The Priest

*You might want to read this if you want this post to make any sense

     As a kid I was passed from orphanage to orphanage to "safe home" to "safe home". I gave up hope that I would be adopted by the time I was 7, nobody wants a child older than 5. I used to write stories about myself living with my parents, going out to get ice cream and going to the park. I used to watch other kids with their families when my orphanages went on field trips instead of playing with the other kids. I'm not even going to lie, I still instantly get jealous and bitter when I see someone out with their mum or dad.

    Every time I went to a safe home I was ecstatic. They were always temporary, but I imagined my new "parents" would really like me and would want to permanently adopt me. Of course, that was never the case. I was always their slave or "doll". They would break my bones for fun, lock me in rooms for days on end, or rip off my nails among other things. Anything to make me scream.

    I never had any freedom. I didn't go to a shopping centre until I was 18, I didn't go to parks, I was never really allowed off the property. Orphanages always had high walls surrounding the property, which I would often fantasise about climbing over and escaping. Sometimes we would go for walks into town, those were my favourite days. In boarding school we weren't allowed off of school property. Safe homes were often in remote areas, so I didn't see anything other than trees, most of the time I wasn't allowed outside though.

    I was always labelled as a problem child, I would scream in my sleep, refuse to speak or shake too much to eat, and everyone would think I was doing it to cause problems. When I was taken out of safe homes, I wouldn't tell anyone what they had done to me. The people I was living with would often say I jumped off a roof and broke my bones, punched myself in the face or ripped out my own teeth. This meant I wasn't eligible for the good safe homes, nobody even wanted to look at me.

    That's why I was excited when I found out my next safe home would be with a priest. I've always been a Catholic, I believed that God was finally coming to save  me. Everyone in the orphanage was jealous of me, they all thought this was it for me, I was going to be free.

     I was flown to Vienna Austria and taken to a train station, where I was to meet the priest. When I first met him he was in robes and instantly took my hand, blessing me. He just dragged me to the train, leaving my luggage behind. I didn't really care to be honest, I only owned about two outfits and a book. On the train trip to Klagenfurt he instructed me not to talk, he had a massive headache and didn't want to deal with me. He rested his hand on my lap...which made me extremely uncomfortable, but I was happy to just look out the train window at all the passing towns. 

 

    When we got to Klagenfurt he immediately took me to his home. It was far away from the actual city, deep in the woods. Looking back, his house was a nightmare. It was made with rotting wood, it was leaning to one side and a window was even cracked. It was very dark inside, mostly lit with candles. All the furniture was dark and wooden, making it even more difficult to see. The sink in the kitchen was cracked with black..."sludge" lining it. He never really said anything to me. He just smiled and kept touching my shoulder or my back, laughing to himself. 

 

   He took me up to my room immediately. I was careful when walking up the stairs, fearing that I'd fall through...the house looked like it could fall apart at any second. He brought me into a closet, and removed one of the walls to reveal a set of stairs. It led to a small room, only with a mattress on the ground, a closet, a night table and a small window that I couldn't reach. He just "welcome home" and slammed the door shut, locking it behind him.  

 

    There were scratch marks all over the room, tallies on the wall, a black mark on the closet floor and pages ripped out from the bible left in the room. I wasn't really concerned, this was pretty normal for me at this point. 

  

  He left me in the room until the next morning. I was brought down for breakfast that morning. It was incredible, he made plates and plates of food for me. He told me if I was good, good things would happen. If I didn't cooperate...I wouldn't be happy.

   

 For the first week he kept me in my room 23 hours of the day, only being let out to eat. For the first little while he would cook for me...then it evolved into my usual of dry bread mixed with sawdust. There wasn't really anything to do in the room. I just sat and counted the floorboards, or climbed to look out the window that didn't reveal much, just the forest. It was agonizingly boring, and I couldn't fall asleep at night because I wasn't being stimulated throughout the day. 

 

   After the first week he stopped letting me out all together. For the next three weeks he just slid my food underneath the door. I got so bored that I started to lose my mind, cutting myself so I could use my blood to draw on the walls. I didn't shower, I had nothing to eat but grains and all I had was myself. The room was cold and I didn't have a blanket so I got extremely sick. If I fell asleep I would wake up to him staring at me. 

 

    During the last of the three weeks he stopped bringing me food or water. I could barely function. Standing up was impossible and I could feel my body shutting down. I would drink the raindrops that leaked in when it rained to keep myself alive.  

 

     Finally I woke up to a small shot glass with a clear liquid in it. I used all my energy to run towards it and drink it as fast as I could. As soon as I swallowed I realised I had made a huge mistake, it was bleach. 

 

     I don't remember much after I drank it. I remember blood, burning and spinning. I woke up in a hospital with my throat burnt to shreds so I couldn't talk. I had massive burns on my tongue and in my mouth which made it almost unbearable to swallow or even breathe. The priest told the doctors that I had run away, which explained my huge weight loss and sickness, and that I had tried to kill myself by swallowing bleach. Of course the doctors believed him, he was a priest, so why would he lie? It wouldn't have been my first suicide attempt or uncommon for an orphan to attempt suicide, so it was believable. He brought me home two days later, claiming that modern medicine was useless and that only God could help me. The hospital allowed it. 

 

     When we got back to his house he started a fire, only to put iron poles in it and beat me with them, branding me. He told me that I was an idiot for drinking it, I was an idiot for not eating or drinking (not that I had a choice) and that he would make sure that I never spoke again. He thought I was the son of the devil, and he had to fix it.

 

 

    *I'll post the rest of this later, I can't really figure out how to keep it...not...disturbing?