Page 1 of Twisted Violet
PROLOGUE
VIOLET
I wasnine when I realized there was something wrong with me.
Intense. I know. But growing up in the house I did meant learning things way earlier than any child should.
I don’t remember a lot about that day, but I do remember it being early, because the dense fog that normally blanketed the city had yet to lift, and the world outside was still coated in a soft milky haze.
After waiting by my bedroom window for what felt like hours, my mother’s gold sedan had finally appeared in our driveway, and I knew I only had a few precious moments to catch her before she inevitably slipped out again.
Normally, I paid little attention to my mother’s comings and goings. She wasn’t home very often, and when she was, my older sister, Stevie, and I were usually the last things on her mind.
But that day, I needed her. My class had a field trip to the planetarium, and my teacher, Mrs. Miller, made it clear that Icouldn’t go without a parent’s signature. My father was just as unreliable as my mother, so staying up and waiting for one of them to show was my only real option.
I should’ve known there was something off with my mother the moment I came downstairs and saw her sitting at the kitchen table. Her face was tight, and she had a glazed-over look in her eyes that raised the fine hairs on the back of my neck.
I didn’t know she was an addict back then. All I knew was she seemed out of it a lot and wasn’t always the best at noticing me. But she was my mom, and I needed her, so I ignored the uneasy feeling in my gut and carefully stepped towards her.
“Mom, could you sign this?” I asked gently, setting the permission slip and pen down on the table in front of her.
She didn’t respond and continued to glare at her freshly poured bowl of cereal.
“Mom?” I tried again, holding my breath as I moved in closer to tap her on the shoulder.
I hated the way she smelled. Like a pungent mixture of sugar and burnt plastic. She didn’t always smell like that, but over time it became the only scent I associated with her.
I tapped her again.
“Mom?”
“Leave me the hell alone.” She hissed, turning her head to pin me with a vicious glare. “Can’t you see I’m busy?”
“Y- yes…” I stammered, breaking eye contact and staring down at her hands, “but I- I waited up for you. I have a field trip today.”
She flexed her fingers, and the sores on them started to bleed. There were more of them now. Way more than the last time I saw her. Stevie always told me it was rude to stare, butI couldn’t pull my eyes away from them. They looked so painful.
“Of course you need something.” She glowered, shoveling a heaping spoonful of O’s into her mouth. “Why else would you come looking for Mommy Dearest? It’s not like you actually give a fuck about me.”
I looked up at her with wide eyes and shook my head. “That’s not true-”
“Bullshit.” She snapped, cutting me off as little bits of cereal and milk flew from her mouth. “All you and your sister do is take. Take. Take. Take. Like greedy little vultures. Well, I’ve news for you, sweetheart. Sometimes, life doesn’t go your way. Sometimes, you don’t get what you want. And tonight is one of those nights. Now kindly fuck off and let me eat in peace.”
I should’ve left. I should’ve gone back up to my room and not pushed any further. But I needed her. I needed her to see me, to care, to love me in a way that only a mother could.
“Mom, please... just sign it. I promise I won’t ask you for anything else.”
She narrowed her eyes and glared at me like I was a filthy wad of bubblegum stuck to her shoe. “Did you not hear what the fuck I said?” She snapped, ripping her cereal bowl off the table and chucking it towards the wall behind me at full force.
Soggy cereal and jagged pieces of her bowl went flying everywhere. Splattering me with sticky sweet milk and scratching the back of my arms and legs with little fragments of cheap ceramic.
“God,” she muttered, running a hand through her dark tangled hair, “haven’t you realized no one wants to deal with you? Not me. Not your father. Not even your fucking sister! She’s just too much of a coward to tell you.”
“Th- that’s not true.” I whispered, my voice breaking astears welled in my eyes. “Stevie loves me. She’s the one who takes care of me.”
“That’s because she feels sorry for you.” She laughed. “Don’t be stupid, Alexandra. Pity isn’t love. People will feel sorry for someone weak and pathetic like you. But they’ll never love them.”
I stood there, my feet frozen in place, as her bitter words sliced me in two.
