The darkness seemed perpetual and inescapable. When I finally descended from it, I felt as if I were being born once more, coming into a vast, intriguing world that I had so much to learn from. I was weak, helpless, and innocent, but at the same time, I wasn’t.           

When I opened my eyes for what felt like the first time, I was overtaken by the pure whiteness of the little room. I could hear the humming of a respirator, as well as the beeping of a heart monitor, which had suddenly accelerated. Soon, nurses came rushing in, all wearing identical expressions of extreme astonishment. I merely stared back at them in sheer confusion.           

“It’s a miracle!” one of them declared.           

“Get the doctor!” said another.           

All the while, I stayed silent, still observing my surroundings. I was attached to an IV filled with a brown liquid. My body was covered in bandages, and I had a cast on my leg. I could hardly move, and I was in considerable pain. I tried to focus on the blinding whiteness of the hospital room in an attempt to distract myself from the soreness.           

After staring straight ahead at the blank wall, I suddenly began to perceive flashes of bold, crimson blood pouring down, down, down…           

As my heart began to pound like a bass drum, my whole life literally flashed right before my eyes. I was confronted by memory after memory, both the good and bad, all up until the day when…           

My spinning head came to an abrupt stop, and I sat up with a start. Or, rather, I tried to, only to be afflicted by excruciating pain. I broke out into insuppressible sobs, trembling immensely. I heard muffled voices amidst my choking tears, but I could not make out what they were saying. When my sobs subsided and I came back to center, I realized that one of the nurses was trying to comfort me. In a soothing voice, she murmured, “It’s okay, sweetie. It’s okay.”           

“She appears to be having flashbacks triggered by the traumatic experience,” stated the doctor, who had apparently entered the room.           

I rolled my eyes in spite. As if he knew what I’d been through! But the real question was, did I?           

Once again, my surroundings became hazy, and my mind started to interpret the long chain of memories I had perceived but moments before. Slowly, it was all coming back to me, or at least my life before the…incident.             Now, coming out of my coma felt more like waking up from a long, dreamless sleep than being reborn. Little did I know that it was, in essence, more so the latter.           

I continued to think things through as calmly as possible, feeling searing pain from my injuries. First, I tried to recite the simple facts over and over again in my head. My name is Essie Miracle. I was adopted. I live with my father, Shawn Miracle. I am twelve years old. I am in 7th grade. I go to Pleasantville Christian Academy. I have many good friends, but my best friend at school is January Jenkins. My other best friend is McKenna Kennedy, but she doesn’t go to my school anymore. My boyfriend’s name is Casimir Chrysanthemum. I love him very much…            

While most of my personal memories and general knowledge were intact, I still didn’t feel like myself. Essie Miracle felt more like a character from a book, or, at the very most, a person whom I was acquainted with.           

In the midst of my musing, the doctor and nurses stared at me curiously. After they examined me, they began to ask a few simple questions which I could answer easily. When asked how I was feeling, I responded bluntly, “I’m in a lot of pain.” It hurt like hell whenever I tried to move a muscle from the neck down, which was no surprise. I had a fractured rib, so it even hurt to breathe.           

“I’ll go get you some meds,” one of the nurses said, and left the room.           

“How did I end up here?” I wanted to know. “Please, tell me.”           

In a soft, even tone, the doctor slowly explained what had happened. I had been found severely beaten in a dumpster a few weeks ago, in critical condition. Hence, I was rushed to the hospital, and had just woken up from a coma today. “Sadly, that’s all we know,” the doctor said, a note of pity in his voice.           

Of course, I did not have the strength to remember what had transpired on that fateful day. But I knew it was filed away in the back of my mind, waiting to be brought to the surface again.           

Trembling and stuttering, I began, “You see, I…they…it…and…oh, no…no…” Tears welled up in my eyes, one of them still a bit swollen.           

“It’s alright dear. Just rest for now,” said the doctor.            

