Ones We Regret

Chapter 5

Alira
January, 2015
California

The door of the washroom slams and I look in the mirror to see my mom standing behind me, her face red with anger and her body shaking with rage. I ignore her and continue washing my hands to remove the blood and glance back at her when the click of the lock slams into place.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" She seethes, as if what happened was my fault. My mom's features are the same like me except that we are nowhere near close and polar opposites. Where she was the queen bee of her school, I am the "lone wolf" as she likes to call me, where she was excellent at extracurriculars, I am excellent at academics. No doubt Scar is her favourite because she is the spitting image of her, the queen of the school, the most popular whereas I am the invisible dark haired girl with blue highlights. My mom never swears and I swear like a sailor which is one of the many, many reasons my mom is tired of me, her sugarcoated way of saying that she hates me. Her saying "fuck" today would weigh a lot on my oncoming days as she would just blame me for the stress which cuts her life 10 years shorter.

"Are you seriously asking me that? The asshole was asking for it." I whirl around and growl. Okay, I was not exactly a type of person who could simply sit and bear injustice or lies. I was violent when I needed to be and secretly taking self defence classes with the money I made by my job in Neera's library helped things.

"You just broke a bottle of wine on your dad's client's son. What do you think you deserve after that, a medal? Do you realise how embarrassing it is that our daughter has just violently attacked a boy for behaving courteously with a bottle like a heathen?" My mom rushes to the tissue machine and grabs herself a tissue to blot out the invisible tears under her eyes. She looks at me with sharp blue eyes, just like mine and I sneer at her before grabbing a tissue to wipe my hands.

"Oh. If my dad's client's son tries to grab my ass and breasts after my innumerable red flags, what do you think I was going to do about it? Also, he just said that reading is boring, can you believe that? He hates Harry Potter, who hates Harry Potter? He is a vile creature and he deserves much worse than a bottle of wine on his head." I nagged at her and even after hearing the part where the guy touches my lady parts, which I am goddamn sure she purposely ignores, she throws her hands up in the air.

"He could go to the cops and report a complaint against you. No, let me speak. I am done with your drama and bullshit. No more mobile phone for a week and you're grounded for a month. No ice cream for a week and if you try to sneak around, one week will turn into two." I grit my teeth so hard at her words I am surprised they don't break. I clench my fists to not do something stupid but fail at keeping my mouth shut.

"You've never tried to just understand what I am saying, mom! You hear me but you don't listen. For you I'm always the worthless, cold and unlovable person I've always been and that'll never change because you're never gonna give me a chance. You tell me Scar isn't your favourite then tell me mom, what's my biggest dream? No? What's my favourite colour?"

"Green."

"No mom! It's blue. It's always been blue. Green is dad's favourite colour and yellow is Scar's. This tells me how much you know about your own daughter."

"Don't take that tone with me." She steps closer but I don't care. I spew the next words forming in my mouth without a care.

"You just won't forget that night, will you?" I whisper and she stills. Her eyes widen and her fists clench. She tries a few times to speak and the words next which comes out of her mouth tells me my answer.

"Get out of my sight."