Battlefield: The Trailer Park

The product of rape becomes attacked herself

by Mongoose750 (mongoose750@yahoo.com)

Heather Vance was a sweet girl who lived in a trailer park just south of town. No, it's not one of those trailer parks that produce the kind of people you would see on afternoon talk shows. There were no married fathers having affairs with eighteen-year-old girls, or women with ten kids who sit around and wonder who the kid's daddies were because they lost track, or any of that crazy stuff at this place. It was like any other normal neighborhood anywhere else, with hard working people, nice people, bad people, and the usual mix.

Heather lived with her father, a local police officer, and her mother, a teacher's aide at the local high school. The three lived, along with Heather's two younger brothers and sister, in a nice doublewide near the front of the trailer park. There were always well-manicured shrubs and a nice garden in front of the Vance's house. That was because Heather had a green thumb, and always liked working in the soil. In fact, she was attending classes at the nearby community college to further her career goals to that end. At the moment, she was torn between landscaping and owning a nursery. Her parents had suggested the possibility of doing both, and she pondered it.

Heather was 5'5" with silky blond hair, and a build that was a little stocky; different from her brothers and sister who had slim bodies. While playing for her high school softball team, she took up weight training to keep in shape, and the habit stuck. Her arms and legs were thick, and sculpted, like finely cut marble. For extra fun, and because of her father's prodding to protect herself, Heather took self-defense courses taught by a former Green Beret. She enjoyed the classes, despite the fact that she would most likely never need to use her skills. Heather got along with almost everybody.

One day, Heather's mother beckoned her into the dining room where she and her father sat at the table. Heather sat down slowly.

"Mom, dad, is everything okay?" She asked.

"Yes, honey, we're fine. This is about something else. We decided to wait until you were of age," her dad began.

"Of age for what, that I was abducted by aliens or something?"

Both parents grinned, and then her mother began slowly. "I can't think of a better way to say it gently, so I'll just say it. Pete is not your father."

"What?" Heather replied.

"Your mother was raped. We were starting to see each other at the time. Shortly after it happened, your mom found out she was pregnant," Pete continued.

"Raped? Here?"

"No, not here," Bonnie, her mother continued. "We lived in Providence, twenty miles away. There was a series of rapes in the neighborhood, and I was the latest victim. Fortunately, I was also the last victim as well."

"The police caught him, your mom picked him out from a lineup, gave him a speedy trial, and put him behind bars, where he belongs," Pete said.

This was a whole lot for Heather to take in. To find out you were the product of an act of violence was a little hard to accept. She had one question; it was irrelevant now, but she had to know.

"Mom, when you found out you were pregnant with me, did you ever think of, of having an . . ." Heather couldn't finish.

Her mother shot forth from the table and grabbed both of her hands. "No baby, I never thought of having an abortion. It was not the best way to have you, but you were life, it was not your fault. Some of my friends suggested it, but I told them you shouldn't pay for the evil acts of another."

"When your mother said that, it made me love her more," Pete said. "As strange as it is to say, because of that, I knew she was the woman I wanted to spend the rest of my life with, and to have more children with."

Heather couldn't think of anything to say, so instead, she jumped up, ran over and gave them both a big hug. They soon pleaded with their daughter to let them go before she caved in their ribs.

In the days that followed, Heather reflected a little on her sudden revelation, but not too much. To her, Pete was her real father, regardless of genetics. He never played favorites with any of her siblings, and he stayed with her mother through that tough time. The fact that a horrible time in her mother's life had been turned into a positive, made her feel good.

It was the beginnings of a warm Friday evening. Heather was walking back from visiting a friend a couple of streets away in the trailer park. She was finished with her homework, and after chatting with her friend, she was going to go home, watch a movie or read a book, and relax. She was wearing an olive drab T-shirt, blue jean shorts, and barefoot, her normal dress around the park when it was warm.

There was a bar called The Thirsty Dog, which was located between the trailer park and downtown. It was a rowdy place, and it wasn't a spot where the most upstanding citizens go. In short, it was a place where rednecks got drunk. After they got drunk, for some reason, they wanted to visit the trailer park. For some of them, it was to look for any desirable women.

The truth was, desirable women didn't hang around The Thirsty Dog, and desirable women didn't hang around men who frequented The Thirsty Dog. For the four men who dropped by long enough to get a beer or two, or three or four, that reasoning didn't matter. They wanted a woman, not a broken down hag who hung around their watering hole, but someone fresh and untouched. So when they saw Heather walking home, all the lustful things a disrespectful man would want to do to a pretty woman appeared in their dirty little minds. And they ran after her, hooting.

Heather saw the four men rushing toward her, and did what any sane woman or man would do, she ran. She knew the park like the back of her hand, including short cuts. However, today, that knowledge would fail her. She ran in-between two trailers that would normally land her on her street. But that day, the son of one of the residents visited, and his giant SUV blocked the passageway. Heather stopped, turned around, and that's when the first man tackled her.

Her training kicked in, and she rolled with the impact as she hit the ground, just as she was taught. Her right knee also flew up between her attackers' legs, and he rolled off her, curled in a ball, whimpering loudly.

