I will possess your heart - Rhys Montrose X Reader

───Part 7.

When you were nine you had mastered the art of cooking (as well as a child could, at least) and doing laundry. When you were eleven you'd learned how to do taxes properly and to never rely on your mother.

It was harrowing, spending day in day out near the woman that was your whole world, realizing that underneath the rosy exterior you deluded yourself she had there was nothing but a nest cockroaches. Good night kisses and terms of endearment you thought you'd heard her tell you during the cover of night nonexistent, diatribes and harsh languages filling the space between the two of you.

And then there was your father. Stone cold, easily mistaken for a statue were it not for the rise and fall of his chest. The living room became his tomb, the walls his canvas, red string and charcoal drawings occupying every inch of it, and your mother his Medusa. You never knew what she whispered in his ear late at night, only saw the woolen thread around his throat and the walls a little fuller the next morning. She'd take a scalpel and cut him open on the kitchen counter, removing his insides for her to use as varnish, and after there was no more for her to use, she discarded him without hesitation. Threw him onto the street along with the trash bags that were piling up in the corner of the kitchen, the ones that were too heavy for you to carry.

You had run out after them, grabbing his bony and stained hand with tears rolling down your chin, begging for him to come back inside, or to take you with him - you'd rather have a catatonic father than a mother whose fingertips produced mold- but your pleas went unanswered. The two of you watched him walk away, no life left behind the glassy eyes, your mother's nails digging into your collarbone to keep you by her side.

It happened in a flash.

Tires screeching. A humanoid shadow amidst a blur of lights. A boom, shoving knives down your ears. Red ribbons flying through the air, covering your form. Then, a scream. But not yours, no you were too young to comprehend what had happened right away. It wasn't your mothers either, she simply cursed him for ruining her clothes and dragged you back inside. But the image of bent metal, pieces of glass, and flesh right in front of you never left. The deformed skull replaced the face of your father, the unnatural position of limbs filled with scrap metal invading your memories of him. The mess was all you could see whenever you tried to recall how he looked.

When you were back inside the living room, time standing still for you, gaze fixed on the spot he'd always be in, you realized from the moment he'd gotten tangled up in your mothers deadly web, he had an expiration date carved into his forehead by her, one that relied solely on how long she found it entertaining to remove everything he was bit by bit by bit, and with him gone, you were next.

The next morning all traces that he had ever existed were gone.

It was the only and last time you'd seen the apartment cleaned from top to bottom, the smell of bleach thick in the air and your mother humming in content as she tore away the last bit of wallpaper that held his soul.

As the years went by, she smashed your teeth in so you'd never eat anything but the pile of worms she offered you, clinging onto you like a shadow as she watched them consume you from inside, vines wrapping around your limbs as if you were a marionette, filling your pretty little head with sweet lies devised just for you.