As a child my life was full of opportunities to live or die. The immediate choices were often contemplated and weighted against the consequence. I lived a life of fear and consequence; now I live my life and when I find fear, I find a cliff to throw it from.

The familiarity and the fear was all I had day in and day out. My need for consistent and familiar filled my every thought. On the rare occasions that my sister and I talked we would only talk about one thing; how our lives when we grew up were going to be so different. She would talk about loving and protecting her children and I would talk about how my life as a free woman would play out. I would never be tied to one man, I would have my own little apartment in the city and I would feel safe in my own skin. I would be a famous writer or singer and not one person would run my life the way every man ran my mothers life. My sister and I were always in agreement in the back of the car on our Sunday drives; our lives would be so much different when we grow up. Then we would fall back into our separate day dreams, staring out the window on opposite sides of the car while my little sister slept between us.

After three years in our house on Covington Road mom and our step-father found a house in Ridgefield for rent. Our move like so many others was swift but less confusing. Our step fathers dream was to live his life in Ridgefield and as his prisoners we were to move without consultation and with complete disregard for our own lives. We moved at the end of a school year to a dumpy little house on Elm Street. Like so many other moves we packed out things and unpacked our things like robots without complaint and in complete silence. The house had rose bushes in the front yard that seemed a hundred years old. The grass had grown higher that the windows in the front and so our summer was spent working tirelessly to make the house inhabitable. The grass was cut but hand at first until it was low enough to run a mover over the top of the uneven cuts, it took nearly two weeks to finish cutting the grass with a sickle and a hand push mower. Walls were torn out of the inside and 80 year old newspapers were found inside the walls doubling as insulation and a historical reference whenever we could keep shards of them in one piece. Dry-wall was hung, taped and plastered. We never actually attained a real heating system in the house, so the kerosene heaters were found and placed strategically throughout the house for heat as the rainy season approached. Once again we were enrolled in school and we found ourselves again trying to build a life as foreigners.

Ridgefield is the smallest town we had ever lived in, our anonymity was diminishing and I felt that we were being watched and judged around every turn. Friends in high-school were hard to come by but slowly over time we each found a friend to talk to but only at school because friends at home or during the weekend were forbidden by our step father. Friends by any right were forbidden because outsiders threatened our step-fathers hold over us as a family. Our home became our prison and any outside contact was potentially dangerous. He found ways to put us down or find fault in any friends. If I found a friend he found a reason that I shouldn’t hang out with them. Either they were too stupid, a bad influence or they would get me hooked on drugs. Boys were strictly forbidden in any sense. There would be no boyfriends because any contact with a boy would turn us into whores which would eventually lead us into a life on the street selling our asses. Each day our lives were spent in the same way, we would go to school, come home and do our chores – after dinner we would each retreat into our rooms to read, write or paint; anything that was quiet is what we were allowed.

My mothers life was much the same, she would go to work, come home and go to bed only to rise again the next day and do the same. Any contact with my mother was always done in the same way, a quick question on the other side of her bedroom door which was sleepily answered and immediately forgotten. By this time she had retreated to one room and one outside location of our lives. If she wasn’t at work smiling and making strangers happy then she was in her room, reading and sleeping asking one of us to bring her a coke. Hugs and stories from a mother is what others received. Wisdom from an older generation was something I read about in books. Guidance from an elder was only given in the form of viscous words from a step-father; fear and distrust were the only guiding words I ever knew. Comfort and solace came in my dreams, in my poems that I so feverishly wrote in the middle of the night in my room and stuffed under my mattress in a journal.

My resentment was building against him and against the world that let him keep me trapped. My head was only filled with dangerous thoughts, angry visions and a life I could only find a way out of if I died. Every moment of freedom I had to fight for. My step-father and I began a relationship built on physical and mental battles. I would scream for freedom and he would fight me for my soul. My mother never intervened or pleaded on my behalf, whenever I would ask her for her support she would shrug her shoulder and defer all decisions to him. As my soul began slipping away, I began to fight harder and harder against the wardens hold over me.

