by MillietheWarrior » 10/10/2011 4:57 AM
Paige kept her gaze studiously turned away from her aunt, determined not to let her emotions get the best of her. It had been years since anyone had even mentioned her mother. It felt like longer. When Paige was a little girl, she remembered asking her father where her mother had gone one night, as she and Nia were being tucked into bed. She’d asked him this on many occasions, and his response always was ‘She’s just on a really long vacation.’ But Paige had never been stupid, not even when she was four years old and still suffered from bouts of wetting the bed, forcing her father to check the closet for monsters, and sleeping with a mountain of her stuffed animals, who she insisted all had names and loved tea.
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After Nia had fallen asleep, Paige had forced her father to sit on the bed and stared hard at him with her large, gold-green eyes. She’d asked him the question again, but this time, she’d phrased it a bit differently. She’d asked him where her mother really was, and in response, Prudii had sighed, and crumpled backwards onto the bed. Paige had been alarmed, and in her unassuming, four year old way, she’d promptly tucked her favorite teddy bear into the crook of Prudii’s arm to make him feel better, then crawled over her blankets and hugged his neck tightly. She remembered looking up into her father’s face, no longer stern or happy or smiling, but upset, distraught and destroyed. She’d wondered at the tears coming from his eyes, confused by the fact that her father, of all people, was crying; daddy didn’t cry. Daddy was…he was daddy. He just didn’t cry.
“Your mother is gone, sweet pea. Far away from here. She doesn’t like your daddy anymore, so she decided to leave.” He gently stroked Paige’s hair, and she’d snuggled against his chest, feeling tears spring to her own eyes. “Does that mean she doesn’t like me and Nia either?” she'd asked in a trembling voice that Prudii only heard when she suspected there was something hiding under her bed. Prudii had cradled her to him, and sat up, tucking her teddy bear into her arms. “Of course not, Paige. Your mother loves you and Nia very much. More than anything in the world. It was just daddy she didn’t like, so she had to leave. I’m sorry, Paige. I wish I could bring her back, but I can’t.” Paige knew, even at that age, that her father would’ve moved heaven and earth for his girls (and in their tiny minds, Prudii really could move heaven and earth is he so chose) but this was not something he could give them; he could never give them a mother.
“It’s okay, daddy,” Paige had told him, using her teddy’s hand to reach up and dab away the tears that had fallen down his cheeks. “Mr. Fluffy doesn’t want you to cry anymore; Mr. Fluffy says he’ll look after us! Maybe when mommy likes you again, she can come back, and we can be a real family! And she can braid my hair and have tea with Mr. Fluffy and me.” She patted her teddy bear’s head, wiggling him in the air as if he was dancing with joy at the idea of getting her mother back. More tears slipped silently down Prudii’s cheeks, but he had hastily wiped them away before she could see them.
“You don’t like the way I braid your hair?” Prudii asked, feigning shock and an affronted dignity. Paige quickly rushed to assure him that she really did like how he braided her hair, even if he had to do it over ten times because it kept coming out crooked. The conversation had quickly devolved into Paige happily chatting about all the things she and her mommy would do when she came back, and Prudii only nodding seriously, as if he was hanging on her every word when really, every word was breaking his heart.
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“Even if she does come back,” Paige said slowly, blinking away the sudden tears that had clouded her vision. “What makes her think she can pick up where she left off? She missed out on too much, you know. She was never there to tuck us in at night, or read us stories. She missed our first day of school, and our graduation. She missed Nia’s wedding and the birth of her children. For God’s sake, she’s missed absolutely everything. How could she even think to come back and reinsert herself into our lives like nothing has happened?” She crossed her arms over her chest, her foot tapping heavily against her chair, and her breath coming in short, frantic gasps. She didn’t need this, not right before a show. She could already feel an anxiety attack coming on, but she couldn’t stop the words from tumbling out of her lips.
Years of pent up hurt and frustration and waiting, waiting, waiting every day for her mother to walk through the door and give her a hug and say she missed her had been building up, and now it was flowing over as the dam slowly, but surely, split in half. “How could she think she could kill a part of my daddy, a part of him that made him who he was, and then waltz back into his life like nothing had happened? What the heck is wrong with her? What is wrong in that messed up head of hers that makes her think this is all okay?” She was breathing erratically, her chest rising and falling in shallow pants. “I waited for her to come home every single day of my childhood. Every. Single. Day. And now she comes back? What, did she think it was safer when her two children weren’t there? Was she ashamed of us? Afraid of us? Did she really hate us? I hope daddy kicks her out on the curb for good, because she sure as shoot doesn’t deserve him, or us!”
I love adventurous tales like that. That uplifting feeling that comes from seeing unknown lands and the knowledge that you came across—nothing can replace it! It opens a path from which self-confidence, experience, and important friendships—from the sharing of life or death situations—are born! But hearing it just isn’t the same. I want to create my own magnificent story!
A great adventure! +Imp. Documents+ +Menagerie+ +Wishlist+ +Journal+