Chapter Text
Katherine Curst smiled to herself as she felt the cold wind on her face, blowing through her hair and making her long brown locks ripple in the breeze. Her blue eyes narrowed in on the blue sky above, and the white, gentle, puffy clouds.
Her legs pumped her forward as she jogged. There was always something peaceful about being outside and running and just letting her worries blow away on the breeze. Katherine never forsook her late morning jog. It helped her think sometimes, and other times it helped her clear her head.
When she was running in the bask of the morning sunlight, she didn’t have to worry about the challenges the next day would bring, she didn’t have to worry about pleasing her father, or caring for her brother. Those were nice things, too, of course, and she loved to do them, but sometimes they felt like burdens. Running never felt like a burden.
Even when she was little, running had always been her thing. She was on the elementary track team for a while, and she had run a couple races in high school. But those things paled in significance to the runs she went on now. Not only had her view of the world, and God, changed drastically, but she actually felt freer than she had been running for a crowd.
Here, there was nobody watching her. Nobody cheering. It was just her and God. When she was little, she had basked in the glory of her accomplishments, one of which was her ability to run, and with this ability, she had won many a race in her high school years. She was a good kid, though, got straight A’s in school (most of the time), never acted rashly or blurted out exactly what she was thinking like some kids. She was very reserved… quiet. But most importantly, she had always made her father proud.
She never embarrassed him like her younger brother Jason did whenever he said just what he thought. Her father liked the way she kept those thoughts to herself. It saved his face, knowing that at least one of his children had self-control.
She never used to shame him, never had to work hard to gain his approval. Katherine had always felt like something was missing, though. Something very important that she was missing, something that she had yet to discover. She couldn’t figure out who she was, and the struggle to figure out her identity and her purpose in the world consumed all of her attention.
That is, until the accident. Her mother and brother got into a car accident when Katherine was sixteen. Jason was only fourteen at the time. It wasn’t just a small car accident either; it was a big one. A car pulled out in front of them, and swerving to avoid it, her mother drove the car off the side of a cliff. However, it didn’t fall all the way down, which at first would seem like a good thing, but it really wasn’t. It was only stopped because a tree branch broke through the driver’s side window and held the car up to stop it from falling, and in so doing, killed her mother.
Her brother would have been fine and probably could have made it out with just a few bumps and bruises… that is, if he had been wearing his seatbelt. Jason had flown through the windshield, and tumbled all the way down to the bottom of the cliff.
Medical personnel got to him, but obviously not fast enough. Jason had been paralyzed. He would never walk or use his arms again. He was handicapped for life; the doctors couldn’t do anything about it.
The day of the accident, Katherine’s world was turned upside down. She was devastated by her mother’s death, and overcome with mournful sobs because of her brother’s predicament. She closed herself off after that, didn’t let anybody speak to her for a long time.
She felt like she was drowning, and yet she knew how to swim. She was falling, and yet she wasn’t the one that fell.
Katherine suffered from depression ever since that devastating day. A dark gray cloud hovered over her, and yet the rain never came. She didn’t let her father comfort her, didn’t let her brother speak to her, she just wept in silence, in the protection of her bedroom.
She wondered, what was the point of life? Could she even go on living after this? Why must there be death? Why must there be grief? Her heart was splitting in two and there was nothing she could do to put the pieces back together. A pain stabbed into her heart, a pain so deep, Katherine was sure it would never heal.
Her grades plummeted, her health failed. She was sixteen years old, and yet her body acted like she was fifty. No matter what friends or loved ones said, nothing could lift her out of the grave she had dug for herself.
She had gone to counseling, been examined by doctors, went through PTSD training; nothing worked. She was too far gone for anything to make a difference… at least that’s what it seemed like.
No colleges wanted her, and Katherine didn’t want them either. She didn’t have anything she wanted to do in college, nothing she wanted to be, no reason to even have a job, she thought. No reason to go to college. No reason to work. No reason to study. No reason to live.
She never moved out of her father’s house, and of course her brother couldn’t have, considering he still needed help with a lot of things he couldn’t do on his own.
She started spending more and more time away from the house, away from her brother. She didn’t want to be reminded of that awful day. She didn’t want to be reminded of the dropping of her heart when she heard the news. She didn’t want to be reminded of the ambulance sirens, the police lights, the yellow tape. She didn’t want to be reminded of the lifeless face of her mother before they covered it with a sheet. She didn’t want to be reminded of her brother when he finally woke up, and realized he couldn’t feel his limbs.