Everyone knew my step-father was very ill from the heart disease that he didn’t pay any attention too. The arteries in his body were so clogged that his brain and heart couldn’t pump enough oxygen to his vital organs. As he grew weaker I felt myself grow physically stronger and decided I would start fighting for my independence. My mothers only defense against his hold was to wait for him to die. My only defense for my guilt and watching this man wither was to help him when he needed; a classic case of Stockholm Syndrome presided over my captivity.

Another winter came my ability to fight was weakening along with my body. So often I found myself unable to get out of bed because my lungs like my soul were failing me. I would cough so hard my body would quake, I ran a low grade fever almost every night while I cooked, cleaned and took care of my broken family. Soon I was unable and unwilling to eat. My step-father and Mom discussed my decline in health and weight and how they were to get me well. A trip to the doctor shed light on some of my ailments. I had mononucleosis and bronchial pneumonia, my recovery would only come with strict bed rest and they were ordered to find a way to get me to eat.

My warden became my caretaker and this time he had complete control over my days. There were days when sleeping took priority over finding energy to drink the half cup of soup that was brought to me. When I woke up each day I would find a new pack of cigarettes and a cup of coffee waiting for me. A trip to the bathroom would send me into deep slumber for days and I had to make choices between the energy to eat, sleep or go to the bathroom every day as I only had the energy for one of those activities per day.

My step-father would come in and sit on my bed and ask me if I was going to eat today, he would talk about how much school I had missed and the possibility that school was too much for me to do. He thought it was best that I drop out of school and when I felt better, he suggested I get a job with my mom at the store. The only time I saw my mother is when she would come in to bum a cigarette. I would see her pass my bedroom door on the way to the kitchen but she would rarely turn her head to look in on me. I often wondered how long it would take her to realize if I died there. Would I start rotting before she came in to find the state of my body or would she just shut the door and leave me there in that room in darkness all alone for eternity.

The more my step-father talked about me dropping out of school the more I thought about dying, I cut my soup eating down to once every other day and replaced food with cigarettes. The only thing I could feel was the smoke burning my throat and the inside of my lungs – this was the closest I could get to death, I didn’t have the strength to search for a gun or cut my wrists but I knew I could be dead very soon. The thought of death warmed and comforted me when I drifted in and out of sleep day after day. Every day he talked more and more about me leaving school and I had no voice and no strength to fight him.

Slowly over a few weeks, I felt the anger well up inside of me I felt the dam bend and strain against the surge of my emotions. The familiarity of my brother leaving school and me leaving school were frightening. I didn’t want to die my step-fathers prisoner – I needed to live or die very soon. One morning I woke and heard my sisters getting ready for school. I hadn’t been up in three months to wake them or help them find their socks. They were now old enough to dress themselves and no longer required me to wake them or organize them for their day. I thought that this would be the day that I would die.

I rolled over onto my side and waited for it to come, as I rolled over I looked out the window. I truly saw the outside for the first time in three months. I heard him in the front room tell mom that he was going to school to withdraw me and while he was there he might withdraw my sister and enroll her in the GED program at the college. I pushed my blankets aside and got out of bed. As I slowly dressed, my knees shook and my fingers fumbled with the buttons of clothes. Everything I put on was loose on my body, my shoes felt bigger because my feet were thinner than they were three months earlier. I walked into the living room and my step-father stood up and asked me what I was doing. My mother just looked up at me from the couch.
“I’m not dropping out of school – I’m going to school today."
I began to sweat but realized it wasn’t from a fever this time. I was fighting; fighting but very weak and almost whispering but I was fighting for my life. My sisters were standing behind me with their coats on waiting for something else to happen. I turned to look at them and asked them to wait for me for just a moment.

I couldn’t comb my hair or brush my teeth I just needed to find my coat. My step-father said he would give us a ride up because he wanted to talk to the principal and take me out of school.
“I’ll drive you up, you‘ll have to clean your locker out today!" He said it gently without asking me just telling me I was done.

“I’m going to school, I will walk to the bus- stop with my sister – I’m not quitting, I need to finish." I whispered back to him but a little louder.

I stood a little straighter and willed the sweat to quit beading up around my forehead.
I didn’t wait for him to respond and I didn’t wait for him to deny me the rest of my life. I slowly walked out of the house and to the bus stop. The stop was only four blocks from our house but it felt like ten miles. I walked slow but I walked straight only stopping to catch my breath. I saw my friends there a couple of blocks away from me and it looked like a finish line and I was winning the race. I saw the yellow bus coming up the road and was too afraid to miss it, I started running.

