Jenna's Battles

August 8th, 1863

Jenna Lewis woke up to the sounds of the roosters crowing in the nearby chicken coop. Knowing that it was time to get up and do the chores, Jenna stretched as she got out of bed. Throwing on her work dress and boots, she looked around her dusty, scarcely furnished room. Her bed was in the corner with an old worn-out quilt draped neatly across it. On the opposite side of the room stood a rickety wardrobe that housed the little number of dresses that she owned. There was a small nightstand with an oil lamp next to the bed along with a small, framed portrait of Jenna’s father from the war. It was her most valuable possession and the only thing that she had left of him.

Despite Jenna’s slim figure she was strong for her age; years of farm work had given her a small but muscular build. She resembled her mother’s facial features, but their hair and eyes were slightly different. Jenna had deep brown hair and sky-blue eyes, where her mother had dark brown hair and a darker shade of blue eyes.

She walked quietly into the larger room next to hers where her four younger brothers snored soundly. Gently, she roused her half-brothers Joe, Rob, and Herbert, but didn’t disturb three-year-old Edward who was slumbering in his crib. As the baby, his only chores were to help momma inside with the cleaning.

The three boys assisted Jenna in her various chores throughout the day. Jenna would milk the cows while eight-year-old Joe took the milk and processed it. She mucked the horses’ stalls, while seven-year-old Rob was in charge of making sure each of the livestock were fed and watered. Lastly in their morning routine, Jenna would clean the coop while five-year-old Herbert assisted in collecting and cleaning the eggs. Then after lunch, Jenna was to take the extra food that they produced fresh from their gardens to sell at the market in town.

Jenna was her mother’s first child and only daughter. Jen’s mother, Joyce and her father were together briefly when her mother was fifteen years old, and Jen was born a year later on April 10th, 1847. After Jenna was born, her grandparents forced Joyce to forget about the father of her baby, and he left to work with the lumberjacks in Northern Michigan. Clifford came along two years later as a knight in shining armor to comfort a vulnerable lonely woman. With his muscular build and his rugged features, Joyce was easily persuaded to say yes when Cliff proposed in 1850.

Not long after they got married, Cliff and Joyce decided they wanted to grow their little family, and after four long years of trying, Joe was conceived. Once they had confirmed the pregnancy, Cliff no longer hid his true feelings towards seven-year-old Jenna. Having grown jealous of the relationship between mother and daughter, Cliff made it very clear that he thought Jenna was the problem. Never showing her any kindness or compassion and becoming more abusive. By the time Joyce had realized how badly he was treating her firstborn, it was too late, she was now dependent on him for survival for all her children and herself. She had a toddler and a baby on the way with Cliff and was helpless against his increased hatred towards her daughter. The only thing Joyce could do was to try and keep Jenna away from him whenever she possibly could.

As mean and hateful as Jenna’s stepfather was towards her, she could always cling to her father and depend on him to feel a small slice of safety, he was the only person who would stand up to Cliff and defend Jenna against the relentless abuse. However, Jenna only saw her father on the rare occasion when the rivers would freeze over in the late winter months. He was a log driver who would return to work once the rivers thawed and the heavy logs could once again flow freely downstream.

Jenna was fourteen when her father joined in the civil war as a union soldier voluntarily, he wanted to help free the colored people from the south. He had been helping with the Underground Railroad for some time but decided they needed more strong men in the thick of it. Shortly after he had joined, there were reports of a massive fire that had spread through the area he was stationed and news got back that he had perished in the fire, leaving his teenage daughter with no protection from her evil stepfather.

Now nearing the age of seventeen, Jenna had become much more assertive when it came to her stepfather. As a child she would cower from him, and he would beat her just for looking at him funny. She still tried to avoid him, but that angered him more. He would always look for a reason to lash out at Jenna and make her cower to him like she once would.

With the impending birth of Joyce’s sixth child drawing near, Cliff had become more on edge. He’d gotten anxious around the due dates of his other children as well, Jenna had become used to this routine of his. Even though he hated Jenna, he loved his own children and their mother. His anxiety was due to the high risks of death during childbirth, for both Joyce and the baby. Jenna tried harder to keep out of his way during these times, because she had learned from the past that he liked to assert control when he was tense. And as always, she was his favorite target.

“Jen!” Her brother Joe ran to her, tears in his eyes with an empty milk bucket.

“What happened?” she asked, looking from Joe to the empty dripping bucket.

“Herbert accidentally spilled the milk while he was washing the eggs.” Joe’s eyes got big as he noticed his father walking towards them.

Before Jen could turn around, she heard a loud smack and pain radiated from the back of her thighs.

“Stupid girl, you wasted a whole bucket of milk because you were not watching your brothers.” Cliff yelled as she fell to her knees. In a single swift movement, he swung the belt once more and hit her across the back of her thighs again. Jenna screamed in pain as tears rolled down her cheeks.

“Daddy! It wasn’t Jen’s fault. I shouldn’t have set it on the stool by the sink.”

