“Fausto, leave her alone!” Christina closed her eyes tightly and pressed her palms against her ears, trying to block out the screams of her mother and father yelling at each other.
“I’ll teach her some respect!” Fausto screamed back at Christina’s mother.
“Fausto, please! She’s just a little girl. Leave her alone!” Shelly’s voice was high-pitched and she was on the verge of crying.
Christina started crying, tears blocking the vision of her mother and father screaming. She didn’t want to see or hear them yelling at each other, she couldn’t stand it.
“Daddy, stop! Stop!”
************************
“Stop! Stop! Stoooooop!”
“Christina?” She felt someone shaking her.
“Stop.” Her voice weakened and she felt tears in her eyes.
“Christina, wake up!”
Christina opened her eyes and looked at Britney, staring at her.
“Bad dream?” Britney blinked.
Christina bit her lip as Britney wiped away her tears. “I had another dream of my past. You know, my dad and stuff.”
Britney looked at her with concern. “Do you want to see a psychiatrist or something? You’ve been having a lot of those dreams lately.”
“No.” Christina said in a barely perceptible voice.
Britney sighed. “You can’t live in fear of your past your whole life, Christina.”
Christina closed her eyes tightly. “I can try to.”
“He’s sorry now. He even apologized for making your life a living hell.”
“It’s not just my dad, Brit.” Christina opened her eyes and stared into Britney’s dark eyes. “Everything about my past.”
“Your schoolmates bullied you. So what? That was years ago, and look at you now. You’re one of the most famous, successful, people in the world. You sure showed them.”
“I can’t just erase the hurt so easily. You don’t know what it was like.”
“No, but I can imagine.” Britney tore her eyes away from Christina as the phone rang. She walked over to the other side of the room.
“Hello?” She said into the phone.
“Is Christina there?”
“Yeah. Who’s this?”
“It’s Jorge.”
“Hold on.” Britney threw the phone at Christina, and it bounced off her pillow as she caught it.
“Hello?”
“Sup, babe?”
“Hey Jorge. I was just sleeping. I’m tired as hell.”
“Oh, you’re tired? I was thinking maybe we could go out to a club tonight.”
“I haven’t slept for two days, Jorge. And I have my break right now. Please let me sleep.”
“Aight, that’s cool I guess. I’m going to go clubbing then. You’ll be okay by yourself?”
“Yeah. Britney is here.”
“I’ll be going then. I love you, girl.”
“I love you too, Jorge.” Christina said as she hung up the phone, and looked at Britney. “If I start screaming again in my sleep, wake me up, k?”
Britney nodded. “Okay.”
Christina sighed and closed her eyes again, drifting off to the land of sleep.