The Blind Girl He Betrayed

1: 1

When Buddy led me home, a girl's scream tore out of the living room.

Then something flew through the air and shattered at my feet.

Buddy let out a low whimper and backed up two steps, pressing close against my leg.

"You mangy dog," Donald Harding roared, "you scared Sharon Vance!"

I gripped the leash, tilting my head, and caught Sharon's soft, fragile little sobs.

"It's all right, guide dogs are very gentle. He won't hurt anyone—"

"You've gone blind. Has your brain rotted too?"

Donald cut me off, furious.

"I told you a long time ago Sharon's afraid of dogs. Keep him out of her sight from now on. Or next time it won't stop at one hit."

I knew why he was angry.

Not because of the dog. Because of me.

I'd come home early today and interrupted whatever he and Sharon had going.

1

Back in my room, unclipping Buddy's harness, my fingers came away wet and warm.

He'd taken the hit to the head. He was bleeding, a lot.

"Buddy…"

I held him, useless, with no idea what to do.

If I walked out there now, Donald might really beat him to death just to let off steam.

Buddy stayed so good in my arms.

Trembling all over from the pain, and still he didn't make a sound.

His warm tongue licked gently at my hand, as if he were the one comforting me.

The voices drifted in from outside, off and on.

"Don, don't be angry anymore. It's my fault for being such a coward."

"It's not your fault. He's just an old dog. If he got hurt, he got hurt."

"But what if he holds a grudge against me and bites me next time?"

Buddy would never bite. Donald had told me so himself, the day he brought him home.

The door slammed open with a kick.

Cold air rushed in, carrying a cloying sweetness.

"Freya Fox. From today on, Buddy is banned from the living room and every other shared space in this house."

I lifted my head, my empty eyes turned toward the direction of his voice.

"Buddy's hurt…"

I hadn't finished before Sharon cut in.

"Don, don't make things hard for her. Maybe I should just move back to the old estate."

"It's only, the old estate is so empty, and living there alone, I really do get so frightened at night…"

Donald's temper caught fire.

"Freya, Sharon is this kind, this understanding, and all you do is push and push at her!"

"A dog got a scratch, that's all, and you won't let it drop. What is it you actually want?"

I closed my eyes, and the pain in my chest spread deep.

He used to say Buddy was our child. He used to love Buddy so much.

Somewhere along the way, he'd started to hate that we existed at all.

Only when the sounds outside stopped did I feel my way up to look for medicine.

Without Buddy to guide me, I went stumbling.

Someone had left a pot of scalding water on the edge of the table.

I knocked into it without meaning to, and the boiling water poured over me, a searing pain that bored straight to the bone.

I bit down hard on my lip.

He used to be so afraid I'd hurt myself. Donald had padded every furniture edge in the house with bumper strips.

Knives, boiling water, anything dangerous, none of it was ever left where I could reach it.

Donald pulled the door open, his voice thick with irritation.

"Can you not thrash around? You're disturbing Sharon's rest."

The Donald who once watched over my every need didn't so much as notice the burn swelling red across my arm.

I didn't dare make another sound. All I could do was crawl, inch by inch, back to my own bedroom.

Buddy was so good. He lay quiet across my legs, letting out the faintest whimper.

I dabbed iodine over Buddy and myself, however I could manage.

The two of us, girl and dog, leaned into each other and collapsed onto the bed.

Even after five years of blindness, I still couldn't get used to a world of darkness.

Five years ago, a fire broke out in the dead of night, and Donald was trapped inside.

I ran in to save him without a second thought.

My mother, terrified, ran in after me.

Donald came out whole. My mother stayed in that fire forever.

And the smoke burned my eyes blind.

My mother's body was barely cold, not yet buried, when my father couldn't wait to bring Sharon and her mother home.

From then on, my life felt like it had fallen into hell.

The two of them always waited until my father was out to beat and kick me.

The scars on my arms and back are all from where they burned me with a curling iron.

The worst time, they took my mother's memorial portrait.

They forced me to crawl like a dog, to eat pig slop, and in the end they threw my mother's portrait into the manure pit.

"Dead people's things are the worst kind of bad luck. That short-lived mother of yours belongs down in the muck."

That day, Donald came charging in with a knife, eyes red, and brought me back to this house.

Afraid I couldn't manage on my own, he carried in Buddy, freshly trained.

"Frey, don't be afraid."

"From now on Buddy is your eyes, and so am I. We'll be with you our whole lives."

Turns out a whole life was only five years long.

The man who once stood between me and the storm had handed the storm right back to me with his own hands.