Wait! I Wrote That? A Collection of Old, Horrific Stories

Story Twenty-Five: The Bird Boy

Song: "I Am Machine" - Three Days Grace

Genre (s): Fantasy/Mystery

Written When? Sophomore Year of College

Prologue

        My father died when I was just five years old. Strangely, I remember that day perfectly. He got an emergency call from work. On his way there, a tractor-trailer crushed his truck and took my daddy with it. The news was heart-wrenching. Mamma and I, instead of opening Christmas presents, mourned my daddy. It was Christmas Eve when it happened. I would never find another daddy as beloved as my first, but then Mamma met Bailey. A hardworking individual, he worked for a factory company known as the Foster Co. The company had been in his family tree since the Industrial Revolution, so Bailey had a lot of ka-ching, ka-ching in his pocket.

Mamma and I met him in the city. We crashed head-on with each other in the subway. I was seven, but even at such a young age, I knew the look Mamma and Bailey shared. It was love at first sight.

They dated for a year, and then on my eighth birthday, they walked the aisle, with wedding bells ringing.

"Well, that escalated quickly," was what I remember telling myself.

I wasn't sure about Bailey at first. When he wasn't working for Foster Co., he was a cop, and cops scared me. He looked like the typical cop: a strong body build, bald head, and a mustache. While cops usually did make me uncomfortable, Bailey was the rare exception. He grew used to my mother's personality quickly. Before I knew it, both he and she bought me anything I wanted. With so much money on their hands, they spent about 75% of it on me, their little girl.

Now, that was both a positive and negative thing. Positive because I could finally get that $1,000 dress I saw at the store, but negative because since Mamma and Bailey were so busy with work and were constantly buying me things, they rarely spent time with me. For 90% of the day, they were on their phones, talking about work. They only listened to me when I asked for something.

It's always: "Maise, tell us what you want, and we'll get it for you," or "Oh, Maise, do you want that $3,000 dollhouse? No problem." I sometimes felt like Mamma and Bailey forgot they even had a child.

When Daddy first died, Mamma and I were in a financial crisis, so Mamma worked two full-time jobs. She was a business person, a teacher, and a part-time librarian. She got home every day around 3:30, fixed me dinner, and left an hour later for the library. When she got off from the library, around 9:00, she went straight to the office. She did not get home until 5:00 every morning. I do not know how people can handle that much stress. I call them "insane".

Because Mamma was so busy with her three jobs, she could not take me to school, so I ended up entering the homeschooling business. Things did not get much better when she married Bailey. Sure, she quit her teaching and library job, but now she worked for Bailey's company. I had to struggle through school myself. They did not have time to help me with homework, study for a quiz or test, or write an essay.

I was excessively independent for a twelve-year-old. Never in my life had I had a true friend. My only friend was our dog, Cooper, a four-year-old Golden Retriever. The main reason why Mamma and Bailey got him was so there was at least one living thing to keep me company throughout the day. We got Cooper when Mamma married Bailey. As the years progressed, we grew close to each other, but I still wanted a human friend. Would I ever get one, though? I never thought I would,–there was too much chaos in my life–but all that changed when we moved to the United States Midwest. As soon as we did, my life was never the same again.