Page 3 of Kian's Devotio
Ailith had taken her under her wing, teaching Karalee a lot about cooking.
He loved growing up alongside her. But his absolute favorite thing was that he had his own special friendship with Karalee. They had heart to heart talks under the stars more than once and he loved her.
She would spend time with him when Emery had to go to dance or something, and he cherished those talks.
She would tell him about her life and her heartaches and struggles and he in turn would struggle hearing it, he wanted to take that pain away from her.
He wanted her to be loved for who she was and wished that her mom would see her like his family did.
As they grew, and Karalee only got more beautiful with each passing year, Kian struggled with it. So much so that he was rude to her about it.
He didn’t mean to be, it was just hard to see her and knowing that other boys also thought she was beautiful.
He was too afraid to admit his feelings for her, knowing that they were both too young and he was scared of hurting her.
When the girls got into junior high, he was getting ready to leave it, and it was hard to see how the new boys reacted around her.
He had warned them all away from her for the two years they weren’t in school together and she had no idea.
He still did that. Warned them away from even talking to her. She was really starting to blossom and develop into what he knew was going to be a gorgeous girl, and it was hell on his teenage body.
He needed to respect her though and did his best to keep his thoughts clean.
That year was hard on him and he fought to not be rude to her, not liking it at all. It wasn’t who he was.
Just hearing Karalee and Emery joke and talk about boys made him see red. He wanted to punch every single one of them and let them know that both his sister and his girl were off limits.
And then he left for high school. He hated not being able to see her in school like they used to and knowing he couldn’t do anything if a boy tried to talk to her was hard.
Karalee’s mom was known as the town drunk and druggie, but not only that, she was also known as the town whore. With good reason.
So, boys would mock her, and some would even try to get Karalee to do the same, and act as the whore her mom was, and he would have none of it.
That was the biggest reason he hated not being able to protect her.
Karalee’s mom was not the sort of mom to care about silly things such as a reputation. That didn’t matter to her. Money did. Drugs did.
She spread her legs for anyone and everyone willing to pay her.
Kian knew from Karalee that her mom didn’t know who Karalee’s father was and didn’t even know that she was pregnant with her baby until she had her in the bathtub.
She had been so high and drunk that she didn’t realize she was pregnant at all and Karalee had struggled with drug withdrawals as a baby.
But there was no one to claim her and her mom, Lenora pretended to want the baby.
She just wanted the free food money she got from the state and often sold it to get money for drugs.
The state tried more than once to take Karalee away, but Lenora would always ‘clean up’ her act enough that she wouldn’t lose her daughter.
She was just lucky that Ailith had stepped in and after the state saw that Karalee was being taken care of, Lenora was left alone and was able to do what she always had.
Kian hated her mother and was grateful that Karalee rarely went home.
She had told him how awful it was there, and how her mother told her on a daily basis how much she hated her.
Kian knew that Karalee tried to stay strong and tried her best to not give into the pain.
He knew how much she hated being made fun of at school for her mom, and being talked to the way she did, and Emery would often tell him that Karalee had cried in the bathroom.
