13
I count the tallies on the closet wall. I am now up to 13. This will be 13 days in the cold, 13 days without food, and 13 days locked in this closet. I slowly lift my boney finger to scratch in tally number fourteen. My name is Tresen Gram, and I am nine years old. I have a mom who is a doctor and one brother named Michael Ritch. He is the golden child. Mom once said to Michael Ritch that his father is a big lawyer in a giant city. I think we have the same dad so that must be what my dad is like.
I am confined to this small room because I was bad. I did not wash, dry, polish and put away every tarnished dish that was left for me. I knew that if I didn’t clean all the containers just the way that she wanted, something I did not want to happen would happen, and who knows if this time I will make it out of her “fun.” Every day I was to wake up and dress myself in the old t-shirt and jeans that Mom gave me when I was six. Then, I was to take the garbage out, clean the dishes that Michael Ritch and mom used for breakfast. I was not to nibble on anything that they may have left on their plate, unless I was told otherwise. I was never able to eat the scraps of breakfast. I was then supposed to run the 13 miles to school, and I was not to be late. After school was done, I bolted the 13 miles back to my household and was to tidy the house and cook whatever mom wanted for supper. I then scrub those dishes until they sparkled like the crystal blue of mom’s eyes. If I have done everything right from the moment I woke up until the moment before I was to go to sleep in my little corner of the kitchen, I got to eat the scraps of what Michael Ritch had left un-eaten on his plate. Usually, he did not have any oddments for me.
Michael Ritch never does anything bad. He never has to do the dishes, or cook the family meal, or run to school, he is a golden child. I wish I could be like Michael Ritch!





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Once I was forced into our bath to sit in scorching water for two hours. In those two hours, I memorized everything about that bathroom. From the baby blue wall paper to the light brown wooden floors, from the picture of Michel Ritch and mom on the wall above the sink to the mirror which I could see myself in. My skin had turned the color of a freshly picked tomato. By the time Mom came to let me out of the now-cool water, I could no longer feel the touch of her tough coarse fingers on my shoulder. All I felt was pain as she squeezed harder and harder into my bone. It was as though my skin had all fallen off and all that was left was bare skin.



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“G!” Mom screams at me. She never calls me Gram, or Tresen. She may have forgotten my name, or maybe she doesn’t like it anymore. It’s been so long since she has labeled me Tresen Gram. At one point, I had even forgotten my own name. It was on the tip of my tongue, but I could not bring myself to say it. My teacher once told me that parents name their children something that means a lot to them or that means something. I don’t think my name means anything. I think mom just named me something random.
Today is my lucky day. I get to come out of the closet after being in there 13-and-a-half days. I slowly stand up, knowing if I get up too quickly that my legs will cramp and pain will shoot from my feet to my belly. Slowly, I turn the brass door knob, hoping she is not behind the door to hit me or push me back in. Mom likes to do that sometimes. She lets me get my hopes up and then watches them all crash down on me like a rock slide. I stumble down the hall to the kitchen where Mom is sitting in her favorite orange chair with the television on some gospel station that was preaching that everyone could be saved.
As I look around, everything is the same. The floor is still the blocks of tile in an off -white color. The counters still go along all the walls with a grass green color on it, and upon the counters are dirty dishes. The kitchen table still has a pile of papers that mom always screams at and throws around saying that she hates “them” and that they need to stop sending all the bills because she can’t pay them now. I don’t know what bills are or who “they” are, but they do not sound like I would ever want to meet them.
“G, clean the dishes! You have one hour to finish, and, if you don’t, you know what can happen,” she quickly barks out to me. I tread over to the sink and fill it with hot water. As the water runs, I remember the time Mom held my head under the dish water.

