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Sleeping with both eyes shut was never an option. Not in this hell hole. St. Cadence’s Orphanage was far from being holy. I was abandoned here when I was born, having no recollection on who was the mutt who left me to live a godforsaken life in this place that was supposed to give me shelter.

England has its perks; I give you that. Sovereignty gives the orphanage good money for clothes, studies and whatever else we might need until we are eighteen and thrown out on the streets.

If we excel in our studies, the top three students get a full scholarship to Oxford University to study whatever we’d like. And I sure as hell will be among those three.

‘Get up, Black. Time for your daily beating section. Best time of my day, watching a hoe like you with your pitiful excuse of a face in the gutter.’

Clarissa. That bitch. She has every boy’s attention, popularity, and hates my guts. Just because her idiot of a boyfriend has a crush on me. She has the IQ of a fly, but cheats on every test by beating me up every day, so her grades are high enough to keep herself in the top three. If she gets less than an A, she breaks a bone of mine. If it’s an A+, I’m safe. An A-... Means she draws blood out of me, which is my current situation. Who would know she wouldn’t be able to memorize her entire presentation regarding Stephen Hawking’s study on black holes?

‘I-I’m s-s-sorry. I-It was n-not...’ I stutter as I am in my underwear on a freezing cold night, with my butt on a shit ton of snow.

‘Was not what, you motherfucking trash of a human being? Able to do a good job? You are absolutely fucking right and now you will pay for it.’

She kicks my face, instantly making a cracking sound, and a bloody trail on the snow, coming right out of my nose. She spits on me as she walks away with her evil spawns laughing maliciously behind her.

‘She will never make that mistake again, Clairy.’ Jess grins while talking as she opens the door for her majesty to walk in.

I can’t help but wonder what I have done in past lives to deserve such a punishment. Why was I left to rot here? What did I do?

As I try to crawl out of the freezing cold, and from the now stained with blood snow, I see Sister Ophelia running towards me with a huge blanket. ‘Late as always, Sister O. Late as always.’ I think as her 70-year-old legs walk as fast as she can towards me.

‘Dear God, girl. Are you trying to get yourself frozen to death? What in heaven’s sake happened to your nose!?’

‘Life happened. Sister Ophelia.’ I reply with blank expression on my face.

‘Don’t you come with your self-pity on me, young lady. Do your thing, Kyla. Do not walk inside that Orphanage with your nose looking like a horror movie makeup.’

I put my nose back into place, and accepted the blanket, turning purple, as my body temperature was giving up, and Sister Ophelia walked me back to my room.

I feel no pain. Not on the outside, at least. They call it CIP, or Congenital Insensitivity to Pain. I can break as many bones as I want, cut myself a thousand times, as deep as I want, but physical pain would never reach me. It was both a gift and a curse. If I got hurt badly, I wouldn’t feel it, and it could kill me.

Clarissa hasn’t managed to do that yet, unfortunately.

She has been my torturer for 10 years now. She’s arrived at the Orphanage malnourished, filled with bruises and a broken left arm. Haven’t spoken to anyone for a year. Until Sister Ophelia took her to the city’s best psychiatrist and he managed to give her the right pills to keep her demons inside. Turns out her parents were heroin addicts and were arrested for drug trafficking, while on their insane trips, they’d beat the shit out of her, and leave her to suffer without any care. Until one day she was able to call for help, and emergency came, as did child’s service and the police. Her parents got 20 years of jail, lost her custody and she... well, did not fall far from the tree. My left arm, my right wrist, my nose (5 times), my right femur, three of my ribs and my left foot were a good example of how sweet she has become. We are the same age. Seven-fucking-teen. Which meant, if she keeps her good scores (if I keep her good scores), she’d follow me to Oxford and keep making my life hell. Blonde hair, green eyes, fit body, every physical characteristic of an angel.

But let’s not forget Lucifer was an angel.

She is a motherfucking psychopath, as she makes lovely smiles and good deeds in front of the sisters and Father Phillips, and is the queen around here. Everybody does what she wants. With threats and blackmail on every single soul in this hellhole, with the exception of Sister Ophelia, whatever she says is law. And that’s the reason my life is worth less than shit.

Lillith, as I like to call her, in honor of the mother of all demons, dates Shawn Jenkins since she got to the Orphanage. She claimed him as hers, to be honest.

Shawn was a basket case, even though he has no recollection of his parents, as he was abandoned just as I was, as a baby. Always picking fights with everyone for no reason, always in detention. He is always wearing long sleeves, even on freaking hot days to hide the scars on his arms as he insists on self-inflicting. When we were five, I asked him why he did that to himself. He said, with the calm of a monk ‘It just feels good.’.

Until we were seven and Clarisse showed up, we were inseparable. He is beautiful, with a charm I have never seen before, even though he insists on his shoulder length hair dyed in black, covering most of his face that gives him a goth look. The orphanage forbids us to have piercings or tattoos, but I’m sure that if we were allowed to have them, he’d have them from head to toe. His blue eyes are not something he can hide, as they are so bright, they could see inside one’s soul. He always had an innocent face, the one that you would follow without questioning. As we grew, he became a 6′3 tall man, with broad shoulders, but as he hates going out in the sun, his skin is pale white. When Clarisse came along, and claimed him as hers, his easy acceptance broke my heart. We never spoke to each other again, his last words to me were ‘Get away from me, you cunt. We were never friends. Never will be.’ We were just seven. Got to thank him, though. He broke me hard enough so no one would ever break me inside again.

But how do I know he fancies me, you ask?

One day, in sophomore year, we were at a Sunday morning mass, and I was wearing a dress Sister Ophelia made just for me. When she gave it to me, she said ‘Magenta is your color, my dear. I couldn’t help myself when I saw this cloth. I knew I had to do something for you.’ It was knee length, with short sleeves and a very high cleavage, but since my breasts were always prominent, and the dress was tight from the hip up, and completely loose from the hip down it perfectly showed my figure.

I always sat in the last row of the church. I hate praying. If God really existed, he wouldn’t have doomed me to a life of hatred and punishment. So, I never said my prayers out loud, only mimicked the words with my lips, making no sound, because he was not worth my benevolence and gratitude.

When Shawn got to church, two minutes late, as usual, the only seat available was the one beside me. ‘Fucking great.’ I thought.

We did not share any looks or any words. The mass ended and I hurried to my room, not to face Clarissa’s wrath for sitting beside her beloved. She could ruin my body as she pleased, but not this dress, it was made for me, by the only person that has ever shown me a hint of affection. But as I walked, seemingly unnoticed, to my room, a hand grabbed my arm and pushed me to an empty broom closet and shut the door, so I couldn’t see who it was and what was happening.

‘I can’t help it. Shit, Ky. Why are you doing this to me?’ As I recognized his voice, before I said anything, he pressed his lips on mine with hunger, and I responded to his touch without noticing, his tongue invading my mouth as if he was dying out of thirst. For me.

The moment lasted 15 minutes. And without being able to speak after we were apart, he just left. My lips were sore, as was my arm, from where he pushed me and held me to kiss me. My body dragged itself to the floor and I just sat there, sobbing for hours until I was able to clean my tears out of my face and get out of that claustrophobic place to get to my room.

That was two years ago. Not a word was spoken between us. He kept ignoring me as usual, as if it never happened.