous two hundred, but I was still moving away from him. My window wipers were on the fastest setting, but I was struggling to see the road. I was slightly panicked now. I needed to find somewhere to stop but I had no idea where I was. My lights were on even though it was only 4.30 in the afternoon. The roads were eerily quiet and devoid of other cars. I had pulled off the motorway, trying my best to follow the map to where I thought the premier inn was. I knew deep down that I had made a wrong turn. Just as I debated turning around and heading back towards the motorway, the lightning and thunder started. My stomach started to churn. An uneasy feeling was passing over me, something very different from how I had felt this past week. I was in a built-up area. I had no idea if it was a town or a city. My map was useless to me, I was totally lost. I decided to pull over between two parked cars. The rain was so heavy that I couldn’t even see the houses past the curb. I checked that my car was locked, and I waited. My watch read 4.38. When I opened my eyes, the rain was still beating down, but the storm had definitely passed. It took me a while to realise where I was. I had fallen asleep in the driver’s seat of my car. I looked in the passenger seat where I saw the open map and the receipt from the service station I had bought it from. I let out a sweet sigh knowing I was over two hundred miles from him. I looked down at my watch, it was 5.53. I had slept for just over an hour. The light entering my car was promising the storm was over and I could now return to my journey. I needed to figure out where I was so I could get back on track. I looked out of the window and for a moment saw my house. I closed my eyes and shook my head. My exhaustion was playing with me. I took a deep breath and looked again. Sure enough, I was parked right next to my house. My neighbour’s car was in front of me. I could feel the bile rising. My body started to tremble. I grabbed the receipt off the seat, it was from a service station in Darlington with a time stamp of 2.48, I should have been in Middlesborough right now, not back in Oxford. I threw the receipt down and tried starting the car, my hands were shaking. My breath was coming in short bursts. I could feel tears leaking from my eyes. “No, no no.” I kept saying to myself. Just as I got the engine to start my heart stopped.There he was walking across the front garden with his golfing umbrella. He was looking straight at me shouting words I couldn’t hear. He was looking so angry. I couldn’t move. He should be over two hundred miles away. I felt my soul leave my body and I watched myself turn off the engine of the car and pull the handbrake up. I watched, helpless, as I undid my seatbelt and then quickly hid the map and receipt under the passenger seat. I tried to scream at myself as I witnessed my hand reach for the door handle and pull it, to open the door. I was powerless as my body left the car and walked as fast as my ribs would allow me to join him under the huge black umbrella. As I watched him lead me back into the house, I saw him squeeze my arm hard enough it should have pulled me right back into myself. But as the door of the house closed behind me, I knew then nothing would pull my spirit back into my body. My spirit died and I condemned you to death, the moment he shut the door. &nbsp;&nbsp;

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The Escape

Vtorieden

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The Escape

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Natalie Stafford

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