Page 7 of Eyes Like Angel (Eyes Like Angel #1)
Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace .
In other words, “ All for one, and one for all” .
Stepping in, the interior house was quite copious and extravagant compared to the neighbors. While the neighbors have simple red-bricked walls, the Divine family has the interior where it almost cost a fortune as the same price as Mrs. Divine’s designer bags and heels.
The interior was a complete opposite to the exterior design.
While on the outside, it was designed as a Victorian house, on the inside was modern but with ornate golden frames with mural paintings of Leonardo Da Vinci’s most famous biblical work, covered from wall-to-wall, on each and every corner and wall in this place.
If you inspect it up close, the ornate frame is mostly carved in detail, from animals to vines and Adam and Eve.
Others were carved in biblical references from the stories and some were carved in most famous angels ever named in the biblical scriptures.
As for the surfaces in their residential space, it was all checkered.
But the ceilings were ornate, too. But more crystals and pearls aligned and shaped, overshadowing the gold accents.
When stepping inside their place, their place was a smell of eucalyptus and sandalwood.
Sometimes floral-scented wax warmer they’ve set up from the living room.
As for me, I don’t know how the technology works or how the concept works, but seeing it at firsthand made much more sense, whether it was small or big object, like wax warmers or industrial chandeliers, can make someone’s life better.
Steamed food wafted in the dining room, and I followed the flavored scent, greeted me like a warm hug, welcoming and inviting.
Peace soon came to an end when I spotted a younger woman in the kitchen, cackling with a boy with wavy dirty-blond hair from watching a video on her device, and an older woman staring at her phone screen, too.
Both have dark-ginger hair, long and frizzy, though the younger woman has a smooth texture while the older woman has a frizz and dryness, as if she dyed it many times.
The older woman looked up at my direction with disinterest. “Go and get to work,” Sister Joanne said to me sharply, weary eyes narrowing at me, before turning her body back from me, reading off of her bright screen on her phone.
***
Thanksgiving feast has begun, and I stood on the sidelines with an empty stomach and a dizzying head and prickling fingers. They passed the food to each other, after praising and praying the Lord to a special holiday dinner.
As my hands coiled altogether, numbing fingernails lanced against the velvet material as I overheard them laughing with pure joy, tasting tonight’s Thanksgiving banquet.
My stomach growled, and I am hungry.
Deeply hungry.
My mind was dizzy and I need food. My wants and needs.
My will to live.
Meanwhile, the Divine family’s canine, a black fur Rottweiler roamed around under the table, begging for food. And it was given to the canine.
While they were talking about their life at work, I spotted an elaborated family portrait right behind the young couple, and examined their features, posed in pride and in elegance.
Other portraits and family picture in the frames displayed nearby, framed on the wall, darting at their joyous faces.
The only picture that I was in was a glass shattered over my face on the far corner.
It looked much better , Sister Jane commented once.
My hunger was searing in. So I took one slice of ham, and I ate it. Whenever they faced me, I must remain as a statue, without any food stuffed in my mouth. I relaxed my cheeks, hoping they wouldn’t notice. My hunger asked for more, and so I ate another tiny, thin slice and stuffed it again.
Everyone was happy and I was miserable .
When the dishes are about to be in next, I gathered the plates as the family ignored my existence, except for Sister Jane’s eyes rolling at me and scooting far with repulse.
Not once Sister Jane spots me kindly, always away or anywhere but my face.
I snagged the dishes away and to be placed in the kitchen sink, using slight cold water to drench in with dishwashing soap, liquefied and placed on a sponge, scrubbing it in, but my hunger insisted on having the slices of ham.
As the family is distracted with their new gifts, I snuck over the kitchen counter and snuck in for another slice—
Accidentally, I broke Sister Jane’s favorite mug and the plateful of honeyed-ham fell on the floor.
Realizing my mistake, I cleaned up the mess, but it’s already too late. Brother Josh saw it all.
He stepped on a shattered dish.
“What the hell are you doing?” he said, interrogating me.
“I was cleaning, sir—”
“Stupid bitch,” he began. “Don’t you realize how much danger you’re going to put on all of us, even the dog?”
“Wow, you’re so fucking pathetic,” Sister Jane, who once not look at my direction, but looks at me with disdain when I messed up.
I hoisted myself, gathering the shattered pieces. “I’m sorry; I’ll clean it up—”
He smacked me across the face, leaving a purple bruise on my head as he turned his head back and screamed, “Mama Joanne, I caught her stealing our food!”
Sister Jane, once again, pretended not to look at me and is interested on the kitchen ceiling with a tap on her shoe and arms folded on her chest.
Oh, no!
Sister Joanne, with her fiery-colored hair, lunged towards me with an attack.
“You fucking demon,” she screeched, she slapped me and pushed me across the kitchen counter; several food fell and clashed onto the floor!”
Then she took me by the hair scalp underneath my coif, and dragged me across the floor, and hoisted me up to gather my arm and pinned it on counter.
“This must be punished accordingly. This is for your own good,” she wailed, having my arm taken and pinned my arm down at another counter and have the heel slapped on me.
It pierced my skin. Sister Joanne again brought down the heel and harmed me again, as Sister Jane guffawed at my silent cries, gritting my teeth and biting my tongue from releasing the cries.
When she brought down the final blow, I let out a cry; and Sister Jane laughed harder as the canine barked louder.
“I’ll give you something to cry about,” Sister Joanne seethed, and threw a hot-boiling across me, but I ducked, and the transparent glass of this mural piece she bought for the kitchen shattered.
“Ah, my beautiful piece!” Sister Joanne screamed. “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MY BEAUTIFUL PIECE!? DIE, YOU FUCKING WITCH, DIE!” she cried in terror and anger, picking up the pace to chase me.
