One Year Ago
Her hands were crossed in her lap, one kneading the other as if she was helping her veins push blood throughout her fingers. Sydney watched her mother fidget and squirm, obviously uncomfortable, but there was something different about her hands, like a part of them was missing.
"Sydney I think you know what's going on here", her father sighed, pushing back his glasses to the bridge of his nose. He looked awkward, as if he was no longer in his house, as if he was no longer sitting next to his wife, no longer talking to his daughter.
They both sat across from her looking like night and day. Her mother's fair skin made her father's only appear richer and darker while her long, champagne hair caused her Dad's thick dark curls to appear black. She always thought it was funny, how different her mother and father were, but what was funnier still was how equally Sydney looked like the both of them. She'd inherited a perfect mixture of both her mother and father's skin tone, her hair dark like her dad's but long and wavy like her mothers, her eyes an absolute mixture of her blue and his green.
Sydney didn't know what was going on and she didn't know why her parents were suddenly looking at her as if she might shatter into a million pieces. They had text her three minutes after school had ended, wondering where she was and when she'd be home. Her parents had never been clingy; they always knew Sydney would be home as quickly as she could so when she had read the text, which basically spewed anxiety, she grew concerned. And now, looking at both her parents' distressed faces her concern only grew while her nails shrunk from constant biting.
After a few minutes of silence had passed, Sydney having not said a word, her mother choked, "oh honey I'm so sorry", before beginning to cry.
Sydney watched as her father did nothing to comfort his distraught wife, to try and ease her pain. If anything he etched further way from her. That's when Sydney put the pieces together. He didn't try to ease her pain because he was her pain. Now when Sydney looked down at her mother's hands she no longer wondered what was missing, she knew. Her mother had abandoned their wedding ring, and with it their marriage.
"Everything is going to be alright Syd, trust me I want only the best for you", her father murmured, his head bowed so Sydney could see where his hair was beginning to thin.
Her father rarely called her Syd, only when he was trying to comfort her. It never worked though. She remembered the first time she fell of her bike and he ran to her, ordering her to show him her bloody knee. He'd helped her back up and said, "it's all apart of learning Syd", when all she really wanted was for her dad to stop the stinging.
It also reminded her of the time her grandmother died. Her dad had picked her up from school like usual but instead of driving home he drove to her Aunt's. When they had arrived he turned to her and said, "Syd, baby, I'm sorry but Gran has passed away." She remembered sitting there, her father in the front and Sydney still in the back, crying before getting out, only to cry more with the rest of her family.
The name was associated with bad memories. It was anything but comforting.
"What the hell is that supposed to mean Dad? Is that your way of telling me you're about to screw up my life? Because honestly I don't think I deserve an 'its going to be alright' speech. I think I deserve an apology. A 'sorry for having to tell you you're going to have to go through the rest of your life never seeing you parents in the same room' speech or maybe an, 'I'm sorry for all the people I'm about to date who aren't your mother' speech. Not an 'its going to be alright' because its not. If it was going to be alright, this wouldn't be happening."
Both Sydney parents looked up at her, her mother's face sticky with tears and her father's pale and sunken. They sat there, unspeaking and still except for an occasional hiccup escaping from her mother's mouth. It was as if someone had lifted the ceiling from the room and poured in silence, it surrounded and suffocated them. When neither of them clearly were going to talk, Sydney stood up from the couch and left the room, leaving her parents to stare at the spot she once occupied.
As soon as she closed her bedroom door, isolating herself from her parents, Sydney felt sorry. She felt sorry for the way she had spoken to her father, with such disrespect, but then again, although this was their marriage, it was also Sydney's family and she couldn't help feeling angry that they had destroyed it.
Kicking off her school shoes so hard they left scuffmarks on her clean white walls, Sydney fell onto her bed, or rather, sank. She closed her eyes and imagined the blue duvet closing in over her, turning into water. She held her breath as she willed her body to sink further and further until she couldn't hold it any more.
Gasping, Sydney rolled over, staring at the stars that littered her ceiling. Once they had glowed in the dark, but that had been 6 years ago when Sydney was nine. Her father had lifted her on to his shoulders so she could stick them on herself, her mother laughing, passing a new one up to her once she had placed one down. They used to be a team.
She didn't know whether to scream or cry, whether to run away or never leave her room. Her brain felt numb, there was too much to think about and Sydney's couldn't focus on a single thought. So instead she laughed. Sydney was surprised her parents didn't come knocking on her door to see what was so funny as she was in hysterics. She laughed and laughed until her throat was raw and her eyes were clouded with tears, and when she finally finished she fell asleep, wondering if she'll ever be able to laugh again.
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Hey Guys! This is my first time writing and publishing a story on wattpad so I guess I'm writing this the way I want to first :)
Sorry this chapter may be a bit long and irrelevant but I felt it necessary to give some background information into Sydney's life.
As this my first story I would love any of your suggestions or comments xx
Thank you!
- Ella Jaye
YOU ARE READING
Valerie Gale
Teen FictionA lot had changed in a year. A beautiful girl with good grades and good friends is how people used to describe Sydney. She couldn't explain what happened. Nor could anyone else. Perhaps it had something to do with the things she saw that no one el...