So it was easier to leave, to get out of there, to do something. But what she was doing, even she didn’t know. Yes, she had thought about suicide as an option before, but she had decided that she shouldn’t hurt her father or her brother even more than they already had been hurt. It wasn’t that she was completely clueless as to her family’s emotions.
She knew they probably couldn’t handle it if she killed herself. Why they still felt emotionally attached to her, Katherine couldn’t fathom. She was too far gone. She wasn’t the same person she had been anymore. She wasn’t the person that they knew and loved. She was someone else entirely. Where the old Katherine went, even she herself couldn’t say.
It wasn’t that she didn’t want to get her back. It wasn’t that she didn’t wish to be the same eager child desperate to figure out her purpose in the world. It was simply that she didn’t know how to get her back. The old Katherine Curst was simply… gone.
Gradually, over the months, her thoughts started to shift from suicidal thoughts, to thoughts of longing for the old Katherine back, and then eventually, to thoughts of revenge.
She was eighteen when she first started to think of revenge. Every day, she was reminded of the tragedy that had befallen her mother and brother, simply by looking at her brother, so she oftentimes refused to look her brother in the eye; anything to stop the pain that she knew would come whenever she thought of her mother.
She missed her… more than she could even describe. And eventually, that longing for her mother started to turn into brutal anger. Not at her mother, but at the people that killed her; the people who pulled out their car in front of her that day. She knew who they were, and each day, she was reminded of how their careless mistake forced her mom to pay the ultimate price.
At first, she tried to banish those dark thoughts from her head, force them into nonexistence. She tried to tell herself that those people didn’t know what they were doing and she really should give them grace. But it didn’t work that way. There was nothing to stop those thoughts from entering her head, there was nothing really telling her those thoughts were wrong. She knew they were wrong, deep down inside of her somewhere, but that sense of consciousness got pushed deeper and deeper down, until she forgot that she had even thought it was wrong in the first place.
Soon, every fiber of her being was fixated on thoughts of revenge for her mother. It was those dark thoughts that consumed her, morning to night, until it nearly drove her insane. She was slowly being filled with dark, dark anger and hatred. She wanted to avenge her mother’s legacy and her brother’s youthfulness.
She wanted to let them know exactly what they had, albeit unknowingly, done to her. She wanted them to know her grief, her loss, her anger. She wanted them to know how they had literally ruined her life, and all chances to go to college or get a scholarship. She wanted them to know, to feel, how deep her pain was, how sudden, how quick, how stabbing it really was. Her grief was just like a bullet to the heart.
No matter how much Katherine tried to fight these feelings of bitter hatred, nothing she could do would make them go away. Katherine was quite certain she had gone insane, no logical person would think like this. And yet, Katherine’s mind remained very clear.
Perhaps it would have all been okay had Katherine talked to her father and brother. Perhaps it would have all been okay if she actually told them what she was going through, instead of simply leaving them to guess. Perhaps they could have helped her get past the feelings.
But, no. Katherine never told them what was really bothering her and instead, spent more and more time away from them. Eventually, she started to plan, to form her strategy of revenge.
How did one go about getting a gun? That was Katherine’s main question. She knew that if she could just shoot the driver who had killed her mother, her revenge would be satisfied cause then he would feel exactly what she felt. She sort of had a plan, although admittedly not a very thorough one. Her plan was basically to break into his house, somehow, in the dead of night, wake him from a sound slumber, explain to him in clear words what he’d done, and pull the trigger.
Okay, maybe it wasn’t the most solid plan, but it was a plan nonetheless. Katherine didn’t want to do this… she really didn’t. But she didn’t see the use in fighting anymore. Hatred had overcome her. There was nothing she could do to banish her anger, so why try?
And so Katherine hooked up with someone who had the capability and means to get her a gun, a black market dealer, who promised to get her a semi-automatic revolver in exchange for an abundant sum of money. So Katherine used the money that her father had been saving for her for college (she didn’t need it anymore anyway), and still the whole time, she didn’t tell her father or her brother her plans. She worked to steer her father away from ever looking at her college funds, so that he wouldn’t see what she had done, and she had indeed succeeded.
