/ take your freedom .

[ryleigh valmont .]

what she was thinking, ryleigh didn't know. she was going to go spend the night at her best friend, aspen van duzen's house, without asking her father. she didn't ask him because she knew he'd say no. the only way to get what you wanted with christopher valmont was to go against his wishes. and that was how ryleigh killed her mother. no, ryleigh didn’t actually kill her mother, but she felt she did. she felt it was her fault - mostly because her father would tell her over and over that it was, that she tore the family apart and killed her own mother. and now, her mother wasn't here to protect her.

there was a dance competition a few towns away, and ryleigh really wanted to go. she loved to dance, since she was young, and her mother approved of it - mostly because she danced when she was younger, and she missed it still. ryleigh asked her father if she could go, and he said no. he said his daughter wasn't going to waste her time dancing when she could be doing something that could get her somewhere in life. her father said no, but from the way her mother said 'alright' when he said she couldn't go, ryleigh knew she was going to that tournament. she knew her mother well enough to know when she had a plan. so the two left while christopher was at work, and they drove down to the dance competition. ryleigh placed second in it, and her mother was proud, just as she was of herself. they drove home then, knowing he was going to beat them for disobeying him, but still hoping they'd get back before he got off work. of course, they didn't talk about this. they never talked about it. when it was ryleigh and her mother, it was just like any mother and daughter. ryleigh loved her mother, and though she missed her terribly, there was one reason ryleigh was glad her mother wasn't alive anymore - and that was that she wouldn't have to deal with christopher anymore.

driving home, ryleigh's mother didn't see it. ryleigh did. actually, all ryleigh saw was the truck's headlights. she didn't see the car, or the person driving it. the drunk seventeen year old boy who made the biggest mistake of his life on that night. the fact that he almost killed a sixteen year old and left her without her mother probably still haunted him today. the headlights flashed into the car, flooding it with a white light. ryleigh was looking toward her mother, and the oncoming vehicle through her window. the last thing she saw was her mother's face. and then, she was waking up in the hospital. her father was sitting in one of the three waiting chairs on the far side of the room, his hands folded in his lap and his head resting against the wall, sleeping. she didn't remember what happened at first, and then it all came rushing back to her, and she started screaming and bawling. a nurse came in , thinking she was hurt. her father awoke. two days later, she walked out of that hospital, with her father's hand on her back, pushing her along toward the car. she looked every nurse, every doctor, every person she passed on her way out, begging them not to let her go with him. but it's hard to say something without actually speaking.

ryleigh sat on her bed, her laptop sitting in front of her. she signed out of the chatroom after aspen told her she'd be there to pick her up soon. she shut down her laptop and closed it, then slid to the edge of her bed. she bent down, touching her fingers to the cold, hardwood floor, and slid her laptop under her bed. she always put it under there, she wasn't sure why actually. she was afraid her father would read through her instant messages and such, as he had before. she slid off of her bed, hesitantly touching the tips of her toes to the floor. she stepped down onto it and felt the coolness that was held in the wood floors flush into her feet. if you wanted to be scientific about it, the heat was actually being taken from her feet and pulled into the wood, because cold is the absence of energy. but who likes to be scientific about things ?

she made her way across her bedroom and to her closet, where she opened the sliding doors and looked through her clothes quickly. she didn't know what to wear, exactly, but she decided on dark wash jeans and a navy blue short sleeve v neck. she didn't usually where any clothes that showed much skin anymore. her arms, she couldn't show really. she had bruises on them still, but it had been only yesterday she had 'fallen off the roof' she decided it made some sense, mostly because they'd been talking about if her father had infrared sensors on her roof - he had to know she snuck out somehow. but she hadn't fallen off the roof. she'd barely gone onto it just by her window sill still, looking for the sensors, and her father had pulled into the driveway. she knew she was fucked, so she went back inside and into her bedroom, laying down on her bed and hoping for the best. he came in pissed as every and yelled at her for sneaking out again, even though that wasn't what she was doing. it probably did look a little suspicious. he beat her, and she did nothing, as always. late that night, or rather, early the next morning, he came into her bedroom, and raped her, as he had done many nights before. she pretended to be asleep, she pretended she was somewhere else, like she always did.