“I don’t want to miss it! C’mon, it’s coming!"
My sister ran a little beside me and told me that the driver would wait until I got there. I boarded the bus and saw everyone’s face as they looked at me. My curly hair had frizzed, my frame had shrunk, my eyes were hallow and my breath was rough. That first day back at school was freedom again, I knew I had to go – I knew he wasn’t taking my life, I would have died there on this day if I didn’t get out of bed.

My days after became a constant battle of will with my step-father. I began to fight back and fight for every breath and every moment I spent on my own. As I watched my mother disappear into her world I wanted mine to open up and I wanted out of this one. I fought for friends and I fought for time to talk on the phone. Our daily battles were expected and dreaded. He would take up his stance and I would take up mine. My frame had only built itself back up to 100 pounds but I knew I was strong and I had survived so much already. I weighed every opportunity with him knowing that he was growing weaker every day and as he grew weak I grew strong. He would scream and I would scream louder back at him and as he would raise his hand to hit me, I would warn him very quietly.
“You may be stronger but I’m younger, you may win but I’m taking a chunk of your ass with me."

Soon after we started doing battle throughout the house, my mother would get up from the couch and usher my sisters out of the house.
“Here they go again."

She would sigh and grab the car keys and the three of them would leave. He and I would fight until one of us grew tired or one of us gave up. I would sometimes run to the wildlife refuge close to our house from his assaults; wounded but empowered. I wandered through the forest and down the railroad tracks. I always came back late after the sun had gone down and my mother would be waiting on the couch for me and my step-father would have gone to sleep, exhausted from the fighting.
“Did you win?" she would ask simply.
“Not yet" was all I would say in reply. I would go into my room and shut the door to paint my dark mood and circumstance onto a canvas. I felt alone but I felt like I was going to win one day.

Six months later…

My mother, sisters and myself left to go visit Lee in the hospital. He was still in intensive care but she said he had requested to see us as soon as possible. We left for the hospital in a strange rush, after one day of freedom I found it strange that we were rushing to see our prison warden. We arrived at the hospital and we were guided to the intensive care unit by a nurse in green scrubs and a mask around her neck. She prepared us for his condition, she explained that he will have a tube down his throat and that he would not be able to talk to us but we were encouraged to talk to him. We were ushered behind a curtain and she announced our arrival to Lee, he turned his head slightly and I met his gaze.
His face was pale and his gray thinning hair looked stringy and dirty. He reached for my hand and I held it for a moment before he let go and motioned for something to write with. I dug through my purse as my mother looked for a pen. I held it out to him and he shook his head no, his face turned slightly red and he looked like he was in pain. His eyes stared directly into mine and I recognize the look of anger from our countless fights. I didn’t understand what he was motioning for and I asked him louder, “what do you want, I don’t understand?"

His face screwed up again and he dropped his hand in exasperation, I searched his face for some sort of recognition but I found nothing I could recognize or interpret. I watched his mouth slowly open and his hand reached toward his chest – he no longer looked angry he was panicking; I saw small drops of blood begin to appear over the sheet that covered his chest. I stood in front of him and watched his eyes as he realized the pain in his chest and Lee and I together realized that this is the moment of his death. His rage had gotten the best of him and he knew that he was going to lose the fight he tried to start with me. I looked deep into his eyes as he faded, I didn’t move when the alarms went off on the machines surrounding his bed and I didn’t notice when all the doctors and nurses scrambled into the room to try and save his life. I woke when I was shoved to the side and hurried out of the intensive care unit.

I looked up and saw my mother and sisters crying. I reached up to my face and found no tears streaming down my cheeks; I slid my hand down to my neck and checked my pulse to make sure I was still alive, something I started doing on a regular basis over the last few months. The doctor came into the room and sat down next to my mother, he explained that my step-fathers blood pressure rose suddenly and the grafts on his heart valves were too weak to take the pressure, quickly one after the other, four of his grafts gave way and he bled to death inside his own chest.

It wasn’t until many years later, countless hours of therapy that I realized I won. I’ve been throwing my fear off cliffs and learning to fly ever since.