Cicily Gardener: Daughter Of Freya

Chapter 1: The Past

 Picture above is of Cicily :)

Dear Journal, I've never told anyone this before, so you have the right to feel unique. Okay, I'm going to introduce myself. My name is Cicily Gardener. I'm fifteen right now, and I'm a sassy pain in the ass and proud. I was born on May 16 to a famous gardener and her lover. My mom wasn't married when I was born, so it was just me and her for a wonderful year. I was too young to really remember any of it, but it must have been fantastic. I mean come on I was a baby! Well, unfortunately, right before I turned two, my mom married my dad. He was a middle school science teacher. Dreadful, I know. I had to go to the school where he teached and, nevermind, off topic, sorry.

Since you're probably dying to know what the rest of my life was like, my dad didn't really like me. It's not like he hated me or anything, he just wasn't, well still isn't warm to me. My little sister, Lailah, was born when I was three years old. We became instant friends. Best friends at that. My step-dad treated her only a pinch nicer than me because she was his child. Whenever I had gotten in trouble she would talk to him for me. He must have liked her better because she looked like him too. She had his curly blond hair, and my mom's green eyes. I, however, look like my mom in almost every aspect. I have her olive green eyes like Lailah, and I also have her muddy brown hair.

My mom would have been so proud of what Lailah and I have become with our circumstances. Emphasis on would. Sadly, my mom went missing two months after Lailah was born. I remember every day of our search for her. For a year, every single day, Lailah and I waited in my dad's grimy car. It was tan, filled with Crayola marker slashes, and potato chip crumbs. It was illegal to leave us in there, but my dad didn't care. He told me to be quiet and keep Lailah quiet. I remember some days it would get so hot the windows would start to fog, and I had to pour water bottles over Lailah to keep her cool. Looking back on it, we could have died, but we didn't. We just waited.

My dad must have asked every single police officer in that station if they saw my mom. All of them said they didn't. Every night we had prayed for her return. I even prayed on my knees one time. I never got an answer.

When I was five, I walked down the aisle with Lailah, now two years old, throwing rose petals in the air. I remember how much I hated it all. I hated the pink and white decor. I hated how the chocolate cake looked, smelled, feeled. It reminded me of dirt. Which reminded me of my mom whose hands were in our community garden every night from 5-7 pm. I hated the honks of the passing cars when they saw the "Just Married" on the back of the Toyota my stepmom, Jenna, owed before marrying. My dad was replacing my mom with someone we didn't know or care to know. That night when Lailah and I were staying at my Nonna's house, Lailah was bouncing around grinning ear to ear. Her golden blond hair was put up in an adorable little bun. She had been reenacting her job as flower girl, in Nonna Stella's living room. Grandma's genuine smile and Lailah's laughter made everything more bearable. From then on I was dedicated to being my sister's caretaker. Whenever my parents wanted to go a club or watch a movie in their room alone, I was her mom. That was the one thing I didn't hate. My sister was my life. We played together, dressed up together, and gardened together. We even talked about mom. She couldn't remember mom at all. That made her a good listener.

One night when I was telling Lailah every detail about mom's garden, my dad walked in on us. He yelled at me for even mentioning her name in this new house with our new mom near. I don't know why I did, but I yelled back at him. What else could I do? I was young and hurt. I told him that our new "mom" could leave and never come back for all I cared. By then, my sister had started to cry, and he grounded me for "being an awful daughter." It's not like it mattered though. I was seven where was I going to go? Lailah and I became more careful of our storytelling from then on.

When I turned eight, my life started to crumble. I had these visions of me strangling people with rotting vines every night. Every single night. I tried to get everyone to help me. I reached out to my dad. He told me to grow up. I begged my step-mother for sleeping pills. She said she couldn't waste them on silly dreams. The only person that listened to me was Lailah, but I wouldn't tell her about the dreams. I couldn't. She was too innocent. Too gentle. I began to cry every night before I fell asleep. Then it went to the phase where I thought I was a horrible person. Every night the dreams got more and more vivid. I was in fourth grade when I didn't have the dream for the first time. I only had a dream of mom singing to me. Not this "mom" we had been forced to love, our true mom.

I started making more friends. I believed that my mom was protecting me from above. Everything was perfect, until Lailah turned eight. Every night she would wake up screaming at the top of her lungs. Every night I would rock her and we would sing the "Fifty States Of America" song, which I had been learning in class at the time. Every time she would hear Lailah scream, she would get extremely mad. Every night she would get more and more irritated.

Every night, I would hear the pitter patter of Lailah's feet as she ran across the wooden hallway to my room. After about a minute or two of Lailah being in my bed, Jenna would open my door. She always had mascara on the bottom of her eyelids, a short red nightgown on, and white curlers, that were really a gross cream color from too much use, in her hair. Lailah would hide under the covers, and Jenna would shake her head disappointedly. From then on, my sister slept in my bed always. We were inseparable. I would whisper to her through my polka dot sheets. "Just make it to fourth grade. Mom will help you then." She eventually stopped having the dreams, at around the same age as me, but she still slept in my bed.

When I was fourteen, my dad sent me to a boarding school. Lailah, not wanting to leave me, came with me. I believe dad sent me away knowing Lailah would come. He just wanted a new life. Not having to see his previous wife's face in mine or Lailah's. I don't respect that decision. Honestly, I think it's really cruel. At least, Lailah and I are free from him. We can start our own lives now. I guess that's all for today.

TTYL, Journal.