Her Story Her Face

The cool breeze of March sweeps past her face, feeling like pins poking on her skin. Thana brings her cold hands inside the pockets of her coat after fixing the beanie on her head.

She walks at a fast pace, scanning her surroundings with every step she takes, paranoid. The way her cheeks turn a crimson red seems as if she's holding her breath. But the thoughts that tormented her were thoughts of the tyrants catching her.

It frightens her only a little, but she wouldn't need them adding up to the pressure of this, not exactly, fine morning. She can only handle too much, and she wouldn't want any more trash talking to happen when she's already exhausted. Thana just needs to get past the gate, and she's free from this despicable neighborhood, but only temporarily.

But as always, the gods that fulfill promises and bless people with luck prove themselves to be against her. There's no other choice but to face the misery that awaits her. It happens so frequently that it almost becomes some sort of a hobby.

"Quit following me around twin pigs," she snaps first, earning her snorts from the darned twins. They looked at her with their brilliant green eyes and gritting braced teeth as they meanly eyed her up and down.

Thana wishes their father, Dr. Evans, a dentist, placed barbed wires on their teeth instead. Unfortunately, he didn't, but she ought to do it herself with her mood becoming a wildfire.

They bring trouble wherever they choose to venture, like one time when they burned down an appliance shop that their grandparents own. And the time when they visited Manchester for a holiday but came back with a police record.

Others describe them as a walking disaster. And as miserable as Thana's life could get, they are always hot on her trails. They're the representation of bad luck following her around, refusing to let her be.

"Such a temper. Must be the cause of the breakup," Tweedledee looks with a malicious grin at Thana.

Word sure does travel fast.

Her twin brother, Tweedledum, decides to follow after with a peal of obnoxious laughter, "my goodness, she's still as ugly as ever. Joshua must have taken the right pills this time. Must be the anti-blind pills."

"Oh, Joshua and his pills. He says it's just vitamins, but he would shake whenever we get it off of him. He's psychotic; no wonder why he would choose to be with Thana," Tweedledee strikes again.

And she ends her sentence with an ugly smirk, "let me correct myself, I meant to say, chose, as in past tense."

Thana's face hardened. She isn't bothered by the careless words of the good-for-nothing twins. But she is fueled by the desire to get away quickly when she sees the guy she despises more than anything in the world. He's the only one who can almost successfully bury her closer to hell with his virulence.

Not her sisters, not the twins, but the man himself, Cain.

It's no coincidence he's named after the son of Eve, who killed his brother. Cain became the sole reason for his father's death. Mr. Richards died of a heart attack because of Cain's brutal nature. It's rumored that he must have done or said something deadly enough to trigger his father's illness.

Thana isn't in the mood to be another of Cain's victims again or suffer from a heart attack as his father did. She doesn't want his dirty words and his filthy hands on her. With Cain taking his sweet time walking toward them, Thana took it as a chance to run.

"Goodbye, Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Sorry, but I won't be taking your rubbish words today or any day ever. I hope you both disappear from my life."

And with that, Thana makes her escape by putting her track and field experience to use. No, she is not an athlete, but she is a trained runner from her abuse experiences.

One had to get away from getting hurt.

The twin's shouting fades as Thana gets closer to the gate, but her heart rate quickens when she hears shoes going after her. She pushes aside the thoughts of Cain reaching her as she makes a sharp turn to the market square after passing the gates.

'Go away, get away from me!' her mind screaming converted into her voice when she feels hands on her arms, pulling her to a halt.

"Leave me alone, Cain!" she cries in agony, looking at the person with wide, bloodshot eyes.

She clenched her fist into a tight ball, ready to pull a punch on Cain.

However, the person that grabbed her isn't the person she expected him to be. It's an older man dressed in jogging attire. The man is about in his early sixties, and he wears a surprised look on his wrinkled face as he lets go of Thana's arm after seeing her fist.

The man lifts the purse he caught in front of Thana, allowing her to take back what's hers. Thana looks past the older man to see whether Cain is following but only sees an empty street.

She takes the purse bluntly. And without expressing her gratitude for the older man, she walks away, leaving him stunned by her rudeness. He sighs at what the youth has become in this generation.

"Ungrateful brats. That's another one that came from a rich neighborhood," the man snorts, leaving the opposite way, resuming with his early morning jogging.

On the other hand, Thana could not believe that she allowed herself to let a few tears out for fear of Cain. She promised herself that she would no longer tremble and that she's strong enough to even slap him across his stupid face or kick him where the sun doesn't shine.

She didn't realize that she's breeze walking until Thana reached the marketplace faster than she expected. She slows down, passing a cafe with large clear windows, seeing someone she never thought she'd see for a few days.

It's Joshua with another girl.

Thana can't help but scoff at the sight of them flirting with each other shamelessly. The girl doesn't look familiar, but she must have fallen for his innocent play like Thana did. If only she knew what a douche he is, then Thana would have still dated him.

There's no such thing as love. Thana only dated him to feel less lonely and to relieve her of her troubles. But of course, she didn't tell him that. She made him believe that she actually fell for his tricks. Thana knew everything about him before he managed to utter his first word of compulsion at her.

Thana had her fun and thought that it was enough.

And so she moves on, going past the cafe with her head held high. She ignores the obvious stares she receives from the people that stood by the stores or those who walked past her. The children would drop their jaws or recoil away as if they saw a monster.

Even dogs would start barking loudly at her.

The ray of sunshine past the cloudy sky of London illuminates on her face. Like the spotlight, it shows her but focuses on her imperfection. It shows what once was beautiful but now damaged.

She carries a scar on her face. One that runs from her left eyebrow to the side of her nose. The other from her top lip to her chin. And the last straight line on her right cheek.

Those scars?

It served as the beginning of her tragic story.