Soon, the nurse reentered the room and gave me the meds. Before long, the pain dulled, and I drifted off to an uneasy sleep. 

I woke up a while later to a warm hand holding my own, gently patting it. A soft, familiar voice murmured, “Oh, Essie. Oh, Essie…thank God you’re alive. Thank God. I’m sorry…I’m so sorry…”           

When I opened my eyes and saw my father’s face, I tried to jerk my hand away. Apparently, the demons had bled me of my forgiveness, for I shouted with as much ferocity as I could muster, “GET AWAY FROM ME, YOU LYING BASTARD!”           

Like a sudden rush of burning hot water from a faucet, I recalled the catastrophic calamity. The damned letter, the lies and ugly truth and betrayal. All leading up to the unbearable, nauseating pain and bloodshed…           

I shuddered as bits and pieces of that wretched day came flooding back to me, the devastation lingering in every cell of my body.           

The demons, destroying me for eternity; their jeering, haunting voices echoing in my mind…            

“C’mon, Messy Essie. Let me see you vomit. I do it all the time,” Marion taunted.           

“This is just too easy. It’s like taking candy from a baby. A premature, puny baby.”

“Essie, don’t bother praying to that magical sky wizard. And don’t even think about quoting something from that big ol’ book of fairytales, either. Are we clear? Good,” Donovan said, his voice laced with malice.

“C’mon! Get in there nice and deep! Dig in, dig in! Right up her ass! That’s it! Make her bleed! We wanna see blood!” they shouted.

Before I knew it, I was screaming at the top of my lungs and writhing about, confined by the tubes, monitors, bandages, heavy cast, fractured rib, and my own maimed body. I couldn’t stop crying, and the pain was worse than ever. My father had backed away in shock. Concern, terror, and hurt were written intensely on his features.           

Then, a nurse entered the room. She said to Daddy, brows knitted together, “Mr. Miracle, I think it would be best if you leave for now.”           

Nodding his head somberly, my father left the room without a word. I could not bring myself to see the devastated expression on his face.           

Out of habit, I reached for my heart locket, only to find that it wasn’t there. Running a bruised hand along my bare neck, I recalled the dismal memory.

“What do we have here? Awww, how sweet. A picture of you and your pansy dad! And who’s this? You’ve got a boyfriend, Essie? You better not tell your daddy! He’ll be jealous!”

But this time, I didn’t scream, for I knew that my shrieks would still go unheard.

 

I felt like I couldn’t tell a soul about what had happened, partially because I wanted it to remain as nothing more to me than the worst nightmare of my life. But I had a slew of reminders of the heartrending incident—from my battered body to the missing locket to… the hemorrhoids. Did my stolen sanity have to be yet another thing which convinced me that the atrocious nightmare had indeed been real?

The depths of despair were calling out to me, and I was drowning in them like a heap of rotting garbage. I wished I hadn’t woken up from the coma, or even that my memory was impaired so I wouldn’t have to deal with the pain.

I could no longer enjoy the rays of sunshine which poured through the window, or the chirping of the cardinals outside. Why did the sun keep shining so brightly, even after so much had been destroyed? Why did the birds still sing so merrily, in spite of all the evil and suffering in the world? And why was I still alive, however injured, when my very existence was scorned?

            Perhaps I had needed to hope in order to despair, and to despair in order to hope. But the real question was, did I ever truly have faith? Did I deserve this terrible fate? If there was such a place as heaven, then why had I been sent to hell? The funny thing was, not too long ago, I would’ve never considered life on earth to be hell. But that was before I had noticed the demons that roamed the planet and witnessed the vilest acts of mankind.

            It used to be so easy to discover miracles everywhere and to find the goodness in everything. I never had to look very far for a little piece of heaven. But things were different now. If the world was still my oyster, I knew there wasn’t a pearl.

