My promise to him

Chapter 1

I shove my coat over my shoulder and pull my long curly hair from my jacket tying it up in a half up half down style on top of my head. 

My mum is meeting up with some of her old school friends -kind of like a reunion get together- for the weekend at this hotel they've apparently rented out somewhere down in the country, which I didn't even know you could do. 

And so, because I am the youngest and therefore not in Uni or at work today, I have to go with her and my 2 older brothers get to follow along by themselves tomorrow. I shove my phone in my pocket and grab my bag as I hear the car horn beep and sigh stepping out of the front door, throwing it closed behind me.

"C'mon Emma, I'm not being late again." I jog up to the side walk where mum and Frank are already in the car and I swing open the car door shutting it behind me. "Why are you forcing me to go then?" I ask sarcastically. "Hey, watch your mouth!" Frank says sternly, and I don't dare argue anymore. 

My real dad died 2 years ago and my mum remarried Frank my 'Stepdad' as I have to call him to his face, I still call him Frank in my head though. I hate him, and he hates me, but I don't have the heart to tell mum. He treats me differently than my 2 older brothers because I'm much younger and I can't defend myself plus they have their own places and only come to visit once a week now. 

I trace my hand over my arms picturing the bruises and scratch marks left underneath my jumper sleeves, hiding the true monster he actually is that nobody but me witnesses underneath that fake smiles he puts on and take a deep breath, "sorry," I murmur. 

Mum pulls out of the drive and we begin down the motorway. It's a 4-hour journey from the city so I pull out my phone and start to check my Instagram. "It's nice to have at least one of my children with me," mum carries on, looking out of the window whilst frank gives me a death stares in the wind mirror, "it'll be nice to catch up," he says through gritted teeth that my mum doesn't notice. She never does. I try and sink further back into the seat with some kind of hope it'll make the car reverse.

I try to change the subject. "So, whose gonna be there then?" I can already imagine it; me sat at a coffee table alone surrounded by woman in their fifties asking me questions about college and work – every 16-year-old girl's dream week. Yep that's right we have to stay there for the week. There's no point in driving all the way up for a couple of days - mum had said to me before – it'll be fun. Yeah right...

"So it's Jean and Wallis, Mark and Rebecca, Vicky and Shawn and David and Shanice, Oh and I think Vicky and Shawn are bringing Zack as well-"I cut her off. "Zack! As in Zack! No mum they can't bring Zack, he's...he's well he's Zack you have to turn around, please drop me home please!!" I beg. Frank hits the steering wheel, "Don't argue!" He says to me and I shut up. It's a lost battle anyway. 

Zack is Vicky and Shawn's son and it just so happens that we are the same age and so between the ages 5-12 when they used to live across the street, we were forced to play with each other all the time. I haven't seen him since, but I bet he still that teeny little annoying idiot he was 5 years ago before he moved to the country. Ugh! 

I spend the rest of the journey trying to think of ways to get out of this, but I only come up with jumping out of the car and running off to the circus, so I give up and put my earphones in trying to make the journey as long as possible.