BELLA
Dear Journal,
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I really need to let go of the past, I can't continue to live nor dwell there.
I can't continue to feel the guilt and the shame of what's done and over with. Guilt will kill you and shame will hold you back. So why do I continue to do it? It's so easy to not let go, but why do what's easy.
I've never taken the easy way out before. Look at me, I've turned my life over to God because it's said he forgives all, I preach forgiveness; I preach letting go and moving forward.
Why can't I do it?
Peace and Blessings, Bella
B
ella got into prostitution because she thought no one wanted her and that she wasn't anyone special. Sex made her feel extraordinary. She had something men would pay for and yes, she admitted sometimesâeven women.
This is why she did not preach on such topics as homosexuality because she had been there and done thatâit was her belief that what mattered most is what's in a person's heart. She just wished others believed this as well because the world would then be a much better place.
The word had also gotten around how liberal her church was. You can come dressed up. You can come dressed down. You can come looking any way you like as long as you did not come naked and that was enough to pack a full house every Sunday. She was proud of this. Her ability to keep up made her uncertain.
Bella questioned whether she deserved the life she was living; based on her past, she felt she did not. She knew God forgave all sins, and if you let her tell it, her sins were of a magnitude that required constant prayer even years later. It was a good thing God was her savior because she didn't think anyone else would know how to handle her.
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Bella sat up in the bed. There was no way she was going back to sleep so she might as well do something productive, like clean the house before she went to the opening of the Essence of Self Center.
Insomnia is a bitch
, Bella thought to herself, but not without adding,
Lord, forgive me
. Every now and then an occasional swear word came out, usually when she was alone. Once again, she asked for forgiveness. Sometimes Bella had to laugh to herself because it seemed like she was always asking for forgiveness. She wondered what her congregation would think of that.
Bella did the same thing in the same order every morning. She got on her knees and prayed for about thirty minutes, not that she timed her prayers. It just always worked out that way. It was like clockwork or maybe it was the inner workings of the Lord. Then she would pull out her Bible, read, take notes and work on her sermons.
Afterwards she would make herself a light breakfast and a cup of tea. She'd relax for a little while and then get up to do charity work or go on various appointments.
Bella couldn't believe this was her life. She couldn't believe that she wasn't running from anyone, that she wasn't hiding out, and that she wasn't selling her body. All those things were in her past.
A miracle, that's what she considered herself and her life.
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Bella never had a childhood. If she did, she didn't remember it. She actually didn't remember anything prior to the third grade.
Where she lived, who she lived with, it was all a mystery to her. Who her parents were and what they looked like were also unknown.
Bella was all alone in the world. She never really had a place to call home. She'd never really had a family to call her own. She never had much of anything. She grew up feeling like it was her against the world. Now she felt like it was her and God trying to conquer the world.
What she did remember is going from home to home as a foster child, being either abused, mistreated, or made to feel as though she were a maid.
One family she stayed with made it no secret that they were just in it for a check. They never took her anywhere, bought her the basics of the basics, the necessities, and that was that. She yearned for love. She yearned for someone to tell her she was worthwhile and that she meant the world to them. This never happened. There were many nights when she lay in bed crying and wondering why she was even born.
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When Bella turned fourteen, she decided enough was enough. She was fed up with being an afterthought. She decided to make a plan and run away.
I can take care of myself
. Bella figured that what her foster parents did for her she could do for herself. She looked older than her age, so finding a job shouldn't be that difficult. She could go to school during the daytime and work at night.
All she had to do was come up with some money that would tie her over until she got settled. She needed money now, she needed money yesterday. Babysitting was one way. She couldn't really think of another, unless it involved stealing.
Bella thought about the girls she went to school with. The girls everyone wanted to be around, who always had on the fly gear. These girls boosted for a living. They would find out what people wanted from the mall, take orders, go steal it and charge them half of what they would normally pay. From what she heard in the hallways, they were making a large profit.
Bella wondered if that was something she could do and get away with. Would they say yes to her if she went up to them and asked if she could be down? Would they laugh or would they kick her ass?
She didn't know but she was willing to find out. Her life, her very existence depended on it.
Before approaching them and asking if she could be a part of their posse, Bella decided she would try her hand at stealing, to see if it was even something she could do on her own.
She chose a Saturday to attempt it. She was home alone the majority of the day. All she had to do was sneak out, catch the bus to the mall, and proceed from there.
That whole week, she'd been collecting change from around the house and taking a dollar here, five dollars there out of her foster mom's purse and as luck would have it, one of the neighbors came by Friday in need of an emergency babysitter.
“Please, can I do it?” Bella begged. She was certain her foster parents would say no; after all, they didn't let her do much of anything.
