it was one of those old apartments
where walls crumbled at a butterflies touch.
and glass crunched under every step.
and it was in one of these apartments
that the body of a girl lay.


her body had sunk
into the molding mattress
that sat upon dust covered floors.
her escape.


the bugs had begun
the decomposition of her flesh.
but they had never touched
the envelope in her hand.
even after her last breath left
she remained frozen,
tortured,
and without love.
she was just some silly girl.


the envelope was once white.
but now it's skin was an asphalt gray.
the sticky seal barely held.
and the name penned across the front
had long since bled into the fibers.
it was just a letter.
and she was just a girl.


if someone had, perchance, stumbled upon this rotting form.
they would have seen the letter.
they would have saved the girl.
and she would have gone back home.
but no one goes that way anymore.
no one dares care about a shanty apartment complex.
and no one remembers the girl.


the letter was her last.
it's writing scribbled and illegible.
but who it was addressed to would know
exactly the tale it held.
the story of a daughter
and her father
and the hate she felt for him.


once upon a time
the girl was a daughter.
the only daughter.
and she had a father
a wonderful father.
but he hadn't ever cared.
and now she was gone.



she had nothing concrete.
to pin her murder on him.
no evidence.
nothing.
she had nothing.
because he had taken it all away.
he had known, he had thought it out.
and now she couldn't make him pay.
it was over.


maybe if someone had seen.
maybe if someone had stopped it.
she wouldn't be in this place
laying on a ratty mattress,
rotting.
maybe if he wasn't so believable.
maybe if he wasn't so poisonous to those around
she wouldn't have had to leave.
maybe.


she was once a daughter.
but he had never been a father.
he had been a predator.
a monster.
and she was the child hiding under the covers.
just some little girl
who fell for the lies.
just like everyone else.
but she had to pay the price.
he made her pay the price.
the minute he walked in,
she died.


and now there are apartments
that crumble in the sun,
and windows that let the rain in.
and in one room
is a girl on a bug eaten mattress.
and she was once a daughter.
and she thought she had a father.
but she had a monster.
and no one saw her die.


there is an envelope
that is grasped in the girls bony fingers.
'daddy' it used to say.
and inside it told the story
of a daughter and a father.
of a life and a murder.
a scary bedtime story.


daddy.
i hate you.