 

My days in the hospital passed by slowly. I felt groggy and achy most of the time, and I had blackouts on occasion. Some of my physical wounds started to heal, but not the emotional ones. I still couldn’t bring myself to speak of the tragedy, and the police hadn’t found any additional information. I knew I was a fool for staying silent for so long, but I believed that the moment I put the truth to words, I’d relive the agony all over again. Even when I tried to explain, I was somehow always rendered speechless by traumatization, fear, or both.

            I had a few visitors, including Daddy, the Jenkins family, and, eventually, McKenna. At first, whenever Daddy came to visit, I’d pretend he wasn’t there. Thankfully, he gave me enough space so that I wouldn’t go insane (if I hadn’t already). At the same time, he was persistent enough for me to know that he wouldn’t give up until he made things right (though such a thing was impossible). I didn’t tell him that even if I did have the heart to forgive him, I still could never forgive the sadistic demons for brutally destroying my essence.

            Daddy would often sing softy to me, mostly church hymns, but never “You Are My Sunshine.” I didn’t have to wonder why.

            We had many one-sided conversations because I rarely felt like talking to him, much less listening. But once, I decided to ask him about the affair.

            “When did it start?”

            He answered, “Around the time you started 6th grade. It pretty much snowballed from there.”

            Then, “Who started it?”

            “We both did. It took us a while to figure out what we wanted, but when we did, it was mutual.”

            “Was it love, or was it lust?”

            “Both.”

            “Why did you lie?”

            “Because I was foolish enough to think that what you didn’t know wouldn’t hurt you. I was dead wrong, wasn’t I?”

            “So you regret it?”

            “Oh, God, yes! But especially the lying. That made things so much worse.”

            “Well, to tell you the truth, if our religion didn’t tell us otherwise and people didn’t judge so much and I wasn’t in love with Casimir and you didn’t lie about it and you weren’t such a despicable person, then…maybe I’d think it was okay.”

            That was the last time we talked about the affair for a long time.

 

I was deeply grateful whenever January and her family came to visit. January was the only one who made me feel like life was still normal. She told me everything that was going on at school; always the news and events, but never the gossip. January brought get-well cards that our whole class had made for me, in addition to all the work I’d missed. Thankfully, the teachers were lenient due to the extreme circumstances, and January explained the lessons that I didn’t understand. She was truly my hero during the most difficult point in my life.

            When McKenna came to visit, which wasn’t very often, she acted almost as distraught as my father. She even felt the need to apologize.

            “Essie, I promise I’d never do something like that in a million years! I swear, I had no idea that this would happen! But I want you to know something. Don’t let whoever did this get away with it. Please, just tell somebody, anybody! Nobody had the right to do this to you! Now, promise me that you’ll tell, okay?” she pleaded, extending her pinky. Tears were streaming down her face as she spoke. After a moment of hesitation, we solemnly “pinky swore.”

            McKenna wasn’t the first person who urged me to explain what had happened, but she was the last. For soon after her visit, I began to talk about what had occurred on that horrific day. The demons couldn’t keep me silent anymore. They were going to pay for what they did in every way possible. When I finally found my voice, it was as if a huge dagger had been pulled out of my chest. There was still a great deal of pain that remained, both physical and emotional, but now I almost felt something that resembled hope…almost.

            In spite of everything, I found myself confiding in Daddy. Perhaps this was partially because he knew about the additional piece to the puzzle—the love letter. My dad understood why I had gone against my better judgment (though I’d never understand why he had gone against his)—it all began with the insanity the letter had wrought upon me.

            When I told him everything that had happened on that unforgettable day, I wanted him to feel guilty. He deserved to be burdened by the painful ordeal just as much as I was. Still, I couldn’t bear to see the horror, anger, and devastation on his face as I described my degrading loss of dignity and virginity.

            When I was done recalling the events of the catastrophe, we were both in tears. My father knew better than to hug me or even hold my hand. There was no comfort that I would let him give, and certainly none that could ease the pain.

