The Ghost of You

Chapter 10 - Cai's POV

While Bruja preferred to keep my existence hidden, when her family came over, she pretended to be the most loving wicked stepmother ever. She'd put on her best dress, smile like it was her last day on the earth and refer to me as 'son' or - and I hate to even say it- 'Cai bear'. I don't know who gave her acting lessons but they were a horrible teacher. Well, at least to me she was bad at pretending, but, her family couldn't see past her evil eyes.

The regular visitors consisted of her older, slightly more dislikable brother, Hugo, his wife Victoria and their four equally annoying teenage sons. Since I was the same age as their boys, it should've been easy for me to get along with them, however, like their father and aunty, they were extremely dislikable.

The casual event was usually a dinner on a Friday night. That night, the wind and rain matched the gloomy atmosphere in the dining room. With the table able to seat up to ten people, there was only one empty seat at the bottom - a seat that belonged to my absent father.

Bruja sat opposite his seat with Isa to her left and me close to her. A seat separated us from Hugo's youngest son while the rest of his family sat opposite us. Every dinner was the same.

Bruja and her brother bring up stories from their very boring and preppy upbringing.

Hugo's sons would boast about their positions on their school's football team and how the youngest, Sean, could make it pro one day.

Victoria boasts about how she has a famous designer on speed dial.

Me and Isa sat there quietly hoping their conversations wouldn't come our way.

The whole hour and a half I'd be forced to endure such torture I'd focus on the clocking waiting to gain my freedom. If my eyes weren't on the clock, they were on my sister who struggled to eat her food.

I wasn't sure when Isa's eating disorder started, but it seemed like something she had kept to herself for a very long time. While she denied it whenever I asked, her appearance made it very obvious there was something wrong with her. While she was only 5'3, her weight made her look smaller. The time I knew her I hardly saw her clear a plate of food- when she did, she would run too fast for me to ask her how her food was.

Whenever I asked her, she'd blame it on ballet. Like most rich kids, she had an extracurricular solely for her parents to have something to boast about. Isa's was ballet. I never thought ballet was an interesting dance style - it seemed too boring for me. But Isa was good at it. She was more than good, she was the best. She made me like Ballet.

However, being the best, or at least trying to stay the best, came with consequences. Isa's problem was that she thought the only way to be the best was to dedicate her mind and her body to Ballet. To her, she couldn't be a good dancer if she didn't look like the best dancer. She barely ate and danced more than she slept.

That dinner we had a full plate of food. It was a classic Sunday roast as the Brits called it - Sunday roast on a Friday. I had finished my food within ten minutes of the workers bringing it to us, but Isa had only eaten one carrot stick thirty minutes in. She played with the rest of her food until each piece touched a different corner of the plate. Every minute she alternated between twisting her long hair on her fingers and playing with her food.

"Isabella eat your food." her mother ordered. She quickly picked up her fork and took an uncomfortable bite of broccoli. Once her mother was satisfied she took her attention off Isa and back to her conversation. When she realised she was out of the clear, Isa put her fork down before continuing to play with her hair.

I nudged her shoulder to get her attention and gave her a warm smile. She smiled back at me but quickly turned her focus back to her brittle hair. Whenever I had dinner with her and her mother, I imagined what her life was like before she met me.