Amelia's Daughter

thirteen

CHARLOTTES POV
My mom and Arizona are the cutest. They've been dating for about a month now. I went out with Josh and it was okay. We haven't gone on anymore dates, I mean he's cute, but I'm not really looking for a boyfriend right now so we haven't talked about it. It was kinda over. I walked to my locker and grabbed my books and homework to put in my backpack. I had a stupid history project to do. It was a family tree, so that we could see like our nationalities and stuff, but I knew nothing about my dad. I know he died in a car crash, but my mom has like such few pictures of him. I guess I could ask her more when I got home. I walked into the parking lot and got in my moms car and she smiled.
"Hey how was school?" She asked.
"Good," I shrugged.
"Have a lot of homework?" She asked.
"Yeah, uh actually I have this interesting project," I said.
"What's it about?" My mom asked.
"Well it's a family tree sort of thing," I said. She pulled into the driveway and parked the car.
"Oh," she said.
"Well do you have a picture of dad I can use?" I asked.
"Yeah I'm sure I can find something," she said. She was acting weird about it. She always acted weird when I brought up my dad. Sometimes I felt like she was lying about what happened, but why would she lie about the car crash?
"Do you have to write stuff about each person?" She asked awkwardly as she hung her coat up.
"Just a little," I said.
"Oh," she said. She didn't seem like she wanted to talk about it so I walked upstairs and grabbed my computer. I sat down in my bed and looked at the search bar. Ryan Kerrigan death. I hit search and saw the top story, except it wasn't a car crash. Local LA man identified as Ryan Kerrigan dies in hotel drug overdose. Probably not him. I mean Kerrigan was kind of a generic name. I clicked on the article anyway and saw a picture. It did look like the photos my mom has showed me. I felt my heart racing as I continued reading. Ryan's girlfriend, Amelia Shepherd, woke up to him dead and called 911 the morning of. This can't be. This can't be what happened. I kept reading and it was all true. They were drug addicts. My dad overdosed. I grabbed my computer and got up and ran downstairs into the kitchen.
"What the fuck is this?" I said as I put my computer down.
"Woah language," my mom said as she walked over to my computer. I watched her face change as she looked at the screen.
"Where did you find this?" She asked.
"I wanted to see if there was an article about dad's car crash," I said as I looked at her.
"Yeah uh, about that," she said.
"You fucking lied to me!" I said, "you were drug addicts!"
"Charlotte it's a lot more complicated than that," she begged.
"You've been lying to me this whole time! You told me how great of a man he was and he died in a car crash on the way home from work! But really you were just doing drugs in a hotel!" I cried.
"I wanted to protect you," she said crying, "I didn't want you to know."
"So you lied?" I said, "you've been lying this entire time!"
"Charlotte," she said, "please you have to understand."
"That you're a drug addict!" I yelled.
"Recovering drug addict," she said.
"So I was basically conceived on drugs," I said, "did you even want me?"
"Of course I wanted you!" She yelled.
"Did dad?" I said crying.
"He would have loved you," She said, "I've made mistakes but that doesn't mean I didn't want you. Your father and I wanted a family."
"Am I just one of those mistakes?" I said.
"No you're not," she said.
"Why would you lie about this?" I said, "you're a fucking drug addict!"
"Sit down," she said.
AMELIAS POV
The day came. The day Charlotte found out about Ryan and I's addiction. I didn't want this day to come ever. She was pissed. She had a right to be.
"When I was 14 I had a drinking problem," I said, "a really bad one, and then drinking turned into cigarettes which turned into drugs. I got sober as a teenager, but after a really long time of suffering from addiction. I was okay for a little bit, but I relapsed in college, and then I relapsed when I met your father."
"Were you even like together?" She said crying.
"Yes. I met him when I was working at the practice in LA. We did meet over drugs. I threw a party one day and he was there. I broke my sobriety with him, and we did a lot of drugs. It was bad," I said. She kept crying as I knew I had to continue.
"We were staying in a hotel room because your Aunt Addison and Aunt Charlotte were so mad at me about the drugs. I basically went off the grid because of how bad my addiction was. They tried an intervention and it didn't work, so we stayed in a hotel room. We did a lot of drugs, um, and one night he asked me to marry him," I said. She didn't say anything and I took a deep breath.
"He asked me to marry him and I said yes. We both agreed that we should get sober and go to rehab. We both wanted to get clean, and your father wanted a family so badly. He wanted two girls and two boys. We were going to get clean together," I said.
"So what happened?" She asked.
"I suggested we do drugs one last time," I said, "and he overdosed in his sleep."
"It's your fault?" She looked at me.
"Charlotte that's not," I started.
"YOU KILLED HIM!" She yelled at me, "AFTER HE WANTED TO GET HELP YOU KILLED HIM!"
"I didn't kill him," I said crying, "but you don't think I've felt that guilt?"
"What happened next?" She asked.
"I went to rehab and got sober, and then I found out I was pregnant with you. I was so scared. I didn't want to do any of this without Ryan, but I was having a little girl," I said.
"Why would you do drugs again just to get sober the next day!" She cried, "I haven't had a father all these years because of you!"