By the time, the chase began, our screams increased to a maximum volume and Sister Jane still laughing, clapping her hands; Father Divine stopped her and took me by the fabric.
Father Divine had his hand grip on me and dragged me across the floor, by the time he reached outside from the doorsteps and paused at the hillside staircases, at once, he tossed at the long, winding stairs.
As I fell, the gravity trundled me over by the winding staircases, my skin and bones torn and crushed each time the gravity pulled and rolled me over until to the end of the hillside steps.
My joints seared in hot pain and my bowels hardened and coiled sharply, as my tears pricked from Sister Joanne’s sharp heel.
Hearing little steps, a tall shadow of Father Divine loomed over me, his hand reached out to me as I fell unconscious.
***
His hoary palm fisted and shoved my head under the icy water, running from the bathtub, chanting in Lord’s name as he drowned me. It has been five minutes since his hand clutched to my scalp, shoving me back down as I gathered air within a millisecond.
He recited the verses in the bible, regarding to greed— 1 Timothy 6:6-10
“ But godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. And if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. But those who want to be rich fall into temptation and a snare and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some have been ensnared by it; they have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many sorrows ,” Father Divine’s cleared and blurred as he shoved my head down in a cold bathtub, his hand deepened onto my scalp and plunged me in more than five minutes.
Noise in my ears drowned completely, knowing he said another gospel from the Bible scriptures, his head held high up, praising to the Lord himself as he read aloud— Psalm 12:2-6 .
“ Everyone deceives and flatters and lies.
There is no sincerity left. But the Lord will not deal gently with people who act like that; he will destroy those proud liars who say, “We will lie to our heart's content ,” his voice boomed, still had his grasp onto me, and I was choking, icy water shot straight through my nose and ears.
Once he has done the punishment laid on me, he yanked my head out and tossed me onto the ground, gathering with his belt he held taken from his closet before taken me to another place, a place where no one should hear my screams and see my tears, only a nippy water blanketed me until oblivion.
“Face the wall,” he said to me as I coughed out water, breathing almost to nothing, choking, gathering a thick air.
I heard no sound from him; the bath water trapped, unable to register what he spoke.
“I said face the wall,” he commanded, his veins protruded from his neck.
He then yanked my shriveled body up and strongly pinned me against the grey-bricked wall.
“When I said ‘obey’, you obey!” Father Divine bellowed, and lifted the belt in the air, and deliberately flogged on my back repeatedly until it stopped at seven.
I counted.
“Look at what you had me do! Making everyone’s time a living hell in this special day!
Everything that you do is a sin—a sin! Lord will be angry, angry at your greed, your selfishness; your traitorous hands must be purified, and your darkened, sinful soul must be cleansed!
You must pay a price for ruining this day!
” Each word he rested, he’d gather his leather belt and impacted its blow onto my flesh.
A newly-leathered belt sharply cracked.
My voice croaked into plea, hot tears spilled, my nostrils bled and drowned from bitter water. “Father Divine, please, I was starving—”
I deserve to eat.
Another whiplash cracked.
“Oh dear, Heavenly Father, forgive this lost being, for this wretched filthy demon before you has sinned again, and again and again, and she must be punished accordingly! With you, Lord, we must drown her and be set free into the eternal paradise!” he chanted, cried out, lifting me by the hair tugging on my scalp.
My tongue bit, my arms curled, my back and my skin stung and peeled from his punishment he bestowed on me.
Oh, Lord, I have sinned yet again!
The tongue in between my teeth gashed and left a bitter taste, swallowed as if I tasted a rotten liquid, deepening in my throat and coiled in my emptied, starved belly.
“No, please—”
“Quiet, you filthy demon!” he shouted darkly, withered eyes flashed in rage.
“After everything we have given you, blessed you and welcomed you in God’s name, this is how you repay us?
By stealing the food that was never yours!
? You are a disgrace to the Divine family!
Shame on you! Beg for forgiveness, even if your limbs and tears were wasted and rotten!
I want you to feel shame and the choices you make!
God has put me in charge with your life, and for that, you must be disgrace for all eternity for as long as you live! ”
He recited another verse—in Proverbs 12:19-20 and John 14:25-26
“ Truthful lips endure forever, but a lying tongue is but for a moment. Deceit is in the heart of those who devise evil, but those who plan peace have joy ,” “ These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you ,” he emphasized, his rage seeped in further and further.
“You must honor thy mother and father, thy sister and brother. We took you in as part of the family, and you have given us but your traitorous lies!”
The belt in his hand slapped, and his hand has grown tired; his palm reddened from clenching on a leathered fabric, labored breathing and sharp cracks deflected from grey-bricked walls surrounded me.
I was starving. I deserve to be rewarded, but none has given me.
I deserved to be rewarded.
I deserve some happiness in my life.
After he has given lashes on my flesh on a twentieth hit, as he was done with me with a heaving breath, with little left of my energy, he dragged me by the hair, my scalp scorched and pricked as he hauled me upstairs, tossing me inside the dark attic—where I resided, catching a glimpse of a blurry silhouette.
“Repent, for you have committed mortal sins, for you being so incompetent in today’s mass, you shall repent.
Repent until God will decide whether to release you, to kiss you with love and forgiveness on your bruised cheek.
Repent with your sinful blood, your sinful existence, you demonic witch, for as long as you live, until you accept the lesson and accept for what you are,” he hissed, and bolted the door shut, no way for me to escape, and felt water in my ears, until it drained and heard no noise but felt my own shivers convulsed and clenched in my trembled palms.
The floor has gone wet, and I was shivering.
I, on the floor, curled up alone in the dark, no blanket to warm me down, basked in coldness, as the silence in the thick air prevailed.