Anita had been so happy. That was the first thing her mother saw, the thing that made her uneasy. For years, the laughter she had buried began to rise to the surface again with John, and her mother, who knows her best, recognized the fragility of it. Happiness had always felt like a borrowed thing in their house.
A sharp, demanding knock shattered her revery. Her breath caught as she opened the door to a figure from her past she had prayed would remain a ghost.
"What are you doing here?" Her voice was a fragile tremor.
He crossed the threshold without permission, a cold smile slithering across his face. "I came to see my daughter. Heard she's really happy now. With a boyfriend, no less." His voice was a poisonous sugar, and his gaze raked over the quiet home, missing nothing.
"Please," she whispered, her hands clasped in a silent prayer. "Just let her be happy. Don't do this to her."
At that moment, the cheerful sound of conversation drifted down the hall. Anita and John appeared, their faces alight with an easy joy that instantly curdled into terror at the sight of the intruder.
"John, you should go," Anita said, her voice thin. The joy drained from her eyes, replaced by a deep-seated fear John had never seen before. "We'll talk later."
John's concern deepened, a crease forming between his brows. The vibrant, confident Anita he knew was gone, replaced by a trembling, hunted creature.
"So this is the one," her father sneered, his eyes locking onto John. "The boy who caught the devil's heart. I am her father."he spat
Anita's breath hitched, the old panic surging through her veins. She felt a desperate need to appear strong for John, to hide the monster her father was, but her body betrayed her, a visible shake in her hands.He moved with a chilling, predatory speed, lurching forward to seize her arm.
His fingers dug into her skin with the force of an iron clamp. "Did you think you could escape me forever?" he hissed, his breath hot and rancid. She gasped, struggling for air as panic consumed her. The words, the scent, the searing pain—it was all a grotesque replay of her childhood fears.
Anita's mother tried to pull him away, but a brutal shove sent her sprawling to the floor, her cry swallowed by the shock of the impact.
"Let go of her!" John's voice cut through the haze of fear, his tone as solid and unyielding as a stone wall. He stepped between them, his hand firm on Anita's free arm as he pulled her back.Her father's sneer twisted into a grim mask of pure malevolence.
"Do you know who you're defending? She is a curse. The darkness. A trap. Walk away before it's too late; she brings nothing but bad luck."
"Father, please," She begged, the childish title falling from her lips as tears finally escaped. She looked at John, her heart pounding, terrified that her father's toxic words would poison everything.John held her gaze, his expression unwavering.
"I think I know who Anita is. I don't need your opinion." He met the older man's furious glare. "Now leave. And never come back."
The man's smile returned, cold and terrifying. "You were warned," he said, the words a promise of future pain. "She is the darkness and will drag you down, with her comes pain and suffering." Then he was gone, leaving behind a silence far more suffocating than the confrontation itself.Anita sagged against John, her knees weak, knowing that the battle for her future had just begun.