Your Shadow Is My Light

Chapter 33 - I'll show you just how atrocious of a villain I can be.

Normal text
Thinking
Onomatopoeia

Rayne's POV
Eventually, D-Day came knocking at our doors. Only 30 minutes left before the inevitable confrontation where we tear at each other's faces. And when that ungodly hour arrives, it will be a grisly massacre of the century. However, all that gore and carnage comes later. Now my only concern was how to NOT get indigestion from this awkward breakfast time. It's awfully quiet, with all of us left to stew in our own little thoughts. It would've been fine if it's just eating in deathly silence. But it's extremely hard to have an appetite when there's an unfriendly laser beaming the side of my head.

While chewing the cardboard-like sandwich mechanically, I tried to reduce my sense of presence. Deeply afraid that any one of my actions might randomly trigger the displeasure of Ahri's grumpy dad. I don't know what Mrs Seria said to her fuming husband, but whatever it was, it's bloody effective in appeasing Mr Lanore's resentment. At least he only calls me brat instead of hacking me to pieces for daring to covet his precious pearl.

Even though that man was terrifying, I never once felt aversion towards him. A little resistant, yes, but straight-up repulsion? Nope. Not a trace. How to say it... It's like he helped to fill the empty void that's been bothering me for years. Regardless of his occasional weird antics, I still appreciated his roundabout way of caring. The first 'Dad' who even bothered remembering my name. Because of the Brody Cadell shenanigans, I never got to experience what fatherly love was like. To me, it's an elusive white whale that's far out of reach. An unattainable fever dream.

There's a common saying—people will always want what they can't have. The same can be said about my messed-up situation. I detest the idea of NEEDING a father figure in my life. I don't understand why the universe has to mandate every child to be born between a man and woman. It's unfair. Society could harp about gender equality all it wants, but in the end, guys inherently have more power than their female counterparts. So the initiative would always be in their hands. That's just how the supposedly 'unbiased' God made things out to be. We were created unfair from the start. Be it in terms of societal norms where the child commonly takes after the man's surname, or physical disparities.

As unwilling as I was, it's undeniable that the stars were aligned for men. And I hated it. I hated it with a passion. I hated how reality favours them unconditionally. It's precisely because of such lopsided circumstances that facilitated domestic violence. It orchestrated the entirety of my bleak childhood. If two women could be together openly, where we were equal in every aspect, perhaps I wouldn't need to suffer such egregious treatment. I wouldn't have to undergo a traumatic homicidal case that left me permanently broken. I wouldn't have become an orphan at such a tender age...

I hated Brody Cadell. There's no doubt about this. Yet, at the same time, I can't help but long for a father. Not because I particularly enjoyed being strangled, but because I don't have one. It's precisely because having a normal father was such an abstract concept that resulted in this uncontrollable yearning. It's perplexing. Really. Every day, I just felt myself sinking further into depravity. The desperate cravings were driving me nuts. So much so that I sometimes dreamt of a responsible devil at night. Imagine the horror.

In those deluded hallucinations, there was no crying, yelling, nor hunger. Only a cleanly shaven Brody Cadell adorned in a dashing suit and tie. He would carry me on his shoulders while coddling me like a princess; protect Mom from her lecherous supervisor through his mighty fists. We would be living in a wealthy neighbourhood where the light touches. Far away from the frigid chills that had us scrambling for any semblance of covers every winter. And not hole up next to a revolting dumpster that's perpetually enshrouded in gloom. Different from what reality had to offer, it's all sunshine and rainbows. A promise of what could have been if my sperm donor wasn't such an obnoxious asshat.