Fault

By Amy Ellis

Liz is a regular teenager with a best friend who can get her into the best parties which is great until Liz gets roofied and raped one night at a party and when she starts to speak up, things get messy. When no one, including her best friend, believes her story, she finds herself absolutely alone and the target of bullies, threatening her to "stop lying." Just as Liz is giving used to getting milk poured down her shirt and being called the school slut, mysterious letters begin appearing in her locker and Liz learns that there is more power in numbers and words than she ever imagined. Told in haunting verse, Fault is a story of power and taking back control when all seems completely lost.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Amy Ellis
• Release date: Jan 29, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301778997

Amy Ellis

Amy Ellis is a Longwood University graduate with a BA in English/Creative Writing and a minor in Children’s Literature. She is currently working on her Master's degree in Digital Publishing from Oxford Brookes University in the UK. She is the founder of The Self-Publishing Toolbox, a resource for self-published authors. Find out more about the toolbox at selfpubtoolbox.com.

Book preview

Fault

Amy Ellis

Fault

Copyright © 2013 Amy Ellis

All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except in the context of reviews.

This book is a work of fiction.  Any similarities to real people, living or dead, are purely coincidental.  All characters and events in this work are figments of the author’s imagination.

Smashwords Edition

Cover image Copyright © Can Stock Photo / tanatat

How It Starts

It starts with a kiss. They said

it’d be innocent enough.

They said. Panties sliding off,

one shoe still on, one shoe on

the unvacuumed floor—

someone’s bedroom. Condom

wrappers. This is how it starts.

Lucy

Lucy’s a boy magnet. Black

curls that hang on her shoulders,

breasts that nearly spill out

and a toothpaste ad smile. Boys

cling to her, wanting to peek

inside her sweaters and longingly

watching her suck a strawberry

milkshake, a red and white straw

placed between her pink lips.

I’m not like that; ash blonde

and bland, flat hair and flat

chested. My sweaters sag

where my breasts should be,

my lips a dull cracked salmon.

They don’t watch me nurse

a milkshake or a lollipop.

They don’t fantasize about me.

Dad

Dark hair, disheveled and peppered with gray,

his work uniform coated in drywall dust,

sipping coffee at the kitchen table

reading the newspaper from last week.

He’d been waiting for me.

How was the sleepover? His eyes lit up.

Great, I said, trying to hide the ripped underwear

balled up in my hand, the raging hangover,

the urge to vomit on the front porch,

the pain between my legs. It was great.

Vanilla Girls

Lucy and I used sit on the curb to eat vanilla

ice-cream cones, our tongues licking

white cream from the sides as it dribbled down.

We never thought a thing of it.

We’d never do that now.

Mr. Martin’s Drawing Room

I sit in the back of my classes,

only raise my hand in English,

listening to the hum of poetry

on the teacher’s tongue, hanging

after class on the decoupaged stool

at the front of the room, watching

the posters on the room follow

me with their eyes. I stay

because he understands.

I draw him