To her surprise, they said yes. When she thought about it later, she shouldn't have been surprised, because she knew to them it meant more time for her to be out of their way.
That evening she watched the clock. Every time she looked up only fifteen minutes had passed. So to make the time go by quicker, Bella went to her room and tried to lay down for a nap.
As she was dozing off, her foster mom walked in her room. She never knocked; after all this was her house, she was fond of saying over and over.
“Aren't you supposed to be babysitting?”
Bella looked at the clock, it was time for her to leave.
As she walked to the neighbor's house, Bella tried to think of things she was going to do with their two kids, who were six and four. She hoped they knew how to entertain themselves.
When she arrived next door, Mr. Lee let her in. “Hi Bella, we're glad you could do this.”
“I'm glad I could too,” she told him. “I really need the money.”
“You're saving up for something?” Mr. Lee asked.
Bella wanted to say, “Yeah, I'm saving up to move the fuck out,” but being the respectful fourteen-year-old that she was trying to be, she just told him, “yes.”
Mr. Lee followed Bella into the house.
Bella could practically feel him on the heels of her sandals, he was walking that close to her. If she stopped, he might have run into the back of her.
“So, how long has it been since you've been with the Reeds?”
“Almost two years.”
“Are they treating you good?”
“As well as can be expected.”
Why was he asking her all these questions ?
By this time they were in the living room, Bella looked around. “Where's the kids?
“My wife is bathing them, we're leaving right afterward.”
“What time will you be back?” Bella found herself crossing her arms because if she wasn't mistaken, Mr. Lee was staring at her breasts.
“Probably around midnight, you might want to see if you could spend the night.”
On that note he walked off.
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About ten to fifteen minutes later, Mr. Lee, his wife, and the kids appeared.
“Here's the number you can reach us at in case of an emergency. Remember we'll be late returning, so see if you can stay over.”
“I will, and don't worry, I'll take good care of your babies,” Bella assured them.
When they walked out the door, Bella turned toward the kids. “So, what would y'all like to do first?”
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As it turned out, it went smoother than Bella expected. All the kids really wanted to do was play games and watch television.
Around 10:30
P.M.
, the Lees called and told her they'd be back around one in the morning, so she got permission to stay the night.
When the Lees returned home, the kids were in bed and Bella was asleep on the couch. Mrs. Lee covered her with a blanket and went into their bedroom, so Bella thought.
Sometime in the middle of night, Bella felt someone staring at her. When she opened her eyes, she saw that it was Mr. Lee.
“Yes?” she asked in a low tone and feeling uncomfortable.
Mr. Lee whispered, “You're a beautiful girl, Bella, do you have a boyfriend?”
Bella sat up. She wondered why he was asking her this question in the middle of the night.
“Thank you and no.” What else was there to say? She could tell he was up to something, but she felt paralyzed, as though she couldn't move.
Mr. Lee sat on the edge of the couch and touched her leg. “Do you want to make some extra money?”
Bella wasn't stupid, she knew what he was getting at, and she wondered what made him think he could ask her something like that?
“Why?” Even though she was only fourteen, Bella had a little experience not in traditional sex but in oral. One of the boys in school that she had a crush on asked her to suck his dick in the locker room and she did. She thought it would make him like her back, but it didn't. At first she was devastated but then she was thankful because it was short of a miracle that he didn't go around bragging.
“There's something I would like for you to do,” Mr. Lee told her.
She really needed money so she could run away. Would whatever he asked of her be something he'd be willing to pay for?
Mr. Lee took her hand and placed it on his penis. He waited to see what she would do.
Bella looked toward the bedroom. “I'm not sleeping with you.”
“I'm not asking you to, I just want you to touch me and show me your stuff.”
Bella looked toward the bedroom again. She knew what “stuff” he was talking about.
“You don't have to worry about my wife. She's sound asleep,” Mr. Lee assured her.
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Bella knew this was wrong, she knew she should get up and leave but she also knew he would be willing to give her some money, he'd said so himself. So she reached over and squeezed his penis through his pajama pants.
“Let me see your pussy,” he told her.
Bella closed her eyes, took her hand off his penis, and pulled her dress up. She moved her panties to the side.
She didn't know how she was supposed to feel, a part of her wanted to cry but desperate times called for desperate measures.
That night, on top of her babysitting money, she received an extra fifty dollars, just for letting him masturbate while she rubbed on herself.
This soon became a routine of theirs. He often asked her to babysit or when his wife wasn't home he said he needed someone to watch the kids while he worked around the house.
Between Mr. Lee wanting to see her again and her making money off of stolen clothes, she figured she just might be able to move in two months' time, three at the most.