My conflicting thoughts carried into my dreams, pulling and tugging at me.
Judy was standing over me in my small, narrow bed, screeching at me to get up. I jumped from my bed, afraid of being punished by the leather strap she held in her hand. A tugging on my arm brought my attention to a second person in my prison. A person who shouldn’t have been there. A person who had never showed up despite the million tears I’d shed. Mom was suddenly in my prison. She held my arm in a death grip, making it ache painfully as she attempted to drag me away. Judy’s face contorted in anger, changing from pale to a deep purple shade almost instantly. She raised the leather strap high in the air, bringing it down sharply.
I jerked awake before the strap could rip away a layer of skin. The pillows beneath my head were damp with sweat. Gasping, I tried to dislodge the scream that was still stuck in my throat. The arm Mom had gripped in my dream ached painfully beneath the bandage I’d applied earlier.
It was just a dream.
A nightmare.
My gasps eventually subsided, leaving behind a throat as dry as the Sahara. Climbing from my bed, I left the mound of pillows and the last remnants of the nightmare behind as I headed out of my room. On quiet feet, I felt my way down the dark hallway. I was the master of moving around without detection. A muffled sound caused me to pause before I could descend the stairs. I turned to look behind me. Jacob’s door was firmly closed without a trace of light. Mom’s door though was open a crack and partially lit. The sound came again. This time I could make out a half sob. Indecision rooted me in place. It was obvious Mom was crying. I felt a stirring in my gut. It took me a moment to rationalize what the stirring was. Sadness. I felt sad that something had upset her enough to make her weep in her room well into the night.
Without conscious thought my feet moved down the hallway. I paused outside her door, wondering how’d I gotten there. The sobs were louder standing outside her room. They were gut-wrenching, tearing at my very soul. How could I comfort her? We barely even knew each other. Knowing this did not stop me from peeking carefully into the room.
Mom sat in the center of her bed with her head bowed. Pictures were strewn across her comforter as if they had rained down around her. In the dim light I could make out some of the images of a much younger me. A younger me that I didn’t even remember. She was surrounded by memories that were no longer me.
Swallowing hard to dislodge the cantaloupe-sized lump that had formed in my throat, I started to back away when I saw what she held in her arms. Air escaped my lungs in a whooshing sound that would have been heard if not for her sobbing.
Her body was curled around the object I dreamed about, thought about, missed for an eternity. Nestled in her arms was the thing that had started it all.
Daisy, my old doll.
30
MY NEW friends were the only thing that made school tolerable. They had accepted me into their circle in spite of the fact that we seemed to be on display every single day. I had hoped that everyone’s morbid fascination with me would have worn off by now, but the stares and finger-pointing and whispering still followed me everywhere I went. I hated that it was disrupting my friends’ lives also.
“Fuck that,” Heather said, reacting to another of my apologies. “It should be them apologizing. No offense, Mia, but all it’ll take is some new drama to start around here and you’ll be old news. Besides, next year when we’re seniors we’ll be running the show. I’m thinking about running for student council. Maybe you should run for office too.”
I blanched at her words. I’d rather swan dive off Niagara Falls in the middle of winter. “No, thank you,” I said, shifting on the concrete bench to get more comfortable.
The mild weather outside enticed us to escape the fishbowl atmosphere of the cafeteria for the small area behind the building. The students called the space “The Quad,” though it really wasn’t anything more than a concrete slab roughly the size of a basketball court. By most standards it was bleak—no trees or grass. Just a handful of picnic tables that were quickly claimed.
Normally The Quad was untouchable, but Heather had staked out a table earlier when I expressed a desire for a break from the constant stares. The Quad was far from empty but it was better than the cafeteria.
“Speaking of drama. Did you see Cara John freaking out on Felix again? Talk about a couple that is a walking reality show. And what about her new highlights? Train wreck,” Molly said, speaking out of the corner of her mouth.
“Nice, Molls. I’m trying to cheer Mia up and you’re acting like everyone else.”
“Just keeping it real. How about when you become president, you ban bad hair. That’ll cheer everybody up.”
“Mia, just be yourself. Eventually everyone will realize you’re no different from anyone else,” Katie said quietly, setting her book down to look at me.
“Well, you know that and I know that, and our future president here knows that, but until the novelty of Mia’s kidnapping dies down, she’s different to everyone here at school who has seen her face plastered all over the TV screens,” Molly proclaimed.
I fidgeted uncomfortably. My new friends had been careful to avoid talking about my kidnapping during the short time we had known each other. It wasn’t that I was keeping my past from them. Considering how much the news had reported my story, everyone knew more about my life than I was comfortable with anyway. It just felt nice not to talk about the heavy stuff. I got enough of that from Dr. Marshall. I pondered Molly’s words, weighing them in my head. It made sense. How long would it take for people to forget though? That was the question.
“I agree. It’s their loss,” Heather said, stealing one of my chips. “Besides, I’m selfish. I like having you all to ourselves. Case in point.” She pointed to a guy staring at me as he passed us on his way back into the building. “Why don’t you take a picture, it lasts longer,” she called out after him.
“Heather,” I choked out, not sure if I should laugh or cry. “Now they’re really going to talk about me.” I groaned, dropping my head into my hands.
My friends burst into snorts of laughter. I couldn’t help joining in after a minute. How could I stay mad at them? Our conversation moved to lighter topics after that, much to my relief.
My classes were mostly repetitive of everything I’d already learned on my own. How ironic that as much as everyone preached about all the wrong Judy had done, my education had been stellar by comparison. Even Mr. Knight’s class had become tedious. All the teachers seemed preoccupied with spring break that was approaching fast. I began to wonder why I was even there.
Things at home were equally strained. Most times it was still tense and awkward. We were all trying to pretend to be a normal family, but something f
elt slightly off. Nobody wanted to say what that something was, but I knew it was me. I was the squeaky wheel on a once-functional bicycle. To make matters worse, I hadn’t heard from Gunner again. I tried texting him, but he never answered back. I had the nagging feeling he was giving me the brush-off.
My sessions with Dr. Marshall weren’t much better. We had hit a stalemate on what I was willing to share with her. She pushed me to open up more about my childhood and the punishments I’d received. She tried to convince me that the road to recovery would only be forged when I began to let go of all the secrets I was holding deep inside. She poked and prodded, but the more she tried to get the truth out of me, the more I stubbornly resisted. By the end of my second month home, I could tell she was becoming frustrated.