The second man landed on top of her to finish, or rather start what the first man tried to do. Heather quickly placed her hands on his chin and the back of his head, and jerked quickly to the right. She pushed him off, just in time for the third man to land on her. Her fingers on her right hand in the form of a "C," grasped the front of his throat, and gave a brutal jerk. She pushed him off and jumped to her feet.

The fourth man stopped. He saw two of his friends . . . dead? And the live one was holding his wounded manhood. Then his blood ran cold when Heather lifted her right leg up in the air, and delivered a lethal ax kick that hit the back of his neck. The man was now still.

"You killed my friends!" The man cried out. He didn't consider the fallacy of his logic, which would have told him if he thought long enough about it; that they attacked her first, and attacked her with the aim of extracting pleasure from her, without permission. All he saw were three dead friends, and the woman responsible.

To Heather, regarding this affair, and especially what happened to her mother years ago, she concluded that she'd rather be dead before anyone raped her. Her, or them. Enraged, the man charged at Heather, his arms reaching for her neck. Heather ducked under his reach, and grabbed his belt and shirt, lifted him up. As quickly as she picked him up, she slammed him back down. She then straddled him, and pounded away at his face with her fists. She kept hammering away with the plan of smashing his head, until a pair of hands pulled her away.

"Heather, it's me, honey; are you all right?" Her father asked.

"Y-yes," Heather said.

"Let me check your hands, baby," her mother told her. "What happened?"

"I was coming home, and these four men attacked me. They were going to . . ." Heather trailed off.

"I saw the whole thing, honey. You did good. Otherwise, that would be you lying there," said Barbara Martin, a senior citizen, and the biggest gossip in the trailer park.

During the evening, Barbara sat out on her porch to watch the goings on in the park. When she saw Heather tangling with the four men, she pulled out her cell phone her son bought her (that she only used for "emergency" purposes), and called Pete, who in turn called for backup as he fled out the door, with his wife in close pursuit.

"Daddy, am I going to jail?" Heather asked.

"No, baby," her father said as both he and her mother embraced her as more patrol cars pulled up. "You'll be all right."

In the time that followed, Heather received her brief moment of fame. She gave a lot of the credit to her self-defense teacher, who received an increase of interested students who wanted to defend themselves. As predicted, Heather's actions were considered self-defense with no charges. The Thirsty Dog however, received a couple of squad cars passing by each night, so no unsavory customers will "visit" anyone else at the park or anywhere else unannounced.

The sole survivor of the quartet, after he healed from his facial injuries, tried to deliver a suit against Heather for aggravated assault and wrongful death, excessive force, whatever would stick, but he practically got laughed out of court. He was in prison pleading his case to those who bothered to listen about the "psycho chick from Hell" that "attacked" and killed his friends.

One day, Heather approached his mother in the living room. She wore a dark blue polo shirt, blue jean cut-offs, and barefoot. Her mother stopped polishing the coffee table to see what was up.

"Mom, where is my birth father being held?" Heather asked.

"At the twin towers prison north of town. You're going to see him?" Her mother asked.

"Yes, I just want to know."

"I understand. You want me to come with you?"

"Thanks, but I rather go alone."

Heather put on her flip-flops and later arrived at the prison. When she was finally allowed to see the man who had a part in her birth, she was surprised. He had a sort of repulsiveness about him that oozed from his being. While she had no doubts before, Heather was convinced for sure; there was no way her mother would be with a man like this by choice. When the man, who went by the name of Castor Smith, saw Heather, he leered at her in a way that fathers should not do with their daughters.

"So you're my "little girl,' eh?" Castor said in a raspy voice caused by smoking cigarettes and hard living.

"In a sense, yes," Heather replied.

"So what do you want from me, an apology for boning your mama?"

"No, I just wanted to see, that's all."

Castor raised his arms mockingly. "Well here I am! What you see is what you get."

"How much longer do you have in here?" She asked.

"A year with good behavior. Why, you want to have a "family reunion' or something?"

Heather crossed her legs and sat back. "Three weeks ago, four men attacked me and tried to rape me."

Castor paused. "So what does that have to do with me?" He asked.

"I killed three of them. With my bare hands."

Until then, Castor had been looking around the visiting room as he listened to his biological daughter. Now he snapped back to look at the neutral expression on her face, and the fact she casually mentioned what she did like she talked about the weather. A new recognition flashed in his eyes.

"That was you!" He said.

"I thought they had TV's in here, so I figured you heard," she remarked. "Those men were suspected in other rape cases, did you know that?"

"Okay; but what does that have to do with me?"

Heather uncrossed her legs and sat forward, her blue eyes boring into his. "There were two reasons I came here, "dad.' The first one was I wanted to see who the other party was who helped give me birth. The second reason is when you get out a year from now, and if you start raping women again, you had better get used to looking over your shoulder, because I will come and break your neck. If I hear or see anything that hints at you mistreating women, I will put you in the ground like I did those three rapists, with my bare hands, whether we have the same blood or not."

Castor was speechless as Heather got up from her seat.

"Thanks for the "reunion,' "dad,'" she said as she left the visiting room.

If you have enjoyed this story, perhaps you may want to read other stories from the Barefoot Heroines collection. There is a variety of stories to choose from. They can be found at http://www.thevalkyrie.com/stories/mongoose/index.htm.

Any comments, suggestions, or story ideas, email the author at shrewsberry@juno.com.

#2011, Barefoot Heroines, Inc.