Let Me Forget (standard:Suspense, 1580 words)
Author: Cloud Strife	Added: Feb 16 2004	Views/Reads: 3521/2260	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
The short tale of how a chance encounter between two men brought back memories for one of them which should have remained hidden forever.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

yards up the road smoking their cigarettes as if without a care in the 
world and waiting patiently.  Waiting for him.  Adam knew he couldn't 
turn back from them but as always a small piece of him died as he 
cautiously approached them, praying intensely that the pain would soon 
be over. 

A chill went down his spine as they noticed him and began to stare and
laugh but he kept his eyes fixed firmly on the road ahead of him.  They 
could probably smell his fear as he approached on trembling legs but he 
was actually past them and now trembling with unequivocal relief when 
they grabbed him roughly from behind and dragged him several yards into 
a quiet alley while he kicked and screamed uselessly against them.  He 
knew what was coming.  As always he looked into their cruel faces and 
begged them not to hurt him but that seemed to make them angrier.  He 
didn't see them as human.  How could people inflict pain on somebody 
else like this?  There was never an explanation.  There was no reason.  
They were simply monsters.  This is how Adam saw them and it was 
terrifying because there is no reasoning with monsters.  In his mind 
they assumed almost supernatural status and powers. 

They beat him badly.  They punched him repeatedly in the face and chest
until he fell on the ground covering his face as best he could, though 
it was already covered in a mask of blood.  They then kicked him in the 
face and ribs savagely until growing bored they spat on him and left 
him there alone and crying on the ground wondering why he had to live 
like this.  It was not an isolated incident.  It happened many more 
times but Adam could never tell anyone because then they would beat him 
even more savagely or even kill him he thought. Sometimes he would lie 
there bleeding for up to half an hour and the only thing that would get 
him to his feet was the thought that they may come back. 

He would purposely wear a heavy jacket to school not only to give him
more protection from their kicks and punches but also because he could 
pull the large hood down over his face after the beating so people he 
passed on the way home would not see his bloody face.  When he arrived 
home he would rush to the bathroom immediately where he could clean 
himself up before saying to anyone who asked that the bruises were 
received during football practice that day. The bullies eventually grew 
tired of bullying Adam and left him alone.  Adam forced himself to 
forget the ordeal to such an extent that he was able to convince 
himself it had never happened at all and even that he did not know the 
boys who had bullied him if he should pass them in the corridors at 
school.  Despite this however he was severely changed as a person.  He 
was afraid of going anywhere since then, he was prone to deep spells of 
depression and could not trust people at all to the extent that he had 
few friends since the ordeal. 

Adam stared at Will for a few seconds and then turned around to the
front of the bus again with an immense sadness in his heart that he 
knew would never leave.  He got off at the next stop even though it was 
three stops too early for him and walked the rest of the way home 
feeling just as he had four years ago.  He knew that his life had been 
over since those days when he had felt like less than a human being 
because of William and his gang's merciless victimisation.  They had 
made him feel like a lonely and frightened animal.  He had been trying 
to live a lie now for four years but couldn't do it anymore now that he 
remembered everything. 

He took some electrical cord from the garden shed as soon as he arrived
home and without any fuss hung himself in his bedroom.  His father 
found him that way a few hours later.  He was swaying gently, his eyes 
were bulging and his face had turned a gruesome purple colour under the 
pressure of the cord against his neck but strangely there was a smile 
on his face.  A real smile because he was finally free.  Just before 
the end he had been happy because the pain and sadness would soon be 
gone forever.  His father's first thought was that he had not seen Adam 
smile like that in a long, long time. 


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