What had brought her to this horrific place? She now lay dead upon the floor of her own home, her life ended in such a wretched way. Those who heard of the death blamed it on idleness and vice, yet they did not truly understand the course of events that had led the woman to this terrible end.
         Flashback three years and no one would recognize the happy young mother, pregnant with her third child. Her days were filled with joy in her children, and the true love of her husband.  The house three years back presented a picture-perfect family, something from a Norman Rockwell painting. Nothing seemed amiss, yet as is often the case, darkness lurked just around the corner. The young husband, who was well liked and always merry, hid a secret even his wife didn’t know. The man had once been a wild youth, given to drinking and gambling. He had never fully shaken the clutches of such evil. He had taken to going down to the local bar and making bets with rough, dangerous men. Men very different from the young man, men he didn’t fully understand. Thus, he put himself in grave danger without ever truly realizing it.
         The inevitable day of doom came to the young family. It started like any other day, nothing to distinguish it from the other joyous days of their fairy-tale like existence. The young wife got up and made breakfast for her family. Her husband joined her in the kitchen. They talked and laughed, enjoying the peace of a house full of sleeping children. Suddenly, without warning the door flew open. The wife let out a piercing cry. Two men, huge men, covered in tattoos, and rippling with muscles, stocked into the room. One man grabbed the young husband and the other threw the wife to the ground.

He told her sharply, “Stay down!”

         Then he walked to the husband, they dragged him outside to the yard. The wife crawled after them. One man kept his hold on the husband and the other started beating him. There was no one around for miles; no one would be interrupting them.

They asked him loudly, “Where is the money!?”

The husband pleaded with them, telling them he had no money. They just kept hitting him. The wife screamed and cried. They finally threw him to ground and kicked him in the stomach over and over. He was bleeding from his mouth. They stood him back up and one man took out a knife. He slowly began slicing into the young husband’s arms, and his legs, he cut up his face. He began to cut off his fingers one by one. The grass was full of blood, and skin. The young man was no longer recognizable. The wife was in shock, numbed by the horror of what she was witnessing. She sat perfectly still and watched, no longer able to cry out.
         When it was clear that the young man was dead, the two men dropped his body to the ground. One of them kicked it one last time, for good measure. Then they walked slowly off, as if they had done nothing out of the ordinary. The wife continued to just sit there, in front of her house. The closest neighbors reported that they had seen some suspicious men in the area, and the police finally arrived at the once happy house.     
         The wife could never shake off the horror of what had happened to her husband. She never fully came out of her numbed shock. She passed through life in a sort of daze. Whenever any memory began to cut through the mist of her mind, she would drink. Her drinking assured that she was in a constant state of numbness and fog.  Even the power of the love she bore her children, couldn’t break through the fog. She knew they were there, and knew she could not help them. She could not provide for them in her state of mind. The community failed the children as well. No one came to their aid; no one wanted to rescue the poor suffering family. They viewed the brutal death as a disease; they might die if they came into contact with the family. Soon those in the community pushed the horrific event from their mind, instead choosing to blame the mother of idleness and vice. They chose to not help her, so to cover their guilt they blamed her. In some way the death of her husband, and the sad state of her children, were all her fault.
         For two more years, this carried on. The mother attempted to provide for her kids without ever really touching base with reality. She lived in a world of fantasy, a world of safety from the horrors of reality. She eventually fell so far, into her own mind, she was delusional. She often imagined her husband was still alive, still with her. Other days all she could see was his disfigured body, lying in the grass. On those days she would drink heavily, eventually floating herself back in fantasy land. Her final day came, and she was worse than ever. She awoke and saw her husband sleeping next to her. She got up to make breakfast, and he followed. She talked to him, they laughed together. She brought out the breakfast and set the table. Her children were too young to fully comprehend their mother’s madness. Yet, this morning the eldest knew something was wrong.

“Mommy, who are you talking to? Mommy!” He yelled at her.

The mother heard his voice in the husband’s mouth.

She laughed, “Why are you calling me mommy?”

The boy yelled again, “Mommy!”

He began to grab at her, and he knocked the plate she was holding to the ground. It shattered into a hundred little pieces. With it shattered the mother’s illusions. All of a sudden the fog, that had plagued her for 3 years, cleared. She screamed with horror as every graphic detail she had been trying to repress, of her husband’s death came back to her. She screamed as she saw that shards of glass had cut her little boys legs. She looked around in panic; she realized how she had failed her children. She saw that she was an unfit mother. She ran to the kitchen and grabbed a bottle. She gulped the alcohol down, desperately wanting it to bring back the fog. It wasn’t working, it made it worse. She had nowhere to hide from the trauma of her life. She turned, grabbed a knife that was sitting on the counter. With the desperate need to escape being the only thought that filled her mind, she forced the blade into her stomach. She screamed out in pain, but stabbed again. Blood began to flow from her without stopping. Her hands were soon full of blood. She felt a sudden need to go to her husband’s grave. She needed to be with him. She stumbled to the door. As she reached the threshold, her body quite her. She fell to the ground, and breathed her last.
         The community said the mother had died in a drunken fit, they said it was the fault of idleness, vice and intemperance. They looked pityingly on the children and hatefully on the mother. They spoke disgustedly of her terrible parenting skills. They dismissed her as simply a drunkard, who had no business having children. How terrible a community it is, that saw a family struggling and turned away. Who blamed a mother for things outside her control. They offered nothing, yet sat around and scoffed. Who are you to hate a life, whose story you do not know? Who are you to sit back and sneer at someone, who went through things you cannot even comprehend? Do not judge what you do not understand.