Okay, yes, her conscience did stab at her, a little, since she knew deep down that going behind her father’s back and lying about her mental state was wrong, but, again, those feelings got pushed down, in exchange for her hatred. Soon, she forgot that she had even had doubts about her plan in the first place.
Since she hadn’t been in the house much to begin with, neither of her family members knew that when she was supposedly going on her “walks” she was actually meeting up with her black market contact. No, Katherine never thought about how that just might be dangerous. Not at all. She was too far gone, too far encumbered in her rage, to even have any doubts anymore.
One day, her contact had the gun for her, and Katherine had the money for him. She had smuggled the semi-automatic revolver into the house and hid it in her bureau drawer. Once that step was complete, Katherine only had to plan how she would get into her target’s house, and exactly what time she wanted to do that.
Soon, within a week, she had it all figured out. One day, or more accurately, night, she put her plan into motion. She snuck out of the house in the dead of night. All lights were off, all sounds were soft. There was nothing but the slight creaking of wood as Katherine creeped down the stairs, loaded gun in hand.
If anybody had been awake at the time and had seen her, they would have gotten nightmares just from the pure hatred and anger radiating off of Katherine. They would have gotten nightmares as they prepared to meet their inevitable doom. Katherine was 100% gone. Not a sliver of sanity was left in her. And that night, she was about to be a murderer.
She had snuck to her target’s house, which was not actually that far away. She pointed the gun at the lock on the front door and pulled the trigger. The lock shattered and the pieces clattered to the ground. Katherine reached out and turned the doorknob.
The house was quiet. Not a sound was heard. Not a soul stirred. No one had heard the shot that totaled the lock. All for the better, Katherine thought. Now they won’t see it coming. Perfect.
Katherine found the man of the house’s bedroom; the driver, the murderer of her mother, the inflicter of her brother’s predicament. The object of her hate. If she could get rid of him, at least she’d be free. She’d be free from her hatred. Katherine couldn’t wait.
She pointed the gun at the ceiling, and, without hesitation, pulled the trigger for the second time. A piece of metal flew through the ceiling with a bang. Immediately, the man lying in front of her sat up in his bed, clearly startled. Just what she had been counting on.
“What!?” the man shouted, clearly dazed. “Who are you?!” he asked, not in an inside voice mind you, noticing Katherine by his bedside. “Martha!!” he called for his wife.
Before he could get out of bed, Katherine reached out with her hand and grabbed him by the collar of his shirt to stop him from moving. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you. Unless you want her to feel what you’re about to feel, too.” Katherine stated, in as calm a voice as she could muster. Her voice was clear, certain, bitter. Katherine would have never thought she had this kind of hatred in her.
The man backed up a step. “What are you doing here? What do you want? Whatever it is, I’ll give it to you. Just leave my wife alone.” he said, his voice beginning to waver.
“I’m not here for your wife. And there’s nothing material you can give me. I only want you.” Katherine stated, coldly, cruelly, boldly. It was suddenly as if she had no fear.
“What do you mean? What have I ever done to you?” The man wavered.
Katherine smiled. “I’ll tell you what you’ve done.” She aimed the gun… right at the man’s heart. “I don’t know if you remember this, or if you even ever cared or gave a d—- about her, but… let me refresh your memory. Two years ago, there lived a woman with her old-fashioned husband, bright daughter, and out-spoken son. She was kind, sweet. Everybody loved her. But then you came along. You waltzed right in front of her as she was bringing her son back from baseball practice, and then what did you do? You just stood there, as you watched her car plummet off the side of a cliff, and what did you do? You just stood there, waiting for something to happen… watching. And what did you care? It’s not like you knew the woman, right? Not like you understood or even gave a d—- about what happened to her and her son. You just… watched her fall to her death. You just watched as her son tumbled out of the front of the car and got paralyzed forever… and what did you do? You just stood there… watching as what you inflicted on that nice, sweet lady that everybody loved played out. It’s not like you ever had to see her family again after that day, right? Except you forgot about one thing. We’re still here, and not seeing you get justice for your actions really p——- us off.”
“Wait, are… are you Katherine, the daughter?” the man asked, a sense of realization clouding over him.
“What do you care?” Katherine responded.
“You look just like her… that woman.” the man put in.
“How she used to look, maybe.” Katherine stressed.
“Why are you still holding onto this, Katherine? That was two years ago. Besides, it’s not like I did it on purpose. And I was found guiltless of third-degree murder, so… it’s not like I was reckless.” the man tried to reason.
