A Tale Of Blood Throughout My Life

After being dropped off from dance late at night, I was expecting to walk into a silent house where everyone was asleep. Instead, I walked into my living room to find the rest of my family sitting on the couch with the television off, which was strange for my family. It was clear they were waiting for me to get home, so I sat down too. My mom and dad exchanged a look and a sigh then turned back towards my brother and me. They babbled absently for a few minutes, then, my mom quickly spit out the words, as if ripping off a Band-Aid, "We are moving back to Arizona." There was a brief moment of stunned silence before I burst into tears. I could not imagine why my parents would decide to separate me from my best friends six months before we were supposed to

From the ages of 8- 14, I lived in a very volatile home. Coming home from school, I never knew if it was going to be a quiet day in my house or if the entire house would be engulfed in screaming. I dreaded the weekends, that meant that everyone was going to be home. Everyone home meant that things could easily go up to flames in just a millisecond. I tried my best to never be home, I would spend the days with my friends. I knew that when I got home there was a 90% chance of everyone fighting. One day in the summer of 2012, things got too heated, and my mom finally decided to move. We packed up everything in a few hours while my stepfather was at work. We moved into my best friend’s home for a few days until we found an apartment within the school district to move into.

Once my mom and my step dad got a divorce her, my brother, and I moved in to our old house until we could go back to Tennessee where we originally came from. Everything went downhill from there. The house had no water or electricity and she would leave me

Six years ago, a summer afternoon, my dad hugged me and I said “I will be gone for three days, I have a job in Austin, but I promise that I will be back before your birthday. I promise.” Days, weeks, months almost two years passed by and I did not receive any phone call or text message from him. Throughout that time my dad was gone, my mom told me that she was getting the papers ready to divorce my dad. I was noticing that the last three-four years that I was living with both of my parents, their relationship was getting worse. It was not a healthy situation for anyone in the house. What I mean about not being healthy is that my mother and father were damaging one another, emotionally and verbally, which my brothers and I would watch everything. Every day was the same routine, we forgot how it was to have a peaceful home. Around that moment, I honestly never thought divorce was going to be their solution.

He would come home wasted after weeks of not being home; of me wondering where my father had been all those weeks. Staying up late on school nights just wishing for him to come home and tuck me in bed, to tell me he loved me, to ask me how my day was, or just tell me that he was there to stay. As a first grader it is hard to explain to your friends why they can not come to your house to play just knowing that if he is there that he will be drunk yelling at my mom for nothing. It got to the point to where he would come home after a few days and grab a suitcase and leave to go with his new girlfriend for a few days or even weeks. Right before he would leave I would always have hope that he would tell me where he was going or take me with him. I just wanted a father. My mother always told me that he would be back and to have hope; to always trust in her and that she would always be there for me. She was always my rock when I was younger. Until one day she finally told me what a monster the man I called my dad was. He was an abuser, physically and mentally. She told me the truth about the man that I wished was in my life for so long. He never wanted me. I was the youngest out

Bloodsworth described the torments he faced while confined in the Maryland prison. Other inmates would yell through the pipes, “were going to get you Bloodsworth and do to you what you did to that little girl” (2013). He described being confined to a very small cell, while being kept locked away in isolation. He eventually went on to become the prison librarian. In prison he would keep up a healthy habit of reading. One day he came across a book that a guard had passed along. It was titled The Blooding, by Joseph Wambaugh. It was in this book that he learned about DNA evidence being used to secure convictions. He also realized that DNA evidence could also be used as a tool to exonerate.

Life altering occasions tend to happen in the blink of an eye. One moment I am happy and content with how the world is. The next thing I know, I am no longer capable of having trust and faith in others. My feelings of trust have changed sense the events of 9/11 terrorist attack on the world trade centers, Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, and the Boston Marathon bombings.

It was tough trying to handle parents who were always drunk, always violent, always complaining that they could not afford to buy my siblings and me food when every night they would come home with two new bottles. Every night had the same ending. My mom crying for help as my father showed the true demons that hide beneath his aging flesh. I wished many times to die, cried myself to sleep almost every night, and tried my best to keep a face that did not reveal how I truly felt.

For as long as I could remember, a trail of blood always seemed to follow me. It starts when some punk kid picks on me, the next week or so, they die. Most blame me, the police accused me. No matter where I would go, the killings follow me. Nobody wanted a girl like me around, I wouldn't blame them. I wouldn't be around me anyway. At least at home, I wouldn't get bullied, no more killings.

I was really young to notice the things that were going on with my mom and dad but I had a clue that was going on because I was around it and it happened so often. My brother had no clue because he was only 1 when things started to get out of hand. When my mom left the house I didn't know she was leaving to start a new life in Florida and leaving me and my brother like we were not her children. My dad sat me down and explained to me what happened, I did not know what was going on. Once my brother started to get older some days he would ask ‘’Where is Mommy’’ and I started to cry because I knew what was going on

Mitch was having difficulties trying to figure out where and when Jack would have gotten a blood sample from him. After failing to unlock the contents of the USB drive with his own blood it was obvious the Jack did not have a sample of his blood to use. Looking up Mitch said in a contemplative voice “Who’s blood did he use?” After a short pause the lights came on “It’s Katy’s blood. Now, where the hell is she?”

Blood. It is almost brown, crusting on his soft fingers, all she can think is how it's not the first time.

In my case, I was blessed to go home to a dad every night, even though I can’t tell you anything about my father for the simple fact that he never gave me a hug, kiss, told me he loved me, spent any time with me or said anything positive. He always talked to my mom and me like we were nothing, and even beat my mom. When I would try to tell the family about it, they just looked at me like

Devastated, I ran to my room gushing my eyes out. All these emotions going through my head of how my life would be without my parents in the same room or even house. From what I remember it all started about mid-June, the weeks before that were crucial. My parents would always argue over how to deal with a situation between me and my brother, Skyler. They hardly spoke to one another, but when they did they would just start bickering. I remember, one night after dinner they both went into ''their'' room with the door locked yelling at one another. Skyler and I didn’t know what to do, so we went downstairs and tried to figure out what was going to happen. With a scared tone I asked if mom and dad were going to get a divorce?" He answered back '' No, they love each other, they wouldn’t do that to us." That following night, was a school night everything was quiet except for my crying. I couldn’t sleep; all I was thinking about how it's going to affect my family.

My mother relocated to Birmingham, Alabama my first year of high school seeking a better life. Apparently, my father started to miss having his family because he went from being a “ghost father” to a “pop up father”. My father was here one moment and gone the next; he was constantly in and out of our lives. Initially, my classmates scrutinized and ridiculed me for having a fatherless household. I felt destitute and powerless. I needed to find someone or something to influence me in a better way by helping me change from a boy into a man. I became a recluse, never interacting with anyone.