Angela

Sweat ran down Angela's back as she came upright.  Another nightmare, the same nightmare that had troubled her all of her life.  In the dream she is in a forest, and she can hear a sweet woman's voice singing, singing to her.  She knows that the sweet woman is her Mother.  The features of the woman are teasingly lost in a foggy mist.  One minute she sees a nose that is absolutely perfect.  Then the nose is covered and one eye peers out of the mist.  She can't tell the color of the eye.  On the other hand the eye is lovely, perfectly formed, with a strong brow framing it, and lush eyelashes decorating it.

Then the woman is gone...lost in the mist.  Yet Angela hears the song continuing...sweet, low, and joyous.  Then gradually the voice changes.  The song is no longer sung by a woman mysterious and beautiful.  Now the song is harsh, rough, the voice singing it is Henry's.  The words are completely different.  Instead of singing her a soothing lullaby he's screaming at her, "You're worthless.  You haven't a single brain in your poor knot head.  I don't know why I bother with you.  I knew that a girl child was not as clever as a boy child.  I should have adopted a boy.  He would have quickly adapted to the lessons that I taught him.  You never will...never will...NEVER WILL!"

 Often the dream would bring Angela to wakefulness with the sound of her own screaming.  At first she can't remember where she is, and sometimes who she is.  If she has awakened Henry he begins to scream the same words at her that he wields as a club in the dream.  Confused, Angela is not certain what is real, the dream, or the wakefulness.

She turns to her stomach, and does her best to again coax slumber back.  The worst nights are when she has the dream multiple times.  She knows that having awakened Henry more than once he will NOT feed her.  

Henry uses every excuse that he can gain to keep food from Angela.  He is determined to keep her small, small enough to be mistaken for a child.  He is aware that most people are more forgiving of a child if the child is caught with a hand in their pocket. 

Henry feeds her, just enough to keep starvation at bay.  He has a long term goal.  That goal involves keeping Angela so small that she will pass for a child for the rest of her miserable life.  He works to achieve this by limiting her food, and giving her Herculean physical tasks to achieve.  He does not wish to go through the pain of training another child.  He has decided that if Angela grows regardless of her food intake he will kill her.  At that point she will be of no use to him, and only a drain on his assets.

Henry has long since lost any spark of human decency.  Instead of facing his challenges and trials with courage and determination he blames every single problem in his life on someone, something, else.  Nothing is his fault.  This makes him blessed.  Every person on the planet makes mistakes.  Henry NEVER makes a mistake.  The situations that are less than positive in his life are ALWAYS someone else's fault.

Angela fails in her efforts to sleep.  After a very long hour of attempting to sleep she gives up.  She has long since learned to walk silently.  She tiptoes far past Henry.  Reaching the crudely built shelter for their cache of food Angela helps herself.  She takes a piece of beef jerky, a piece of bread, and a large dollop of butter.  She is excited when she discovers some dried fruit.

Taking these treasures she creeps out beyond the clearing where Henry sleeps.  She sits on a large boulder overlooking a river.  The gurgling noises of the water comfort her anxious feelings. 

Angela is not yet ten years of age but already she has faced abandonment, neglect, starvation, privation, and many other difficulties.  The remarkable thing about Angela is that she has not allowed her situation to crush her native jubilant spirit.  She clings to each and every positive experience that comes her way.  Tiny things that most people would not even notice bring Angela surges of the purest joy.  A small blossom pushing it's way through the spring encouraged earth brings joy to her heart.  Having a few stolen minutes to leave Henry and bathe in the iciest of water makes her wish to sing, and often she does. 

If Angela can leave Henry for a time she races to get as far away as she can.  There she sings, sings, and then sings more at the top of her lungs.  Her only exposure to songs has been at the orphanage.  One of the caregivers that she had known there had sung constantly.  Angela treasures those few songs, those glimpses into a completely different life that she has never known.  "You Are My Sunshine," "Today While the Sun Shines," and "All Things Bright and Beautiful." 

At the orphanage the orphans were dressed in their very best on Sundays.  That even included a somber black hair ribbon.  She had seen a picture of a penguin once and felt that she and the other orphans looked like a train of penguins marching along single file.

At church Angela treasured the time to sing.  Each and every hymn became emblazoned in her heart and mind.  She does not sing much at the orphanage.  It is highly discouraged. 

Soon after Henry adopts her she makes the mistake of singing in front of him.  Sharply Henry barks, "Stop that noise!"  She only makes the mistake twice.  The second time she sang in front of Henry he refused to feed her or let her drink for a day.

Angela NEVER makes that same mistake.  On the rare moments when Henry tells her to get lost, she does just that.  She finds a place where she can sing, sing, and sing some more.  Angela doesn't believe that she sings well, but the music and words fill her soul with hope, an emotion that Henry does his best to deny her.