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The water filled every crevice of my face with scorching heat. Her grip was so tight on my neck, the nails of her strong hand digging into my flesh forced me to yell with all my might. I know I wasn’t supposed to breathe the water in, but I couldn’t stop myself from doing it. With the sting of water in my lungs, I jolt open my head. The soap sends sharp stings to the back of my eyes, and all I see is the orange-brown color of the water with floating bits of the leftover food from that night’s supper. Then, it all fades into one tan mess.



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I snap back and luckily I do, or the sink would have ran over with water, and I don’t want to know what Mom would have done with me if that would have happened. I start washing the dishes, when I get the sudden urge to look at the clock. I don’t know what made me do that. I can’t even read a timekeeper. Maybe I thought I would know how long an hour was, so I would know how fast I had to wash the pots. Maybe time froze, and I would be able to run away, far away, to a place where everyone loved me, and I was not punished for doing something’s wrong. I pictured somewhere beautiful, with a park, and lots of food. But, nothing happened. I just saw symbols on a disk, on the blue wall of our living room. I quickly wipe off the dishes, dried them, and put them away. I must have done it before an hour was up because when I was done, Mom did not make me go back to that dark place where all the fuzz from the coats made it hard to breathe.
Instead, she makes me take out the garbage that had piled up in one corner to the point that you wouldn’t even know there was a trash can under all the boxes, cans, cigarette butts, and half-eaten food. I start to bag up the pile, slowly enough so that I can eat a little bit of the leftover food. I was so thankful that someone didn’t finish their sandwich. Half of it was left in the trash can. Ham and lettuce, a little butter and mayo and two slices of cheese! I slowly picked it up and scarfed it down in three bites. The bread was stale, and the ham had dried out, but it felt amazing to have food in my stomach. I ate it in such a rapid pass that I don’t even think mom heard me moaning on the meat and cheese combination. By the time that I got done a picking up all the debris, I have a total of three sacks to bring to the garage, where the dumpster is. I take all of them at once, knowing that if I leave one behind to come back and get, I will be hit. I slowly walk down the 13 steps to the cement floor of the garage. I make my way to the giant box, slowly and carefully lift each bag and give a big thrust over the side to make sure it lands inside on the others. Feeling satisfied that I had not dropped one single crumb on my trek, I quickly turn around to make my way back to the door. Mom is standing behind me and starts to hit me with her cold hard hands. Soon, I am on the ground, and I can feel the blood trickling down the right side of my face from a gash above my eye where Mom’s wedding ring hit my face in just a way that is was able to cut me.
“I know you ate the food in the trash, you rotten child!” She kicks me one more time and walks away giving me “the speech.” “You know you can be a good kid. You would not have to be punished if you just did everything like you are supposed to. Why can’t you be good like your brother Michael Ritch? He is a perfect child and has so many friends. You are worthless and can’t do anything right. That is why you are imprisoned.” I count the thumps of her feet on the stairs. Step one, “You will be sleeping in the garage tonight,” step two, “You will learn,” step three, “You do as you are told,” step four, “Goodnight sweetie.” When I awoke, I was lying in a puddle of my own urine, and dried blood covered my face. I remember her saying, “Goodnight sweetie” to me. I rage with anger knowing that she really did not care if I were to die on the cold, bare cement floor as she went back inside to a nice warm bed.
It was a Monday morning. I was to go to school. I clean myself up as much as I can before I have to finish dishes. There are more than usual. Mom had made Michael Ritch pancakes for breakfast. I quickly washed them and took the trash out. Mom and Michael Ritch were already gone, and I was left to run the ten miles. I start my run, out the drive way, a left on, 47th Street, then a right to Green Avenue. After that, I take a right on to Main Street, and, finally, I take a left to Holden Street. Holden is my Great Grandpa’s name, or that is what I am told in school. He was a president of something or another. When I tried to ask Mom about it, she slapped me and told me to never speak out of turn. I didn’t know what to do, so I hesitantly raised my hand like we have to do during school, but she slapped me again. I don’t ask any questions at home. I don’t speak at home at all knowing that if I do I will pay for it. If I’m not heard, maybe she will forget about me and not punish me.
