Stranger

Chapter 16

14 years ago

"Daddy," the timid little girl murmurs, shuffling over to her father, who has downed almost a whole bottle of alcohol, looking down at the stickman drawing of her family. The girl feels awfully culpable for being the reason her father loathes this day, and so she'd locked herself in her room for a full 10 minutes, working on her present for her father, trying to perfect every line. She points to a stickman with angel wings on its back, yellow coloring scribbled around it. "I drew mommy for you. And you, and brother, and me..." the girl drawls, her smile uncertain, before completely dropping at the hard look on her father's face.

"How the hell did you draw your mother," the man chuckles, a cold, humorless thing, and she could smell the alcohol on his breath from where she's standing, "if you don't even fucking know what she looks like?"

The girl cowers, feeling like a puppy being scolded by its towering owner, and she doesn't understand why. "I'm sorry, daddy," the girl says, a single tear falling from her eye, not really knowing what she's apologizing for. "Get the fuck out of here," he says, all false humor wiped from his face, which now just reveals disgust, and the girl scurries off to her room, wiping her face. "And stop fucking crying, you look weak," he calls.

The girl throws herself onto her bed, and curls up into a ball, and cries for a full 9 minutes before there's a soft knock on her door. She doesn't answer, only stares at the wall, but when she hears a familiar, and much more preferred voice, call her name, her small voice squeaks, "come in."

Marcel walks into the room with a party hat on his head, two boxes under one arm, and a big grin on his face, but it drops when he sees Nevaeh's pouty, tear stained face.

"What's the matter, pumpkin?" He asks her, sitting next to her on her bed.

"Marcel, why does daddy hate me?" She asks him instead and he shakes his head. " 'cus he's a dick."

The girl looks down at her drawing. "Because he thinks I killed mommy." She looks up at him with watery eyes, "are you mad at me for killing mommy?"

Marcel swipes away a tear on her face with his thumb. "You didn't kill mommy," he shakes his head and looks down at her drawing. "What's this?"

She bites the inside of her cheek. "Daddy's present."

Marcel gives her a soft smile. "That's sweet, pumpkin, but it's your birthday. Not his. So you get presents, not him," he says and hands her the two boxes. Nevaeh opens the medium sized box first which holds a cake that reads just graduated! across it. Nevaeh snorts. "You told me stealing is bad, Marcel."

He smirks and lightly pinches her arm, "only if it's for bad reasons." She giggles, and opens the smaller box which holds a pumpkin necklace. She looks up at Marcel, her eyes filled with nothing but adoration and love. Her mouth quivers. "Thank you, Marci."

He kisses her forehead. "Always."

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Present day

When Nevaeh wakes up from her dream, she wakes with the urge to cry and a heavy heart. She touches her pumpkin necklace around her neck that never leaves unless she's showering. These past couple of weeks have been pretty hard on her, between her birthday and her mother's death anniversary passing, which always puts her in a negative mood but twice as much now because her brother isn't here and a case chasing Bloody Mary who was determined to take Nevaeh's eyes for feeling guilty of her mother's death, which scared her half to death because of her fear of mirrors which Dean made fun of.