            After I told Daddy, my story was imparted to the police. The people whom I was closest to believed me without question, and I deemed that things would go smoothly in court. After all, there was sound evidence that I had been beaten and…violated (this part was still nearly impossible to admit), and I assumed that Marion Shellery and Kain and Donovan Winchester would not have solid alibis. However, the conspiracy proved to be much more premeditated than I had thought. Marion claimed to have been visiting her ailing Aunt Agnes up in Jackson Hill on the day of the incident. Mrs. Shellery testified that she had driven her there the day before. The Shellery family also stated that Marion had not returned home until two days after my assault. I could tell that Marion’s parents were ignorant and simply unwilling to believe that their daughter could’ve participated in such a heinous crime, and Marion was lying right through her teeth.

            I rationalized (surprisingly, I was able to do this) that Kain and Donovan must’ve picked her up from Jackson Hill and driven back to Pleasantville. The boys claimed to have been at the landfill during the time of the incident, but I could put two and two together. When the three of them returned to Pleasantville, they most likely parked Kain’s truck someplace out of the way and laid low for a while so no one knew they were there. That is, before they destroyed my life forever.

 

I was constantly filled with anger, hate, and self-pity. How could those demons still be living their lives and pretending that they were innocent? Why couldn’t they suffer and experience my pain? Why couldn’t they live the hell I was suffering, the hell in which they belonged?

            I now relished in the oblivion of sleep, the occasions when I was too exhausted to think anything at all, and even the blackouts. Right before a blackout occurred, my mind would be reeling faster than the speed of light, until it nearly exploded from an overload. Afterwards, I would always feel so powerless, as if I were a puppet being controlled by my brutal and spiteful fate.             

            In the midst of this demoralizing tempest, every now and then I managed to see beyond the cruel hand that fate had dealt. It wasn’t a light in the darkness or a rainbow after a storm, but it was something. True, I still felt like hell, and my heart and soul were in disarray. But the fact that the rest of the world was continuing to thrive later produced the notion that perhaps I could, too. I knew it was quite a stretch, but the rest of my hope had already been lost, so what difference would it make? What more did I have to lose? My will to live, but that seemed to decrease more and more with every passing day. So why couldn’t young Essie Miracle become a complete stranger to me? Why did I still have to carry all of her pain? I couldn’t spend my whole life waiting for the storm to pass—I had to learn to dance in the rain. Unfortunately, this was easier thought than done.

             When people said that my survival had been a miracle, I wanted to strangle them. They had no idea what I had suffered, and how much I would always suffer. I was scarred for life, which felt a million times worse than death. I could never love again; only hate the world with a burning passion. Now, it was all ugly and destructive to me, and I would never know anything that had the slightest resemblance to happiness or joy.  

            But somewhere along the way, without my knowledge of course, a tiny candle of hope relit inside of me.  Needless to say, I no longer believed in the goodness of humanity. But if others believed in me, couldn’t I believe in myself? Then again, how could I believe in such a weak, mortal being as myself when I had trouble believing in an all-powerful, all-loving God? For one thing, there were many people like me—a weak, woeful, broken soul—but only one as omnipotent as Him, if such a being truly existed.

            The rest of my life was on hold. In 7th grade I missed more than three months of school total, including most of September and the time I spent in the hospital, which was all of April, May, and June. I was trying to keep up on my assignments as best as I could, if only to distract myself from all the pain. But returning to school seemed out of the question. The flashbacks and blackouts still occurred fairly often, for one thing.

            Also, I couldn’t bear to see Marion Shellery ever again. Though she was in 10th grade and I was in 7th, Pleasantville Christian Academy was a small school with only one building, so we’d be bound to cross paths at one point or another. Kain and Donovan went to Pleasantville High School, but I was still fearful that they wouldn’t be satisfied until they finished me off. All of my newly acquired fears were mixed with livid anger, which didn’t help matters at all. I knew I would never be able to see the world in the same way again.