“Yeah, you know, that’s the conclusion the jury came to, but I’ll never buy it. I know you weren’t paying attention to the road. Otherwise you would have seen her. And as for still holding onto this, how can you even say that? It’s as if you expect after two years for me to be completely over this… for my pain just to be gone. That’s not how grief works. Do you even know what you’ve done?! My whole life went down the drain because of you.” Katherine expressed.
“I know. I understand—“ the man started, but Katherine cut him off.
“You know, I don’t think you do!! You’ve never felt the pain, the sense of loss, the grief. You’ve never felt how deep this is, how sudden, how stabbing, how quick. You’ve never felt like you’ve suddenly been shot in the heart. No warning, no buildup. You’ve never felt that. And why would you? You’ve been lucky. You’ve been just moseying on through life and not giving a d—- about anyone or anything but yourself! Well, not anymore.” With this, Katherine turned off the safety on the gun.
“Okay, Katherine. Wait! Look, I’m sorry—“ the man attempted to reason with her, but she cut him off again.
“Oh, you’re sorry!!? Yeah, that’s right! Just say you’re sorry! Maybe then this girl will lay off me.” Katherine shouted, shaking her head slightly. “No, not anymore. I will never let you terrorize us ever again. I will never rest until you have felt exactly what you made me feel. The pain, the hurt, the deepness of it, right in the heart. You ought to know, to truly know, what you’ve done to me. Because of you, I’ve sacrificed all hope of ever going to college. Because of you, I’ve been lost in depression. Because of you, I feel this pain, this bitterness, this hatred, this longing for revenge that will never be satisfied unless you feel it, too. It will never be satisfied unless you feel… this bullet to the heart.”
Suddenly, the man had no doubt of Katherine’s overall intention for being there. “Wait, Katherine! Let’s… um… talk about this rationally. You’re… um… you’re not going to say a prayer for me so that I will come to Jesus before I die, or anything religious like that? You’re not going to let me have any final words or… let’s talk about why you think this is the best way to avenge your mother, or whatever you’re trying to do, maybe avenge yourself or your own feelings I guess—“
Katherine had heard enough. Without a second thought, Katherine pulled the trigger. Her aim was spot on. The bullet found its mark, and the object of her hatred lay limp on the bed.
Katherine was expecting to feel relieved immediately. She was expecting for it to feel like her bitter hatred was melting away from her after the source of all her problems lay dead. But, that was, in fact, not what happened. Oh, her anger was fading away… but it was not giving way to relief.
Suddenly, all in an instant, Katherine realized what she had just done. Panic immediately arose on her facial features. The gun slipped out of her sweaty palm, before clattering onto the floor. Katherine’s hands were shaking, and her eyes were locked onto the wide open eyes of the one she had killed.
It was her. She did it. She took away this person’s life. She took it away from his wife, and she took it away from whatever other family members he may have. Little did she know… she had also taken it away from Jesus.
Suddenly, Katherine was thinking about his wife. Martha… was that her name? How would she feel? What warning had she gotten? Had Katherine unknowingly done the same thing to her that her husband had done to Katherine?
With her hand still shaking, she reached out slowly to the lifeless corpse of her making. “What have I done?” she muttered under her breath. “What have I done?!” a little louder this time.
There it was again. The shot to the heart. But this time she had shot herself. Her hatred had done this to her. Well… not her hatred in itself… more like the way she chose to handle it. This had all been a choice. This… was a choice. Once again, Katherine had dug her own grave.
The tears were streaming down her face before she even knew they were coming. Sobbing, Katherine fell to her knees beside his bedside. She raised her hands up and wailed… crying, sobbing, screaming.
“Why?!!! Why, God?!!!!!!” Katherine was convinced that she must sound like a crazy person. But when had she not been? She collapsed onto the ground, and buried her head in her arms… screaming, still wailing to God for an answer. When all along, she already had the answer. She knew why this had happened. It had happened because she let it happen. It was all her fault. She couldn’t blame God for her decision. Then why did she suddenly feel so mad at Him?
Once again, Katherine was drowning. She was drowning in sorrow, anger, regret. Hmm… that last one was new. Regardless, things felt much the same as they had before, but this time maybe it was even worse. What she had done did not bring her mother back, it did not change what happened to her brother. Why had she ever thought that this was the right way? Why had she ever let her anger consume her? Why did God let this happen to her? But most importantly, why did she let this happen to herself? She had been trying to bring together the pieces of her broken heart, but instead, she wound up nearly destroying it completely.
