Just Breathe

Chapter Nineteen

"I'm not going," Lia told her mother decisively as she stared at her laptop screen later that night. The twins had been put to bed and Vanessa thought it was probably the best time to talk to her daughter about some of the new changes that were going to be starting the next morning.

Vanessa sighed, wishing her child hadn't inherited her tenacity for arguing at the moment. "Lia, it's not negotiable," she continued. "You need to go talk to Dr. Sanders and, after speaking with both she and the physician at the hospital, you're going to try out group therapy. You had an overdose and landed in the hospital. Close the computer please."

Vanessa sat on her daughter's unmade bed, which was highly unusual and perhaps another indication of her still precarious mental state. She assumed Lia had been trying to catch up on homework but when she saw she was actually looking up SAT dates, her heart sank. Was she really not getting how serious this all was?

"Lia," she said again with more urgency, but it seemed to fall on deaf ears. The teenager kept scrolling. Vanessa felt blood pounding in her ears, getting frustrated. She stood and quickly snatched the Chromebook out from under Lia's fingers, then snapped it shut.

"Hey!" Lia yelled in protest, glaring at her mother. "You can't do that! That's mine!"

Lia was a lot of things, but she had never been a petulant kid.  It frightened Vanessa that her child was so unrecognizable at this point.  She thought Lia had long ago learned not to take a disrespectful tone or cross her when she gave a consequence.

The twins were asleep, but Vanessa simply couldn't hold in her disapproval.  "Emilia Marie Nadal Miranda," her voice was loud and firm.

The look she received along with her mother's voice left Lia shrinking and turning away in her seat.  She couldn't remember the last time her mom had used that tone with her.  As a child, that was the tone she dreaded and when she knew she'd crossed the line.  Even at seventeen, it had the intended effect.

Vanessa ran her tongue over her front teeth in frustration just as the door pushed open quickly.  Lin had heard his wife's voice from where he was cleaning up in the kitchen and knew it couldn't be good.  "What's wrong?"

Tears were beginning to form in Vanessa's eyes and he knew she was done for the evening.  Whatever had transpired between the two of them had upset Vanessa to the point of tears, which was a very rare occurrence.  It had happened several times in the last few days, and it was all due to Lia.  Lin glanced at their daughter, who was now holding her head in her hands.

Vanessa strode across the room, not answering, and passed her husband the Chromebook.  Luckily, she didn't hear any crying from the next room so she strode straight to her bedroom, leaving Lin to deal with their teenager.  She had reached her limit.

Lin sighed and looked down at his feet, noticing that Lia was crying softly, ler legs pulled up to her chest.  Knowing his kid, she would be lost in this mood for a while now.  Lecturing and yelling wouldn't do them any good at the moment, and that wasn't his style.  Seeing anyone in his family hurt was one of the few things that would drive him to that; but when it was at the hands of another family member, it just complicated the feelings further.

"Get your shoes," he told her, his voice steady.  "Let's go for a walk."

Lia wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand as her dad closed the door softly, leaving her to get herself together.  She let out a shaky breath as she sat up and straightened a few things on her desk.  As she looked around her bedroom, it was a wreck, which she didn't like at all.  School supplies were everywhere, clothes strewn about, her bed unmade.  Worst of all, she had just snapped at her own mother, simply for asking her to close her computer.