Then it happened

Chapter 10

A/N btw I'm sorry to anyone who's actually reading this- I literally just noticed the change in perspective. I will try to edit the other chapters but I don't know if I'll get all of them. ✨patience please✨

"Are you all packed and ready to roll?" Aaron asked me as I sat on the living room couch reading the 21st chapter of my book. "Yes, why else would I be sitting here, reading, dumbass?" Was the thought that crossed my mind, but I decided against it. "Yup. All ready!" My faked optimism was somehow believed, and the rest went rather smoothly.

"Babe, come on we need to get to the house before midnight!" Aaron pestered Tasha, as she packed the clothes for all four of my little siblings. "Oh calm down, its only two in the afternoon." Came my mothers retort. I smiled at my book as I imagined the look on his face at such backtalk.

A few hours later, on that wonderful September day, we were on our way back to the house that had been nearly destroyed in the tornado two months prior. And when we arrived at the destination, it wasn't even fully fixed.

"So let me get this straight. They kick me out in July, threaten to call the cops on me, a few days later on my mothers birthday the house gets hit by a tornado, they go to live with my grandparents. Then, in August, I'm forced to move back in with my mother, sleep on a couch for a month, and then in September move back into the house I left two months ago and its not even fully repaired?!" I thought angrily to myself.

"So um where am I supposed to sleep? My room isn't fixed yet." I questioned Tasha. "You'll be sleeping on the couch for now." She replied. "Another couch? For how long?" I asked. "Until the room is fixed. I don't know how long." My mother told me. "Seriously? What is wrong with these people?" I muttered under my breath as I walked away.

I plopped down on the second couch in two months- and sighed. I missed my friends, my dad, the freedom. Instead I was stuck with suffocating imprisonment. Before I at least had my phone, I could text Grace and Riley any time I wanted to. And it was really nice when me and Grace would facetime during school, she had online school and I had homeschool so I'd just hide in the laundry room with the door locked and be happy for a couple hours.

But as soon as I was almost certain that I was climbing up on the list of people Grace liked, my mother found my phone and took it away. And I was back to a hole of nothingness.

~~~~~~~

About a month passed, and my room was finally done. Or done enough for me to sleep in it, and for blissful nights, countless nights, I had my own room. The election was coming up fast, and I expressed excitement and intrigue in it. I was horribly invested in it. Why? Because my mother let me use her computer to monitor the voting, and in all reality I didn't give a damn about the election. But with the computer, I could go places and talk to my friends without my mother ever knowing.

Eventually that ruse came to an end, as my mother needed her laptop for other things, so like all good mothers do, she gave me access a different way. She downloaded an app into the kindle, and like I did every time, I found loopholes in it. I found a way onto the internet, to contact not only Riley, but Grace as well. I finally felt alive, I had a purpose now and I had a way to be with the people I loved when those who say they loved me tried to keep me to themselves. I wasn't about to let them go now.

More months passed, the same old endless boring routine, and it was December. Finally. Almost Christmas and the only enjoyable day all year with this cursed family.

One night in that cold month we were cleaning while Tasha put the little kids to bed. Me and Aaron. He had kitchen duty, and I had living room. Suddenly as I was sweeping, a memory came back to me. One I had suppressed and for good reason. I didn't know what to do with it, I'd never told anyone before because I was embarrassed. But that night I decided I would tell them. So I told Grace.

I hurried upstairs and texted her. She came ready to listen, and so I told her. I told her everything, I didn't spare many details. She was so angry, "Why haven't you told anyone Shey?! That isn't normal! Thats not ok! He never should have done that. I'm showing Riley." I pleaded with her not to, I'd kept this a secret for two years almost and I was really embarrassed.

But she did. In the moment I hated her for it, resented her, I'd trusted her and she broke that trust. But looking back years later, after I'd fallen so deep in love with her it hurt, I only fell deeper when seeing how much she actually cared for me.

I left the very next day because of that secret. And unfortunately justice was never given to me, no consequences came for Aarons actions in that secret. In fact he denied it ever happened. And my mother took his side, leaving me for his sorry ass. She didn't know how much I needed my mother even though she should have, she is my mother for loves sake. Or she was. I no longer see her as my Mom, she forfeited that privilege the day she chose her husband over me.

I can't even describe the secret, I apologize for the vagueness but sometimes things are better left unsaid. Sometimes its better to let people wonder, because wondering is better then knowing the truth. The truth is worse then most would imagine, and everything put together in one is worse then even I could believe. I can hardly believe it and I lived through it.

So I'm just going to leave you and let you imagine and think of what that secret is. I'll let you put the peices together. But just know, that one night, that one conversation, changed my life forever. And changed it for the better.