she grabbed her bag - a purse , and put a pair of pair sweat pants into them, and a t-shirt, which was really all she could do before she heard a honk in the driveway. she decided it was good enough, grabbed her cell phone from her bed and stuffed it into the back pocket of her jeans. she tried to clear her mind as she left her bedroom, shutting the door behind her. she walked down the dark hallway of the second floor. she made her way down the staircase, placing her fingertips on the coffee table that was against the wall with framed family pictures. one lay face down, the glass broken - ryleigh hadn't cleaned it up yet. she lifted it up, looking at it for a moment. a few pieces of glass fell from the frame as she did so. the picture was of ryleigh and her mother, at the beach. ryleigh was about seven years old or so, her mother's arms were wrapped around her daughter's waist with her chin rested on ryleigh's shoulder, smiling brightly. ryleigh forced a small smile, thinking it'd make her feel better, though tears were already forming in her eyes. she placed the picture face down again, looking away from it. she remembered why it was broken. her father had pushed her against the coffee table and most of the pictures had fallen flat on the table when she ran into it. but that one had fallen to the ground, the glass shattered all over the hard wood floor in the living room. it cut her father's yelling off and he became quiet. all ryleigh could hear was her uneven breaths. she swallowed, still leaning against the table and wall. her eyes were locked on the faces of her mother and herself smiling happily. she blinked her eyes and looked up at her father, who was also staring at the picture. he then whipped his head up, his face angry once again. 'god dammit ryleigh!' he exclaimed, grabbing a picture frame from the table and holding it up, 'look what you've done!' and he smacked her with the picture frame. ryleigh fell to the ground along with the picture this time, and she just cried.

ryleigh pulled her puma sneakers on, the laces already tied as loose as they could be. the ends of her jeans fell over her shoes as she stood again, reaching for the door knob and turning it. she pulled the door open and saw aspen in her car, and she walked over, forcing a smile on her face. it hurt her lips to smile, that was one reason she didn't do it much anymore. she didn't have the energy to smile anymore, to be honest. she didn't sleep - she couldn't sleep, ever. she'd lay awake at night, wondering if tonight was going to be a night her father came into her bedroom or not. she was paranoid. she was paranoid everyone wanted to hurt her, that everything bad that could happen, would happen. as ryleigh forced her lips to come up over her teeth in a smile, her dry, tight lips cracked painfully. her face was still bad. not as bad as it had been before, but it didn't look normal. she had a bruise that was fading on her upper cheek, near her cheekbone. the most obvious were finger marks on her neck, and it was obvious what they were. it wasn't possible to get those kind of bruises from falling down the stairs, or off the roof - whatever. she had bruises here and there all over her body, and it had gotten to the point that she'd see a new one and not know where it had come from.

ryleigh buckled herself into the passenger seat, still smiling. it hurt her shoulder a bit to turn and buckle it. she really though she had dislocated it. or rather, her father had. it hurt a lot, but there really was nothing that could be done about a dislocation. of course, popping it back in place. but she'd tried that, and it still hurt. she placed her bag at her feet and let out a sigh as she set her hands in her lap, looking out the window and watched the scenery as they sped past all of it. once at aspen's house, she walked in behind her best friend and shut the door behind her. she slipped her shoes off easily, as they were lose enough to basically just step out of them.

----- status - donee.
----- tagged - kelllllllay my loverrrr.
----- words - 1822 .
----- outfit - this with bruises & minus the sunglasses.
----- music - save you by kelly clarkson.
----- notes - this is really crappy, i’m sorrrry. & i just kind of skipped the car ride ? hope that's okkay !

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