            Strangely enough, I remembered something that I had said to Casimir last summer, which felt like decades ago. “If something is ruined, then it cannot be fixed. But if something is broken, the pieces can be put back together. You just have to find the right kind of glue.”

            I scoffed at my words. What did I know back then? Nothing of suffering, nothing of evil. But what did I know now? Far more than any human being ever should, yet at the same time, not nearly enough.

            My thoughts soon drifted back to Casimir. I hadn’t heard from him once during my time in the hospital. I knew he had been too good to be true. He’d probably found out about the affair by now, so no wonder he wanted nothing to do with me. But did he have any idea what I’d been through? Did he even care? In my mind’s eye, he was just as ignorant as the rest of the world. There was nothing special about him, nothing at all. Except for the way his eyes sparkled when he smiled, or how he could see right into my soul… No. Casimir was out of my life now, and he wasn’t coming back.

            Well, love, I thought wistfully, we both have to face our demons sooner or later, haven’t we? Too bad we couldn’t face them together.

 

By June, I had grown accustomed to softly crying myself to sleep on most nights; that is, before the sleeping pills kicked in. Sometimes, I’d pray, but my prayers were addressed to a God whom I wasn’t sure existed anymore. I prayed for redemption, and to be rid of the awful memories that weighed me down. The greatest deliverance I had received so far was a dreamless sleep, free from any haunting nightmares. However, this was not through the grace of God, but an effect of the sleeping pills.

            That was until one night when redemption came in the most unexpected of ways. I had my first dream since what felt like the beginning of time. I was in the hospital room, watching as the moonlight poured through the open window. It casted many large shadows throughout the space, but some of the room was illuminated by the splash of beautiful light.

            Suddenly, a glowing, translucent figure appeared right before my eyes. She was a tall young woman with dark hair and lush, pear green eyes. She wore a long white robe and smiled warmly at me, a twinkle in her eye. I recognized her as none other than Carlena Leigh Chrysanthemum. I simply lay there for a moment, utterly mystified by her very presence.

            She spoke to me in a voice that sounded like fresh water cascading in a peaceful stream. “Hello, Essie. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you at last,” she said.

            “A-am I dead?” I asked shakily.

            Her laugh was a soft, lilting melody. “No, my dear. You are quite alive. I have come to thank you for being there for my son. God knew he needed another kind soul to love him. Casimir loves you very dearly, and he’s extremely worried about you. But I have promised to watch over you,” Carlena Leigh explained.

            “Then why hasn’t he written any letters?” I wanted to know.

            She merely said, “All in good time, my dear.”

            “Everything is so broken now!” I exclaimed morosely.

            “I know, child. But do not worry. You have always had faith, and you still do. It’s all a matter of believing,” Carlena Leigh whispered calmly.

            “But did you see what they did to me? They ruined me; they destroyed me! My purity is gone!” I cried.

            Carlena Leigh came closer to the bed and gently took my face in her hands. “Yes. And it was a wicked, malicious deed. But you have been born anew. Don’t you see? Your soul is something that no one can ever take away from you. We are both victims of the same crime—and I’d do anything to undo the evil that has been done—but it rests in God’s hands. In spite of the past, we have sustained our purity through the grace of God, and through the gentleness of our hearts,” she told me, her eyes shining brightly.

            “Why do I have to carry these memories?” I asked.

            “Because you are strong enough to bear them,” she replied simply. “And someday, they will no longer weigh you down.”

            “If you know what happened, then you know about Arthur and my dad, right?”

            Carlena Leigh nodded. “You will find the strength to forgive both those you love and those you have reason to despise,” she said. “The rest is for God to judge.”

            “But how—” I began, yet she held a finger to my lips.

            “Hush now, my child. Don’t let the darkness keep you from finding your way. Embrace the light, Essie Miracle. Never stop shining.”

            With that, she pecked me on the forehead and took the form of a dove. Wings outstretched, she flew out of the open window and into the starry night.    

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