“No! Please don’t burn that!” I screamed while my father threw my grandmother’s handmade quilt into a flaming barrel behind our house. My mother tried desperately to stop him as years of abuse finally exploded that night. I escaped with absolutely nothing — but decades later, I came back holding the eviction notice that destroyed him forever.My name is Bethany. I’m seventeen years old, and tonight the Ohio sky is clogged with thick black smoke. I’m standing barefoot in the backyard of 4892 Ridgewood Drive, trembling in the freezing air while I watch my entire life burn alive.This is what happens when you go behind my back!” my father, Gerald, bellows above the violent crackling of flames.
He throws another stack of my sketchbooks into the steel burn barrel. My heart slams wildly against my ribs. He found my secret acceptance letter to Sinclair Community College. Inside this house, Gerald Thornton rules like a king. He keeps my identification locked in his safe, steals my paychecks from my part-time job, and controls every breath I take, while my older brother Garrett — lazy, spoiled, adored — gets everything handed to him effortlessly.When I was fourteen, I tried reporting my father to Child Protective Services. But because there were no bruises anyone could photograph, they couldn’t help me. After that, Gerald made sure the rest of the family believed I was unstable and rebellious. He isolated me completely.I watch numbly as my textbooks and clothes melt into the fire.Then my blood turns cold.He reaches into a garbage bag and pulls out a patchwork quilt.“No! Please!” I scream, lunging forward. “Not that!”It’s the last thing I own from my grandmother. The woman who told me I was meant for something bigger than this prison.
