Alone

She storms out of the house at a quick pace, painfully ignoring the shouts and threats being repeatedly hurled at her from inside the building. Frustrated and angry, she puts on her headphones and shuts out everything by turning her music full blast.

It is her way of escape.

It's a long walk to the bust stop, and she does it quicker than usual.

When she gets there her best friend Sam greets her with a smile. She tries to return the gesture, but a tear drops from her eye as she does so.

"What's wrong?" Sam asks in a worried tone.

"Nothing." She lies, "Just having a bad day."

"At 8:15 in the morning?"

"YES!" she shouts.

***

15 minutes later she hurries out of the bus and makes a beeline for her locker, music blaring. She says hello to no one, and hardly acknowledges her concerned looking boyfriend as he playfully sneaks up on her.

He notices she has been crying.

"Are you okay?" he asks quietly as she grabs her books for class.

"I'm fine." she says without looking at him.

"You sure? You don't look fine. Were you crying?"

"I'm going to class." she says and starts to walk away.

"I love you." he calls after her.

***

At lunch she feels some what more cheerful and heads to her locker after a quick meeting with the environment club. Her usual friends meet her there and they sit down to eat while talking about their, 'totally awesome' weekends.

It seems like everyone had a good time except her.

It seems like that every Monday, and when asked how her weekend went she gives the usual, "It was interesting."

No one presses her any further and she continues eating in silence, pretending to be interested in her friends conversations.

The bell rings and she makes her way to class again. The last two periods pass by quickly--mostly because she isn't paying attention--and she reluctantly gets on the bus to go home.

***

Before she goes inside the house, she looks around the yard for signs that anyone is home. When she is sure no one is home she lets out a sigh of relief and walks in the house.

She goes upstairs and locks herself in her room until dinner. After a listless and uncomfortably quiet dinner she heads back to her room and stays there, doing her best to ignore the sound of her drunk father pushing around her innocent, sobbing mother. She gets up and double checks the multiple locks on her door.

He doesn't normally hurt her, but he has his nights.