Just then, Katherine suddenly felt the presence of another person in the room. She tried to sit up quickly and wipe her eyes out of habit, but the sitting up was forced, and however hard she tried to wipe the tears away, more kept coming, and Katherine could not stop her sobs from bubbling to the surface.
Katherine was finally able to clear her vision enough to vaguely see the figure in the doorway. At first, Katherine was confused as to why a red-haired woman with freckles on her cheeks would be staring in disbelief, the beginnings of tears in her eyes, at the dead man on the bed and the crying young woman before him, a look of shock and horror appearing on her facial features. It probably took Katherine a full minute before she remembered about her victim’s wife, Martha. This must be her.
Her mind was so discombobulated right now, it was no wonder it took her so long to register what she was seeing. All that Katherine’s mind could really register was the pain, much, much deeper than it had ever been, swirling in the center of her chest. Katherine couldn’t begin to think of what to say to her. And she would rather not say anything. She would rather not see Martha’s reaction. She just wanted to crawl away into a pit and die.
But she couldn’t look away from Martha’s face. Tears were rolling down her face, her mouth opening slightly. “Who are you? What’s going on?” Martha muttered the questions under her breath, her voice quivering with emotion.
Katherine tried to force out an answer, but her vocal cords refused to work. All that came out was another sob. She longed to explain herself, maybe to try to make the pain less deep for her. But she simply… couldn’t. All sense of normality was gone. Besides… she was a murderer. How could she ever justify that?
The woman slowly crossed the room to her husband’s bed, stepping over Katherine’s handgun on the floor, and she placed a shaking hand on her husband’s arm. “Honey? No…” she choked up before she could finish her thought, and the flood of tears flew free.
Katherine knew exactly what Martha was feeling. She knew exactly what… she caused her to feel. This whole thing was about getting revenge for the person who had shot her in the heart. But… unknowingly, Katherine had just shot two people in the heart. One literally, and then one just like how she had been shot. And in the meantime, she had shot herself again. She dissolved into wails again, a fresh torrent of tears starting along with Martha.
I’m sorry!! I’m so sorry!!! I didn’t know what I was doing, I’m sorry! I never meant to shoot you and I’m so sorry I shot him!! Please… wait!! I’m sorry!! Katherine longed to scream. But she… just… couldn’t.
Then the rest was a blur. She knew that Martha must have called the police (I mean, duh, there was a murderer who had just killed her husband in her house), but Katherine didn’t remember when that happened. But she did remember the flashing red and blue police lights. It took her back… once again… to that dreadful day two years ago, and a fresh wave of tears started.
She knew that she was crying the whole time, unable to stop even when she was getting handcuffed and shoved into a police car. She saw them rolling the body away on a gurney, and there was some other policemen carefully putting her gun in a plastic bag and counting it as evidence. There were also some policemen talking to Martha, supposedly consoling her.
Apparently, Martha must have remembered who Katherine was and told the policemen, who then called her father. At least, that was the only explanation Katherine could come up with when she spotted her father, obviously having been aroused out of a sound sleep, doing his fast walk down the street toward the police car that Katherine was in, calling out to the policemen about what they thought they were doing with his daughter.
The policemen countered that they had sufficient reason to believe that she had just committed murder and were going to take her to a safe place until they could get a trial organized for her, where she would have the right to an attorney to defend her. The charges? First-degree murder.
It shouldn’t sound as scary as it does, though, cause after all, it’s the truth. She did in fact commit first-degree murder, as she had most definitely been planning this for months. Katherine didn’t have very high hopes for the upcoming trial. She doubted her new attorney would even be able to argue that she hadn’t done it when that wasn’t the truth. Heck, she might even plead guilty!
The only thing was that Katherine really didn’t want to go to jail. But why should it matter? It wasn’t like she was going to do anything with her life in the first place. Might as well just let it waste away in a jail cell, right? Or, if worse came to worst, she might as well just kill herself now… spare them the trouble of having to do it for her.
Whatever happened to that girl that Katherine had used to be? Once again, Katherine found herself longing for her back. She used to have such high hopes for the future, such potential, such energy. She used to be a bright young girl with a future. Now what was she? A murderer who had lost the will to live. Her grief had never felt so prominent.