Cliff looked at Joe and then down to Jen, “You be lucky if I don’t sell you girl…” Bending down he slapped Jenna across the face. Glaring at her, he spat on the ground as he walked off. Waiting until Cliff was out of sight, Jenna reached up to her slightly swollen painful lip and felt the moisture of fresh blood.

“Jen, I’m so sorry.” Joe helped her stand up and walked with her to the house to help set lunch.

As she helped all the boys get their salted ham sandwiches, she could feel the pain of newly forming welts on her bottom. Every time she moved the fabric of her skirt would brush up against the sensitive tissue. Once the boys had all sat down to lunch, she made her mother a plate as well. Leaving the boys to their meal at the kitchen table, Jenna limped into the bedroom that Joyce and Cliff shared.

“Ma, I made you some lunch.” She whispered as she gently awakened her very pregnant mother.

“What happened darling?” Joyce looked at Jenna’s red cheek with concern etched on her face.

“Never mind me Ma. How close are you to delivering you think?” Jenna rubbed her mother’s belly affectionately.

“Probably in a few more days. I have a feeling it will be really soon.” Joyce smiled as she took a small sip of the iced tea that Jenna had brought in for her.

“I’m going to be heading to town to sell goods at the market. Will you be okay for a little bit while I am gone?” She handed her mother a sandwich and watched as she took a few small bites.

“I’ll be fine; if anything progresses, I can always send Joe to find you.” Joyce finished half her sandwich and handed it back to Jenna. She then took one more sip of the tea before she laid back down in bed.

“I love you Momma,” Jenna said as she leaned down and kissed her mother on the forehead.

This pregnancy had been especially hard on Joyce. She was more tired than usual and in a peculiar amount of pain. The midwives said that the baby was just sitting in a difficult position, and it was making it uncomfortable for Joyce to move a lot. With Joyces four other pregnancies that Jenna had witnessed, her mother was never in this much discomfort and that worried her a bit.

Holding back her anxiety, Jenna finished off the other half of her mother’s sandwich, downed the cup of tea and gathered up the goods to sell at the market. She walked into town with baskets of eggs and some vegetables that they had collected that day. Heading over to the family’s booth stationed in the center of the market near the town water well, she began setting up the items to sell for the day. Along with the produce from the farm, her brothers would also make small items out of stuff found around the property. Today she had some small wooden carved toys that Joe had made a few nights ago out of scrap wood.

In more recent years, Jenna’s body had begun to fill out. Every time she came to the market she looked less like a girl and more like a woman, this had caught the attention of the men in town. Most of them were home visiting from the war and would always drunkenly titillate with her. Typically, she would not have any issues with the occasional flirtations of the older men, but today…

“Jenna! Hey treasure, how is it going today?” An older man who stopped everyday called her. Jenna rolled her eyes, she had gone all afternoon without much trouble and had done very well with sales. A lot of the produce had been sold, along with the toys that Joe had whittled. But this unwanted advance instantly fouled her mood. The crowd had started to dissipate as the evening drew near and the market started to close. Jenna was thankful she could start packing up the booth shortly.

“Tom, I’ve told you time and time again, please leave me alone.” She scolded as she straightened the vegetables that he had messed with. He frowned and walked over to the side of the booth that she was standing on.

“Oh, come on! Give old Tom a little kiss, you can’t just be Cliff’s little stepdaughter harlot.” He grabbed her around her waist and tugged her in closer to him to force a kiss.

“NO!” She managed to wiggle out of his grip, but not before he got close enough that she could smell the putrid whisky on his breath. They were drawing the interest of a few bystanders as she struggled. “I’m not Cliff’s and I am not yours!” She got only a few feet away before she turned to face him. He pulled his hand back and slapped her hard across the face, reopening her cut lip. The dry dirt clouded up around her as Jenna fell to the ground holding her cheek, she could already feel the redness radiating heat and a few spots of blood dripped down her chin. Looking up she noticed that the bystanders were watching but continued on their way. Nobody stopped to give her a hand as she got back up on her feet.

“Now you come here and give me some sugar, or I will take you on this dirty street!”

Tom snickered as he yanked at her waist and pulled her close. Not wanting the eyes of everyone in the market she quieted down and let him pull her closer. Jenna braced herself, she couldn’t wiggle away without making another scene. His grip was tight as his hands dipped lower on her hips and one hand reached for the round of her ass. Winching as he reached the welts from Cliff’s beating earlier, she closed her eyes as his face got near and could feel the heat of his rancid breath blow across her face. Just before she could feel the dreadful moisture of his mouth on hers, he was suddenly ripped away.

Jenna opened her eyes just in time to see Tom get punched in the face. Stumbling, he landed hard against the bricks of the well. Her eyes darted to her savior, and she noticed it was Freeman who was now standing over Tom, fists clenched at his side. Spitting out a little blood, the old drunk got up and scampered off under the heat of Freemans glare. Only after Tom was out of sight and the bystanders had resumed their days, did her hero finally turn his attention to Jenna.