The school day goes by slowly, and I don’t pay attention in any of my classes. Mom told me as long as I do not raise my hand and I do nothing wrong, there is no reason for me to have to speak. That way there would be no reason for them to ask me questions or for them to call her questioning her. Mom said I would go in the closet and never come out again if she would ever get a call from the school asking her questions about my cuts and bruises. She always said to tell them I fell down or hit myself on something.
School is finally over, and I start my way home. On my way home, I notice a dog. It’s a cute little one with short brown fur and deep dreamy brown eyes. I dream of having a dog sometimes, but I know Mom won’t let me have one. As I turn the corner of the street to my house, I see that Mom is home. This is not good. I am never to be home after Mom, and the house is supposed to be clean by the time she gets home. That dog must have made me stop and look at it, and now I am going to learn to never dream again. I slowly creep open the front door, and before I can even get all the way in, she grabs my arm and pulls me in. With a quick and slight movement of her foot, she slams the door closed. She drags me to the kitchen and sits me in what seemed to be the hardest chair ever. I know something bad is going to happen to me. I just don’t know what yet. Mom’s footsteps seem as heavy as a brick on the floor as she walks to the kitchen drawers. She opens the spoon drawer, then the drawer with all the towels, then the pots and pans but quickly slams them shut. She slowly opens the knife drawer and ponders the entire collection of silver shining inside. She turns away empty handed, but leaves the drawer open and walks to me with a smirk on her face and a glow in those blue eyes. She grabs the table cloth off and slowly starts to circle me. I can see that she was thinking out a plan and had to figure out just the right way to make me understand that I had done wrong. I start counting steps to calm my nerves. Mom likes when I get scared. It makes her feel in power and that I will feel more pain if I am freaking out. I get up to 13 and all goes black. I feel her pulling the cloth tighter around my head. I hear her walking away from me quickly. I breathe in and out slowly to keep the air in my lungs. Who knows what will happen next, and, if she covers my mouth, I need to have air in my lungs to stay conscious as long as I can. If I pass out, I wake up not knowing what happened to me while I was out. I listen for mother’s footsteps, but it seems like they have disappeared. Maybe she is just letting me sit here for a while. I tell myself this over and over again. She is just going to let me sit here; she is only making me wait it out. I feel the sharp end of a knife breaking through the skin on right my arm. One cut, and my blood starts to flow from my veins to the ground below me. Cut number three, four and five happen so swift, I barely feel them piercing the thin layer of skin of my stomach. Cut six is slow and deep, another one to the arm. Cuts seven, eight, nine, ten, and eleven, are all across my legs. Cut twelve takes long to feel, like she could not find any space left that was not covered yet and needed a clean slate to write the story of my wrongs. I can see all the blood, in my mind, running from the cuts on my body onto the off-white floor, looking like someone had just spilled the entire pitcher of cherry juice. I drift in and out of life. Cut 13 is to my face. She slowly giggles as she presses the blade to my cut, ripping it open. I no longer could take the pain. I let out an ear splitting scream. She laughs again; she is enjoying my hurt. Then I am lifted. My body is limp. I can tell because Mom even has trouble lifting me out of this chair she has tied me to. I count her steps, and then she drops me. I fall hard to the floor, pretty much lifeless. All that was left was my mind and my breathing. The floor is so cold. It feels nice next to my burning skin. I hear a door open.
Mom whispers in my ear, “I never did like you. The pain you feel now is the pain I feel whenever I see your face.” One quick shove and I fall. I fall to my death, down 13 stairs. As I fall, I count the stairs.
Stair one, ”Please ,God, save me from this terrible woman.” Stair two, “why did you have to give me this life God. What did I do that was so bad that you need to give me this horrifying time on earth?” Stair three, “Please take me away from this monster who likes to label herself as a good person.” Stair four, “Thank you, God.”