Sophia ✔

Chapter 4 - Growth

(Above from left to right: Eithen, Sophia, and Connor.)

Edited ✔

Chapter 4 - Growth

Only a few weeks after the funeral Sophia's dad decides to go back to running the church and continue on with his life.

Everyone is sweet to the now family of two, thoughtful of their words and kind with their gazes as they watch Sophia sit there, holding back tears, trying to be as strong as a seven-year-old can be when they lose a parent.

After church many people who Sophia didn't even know come up to her and give her hugs, telling her that everything will be fine and that it's all okay.

She doesn't believe them.

All the attention and pitiful stares make Sophia's skin crawl. All she wants to do is find a dark corner and hide there for as long as she can, ignoring the stares, the feelings, the knowledge.

It's too much.

Connor and Eithen follow Sophia around almost the entire day, not talking, just watching carefully, gazing at her with the same pitiful eyes. It only makes her hate this whole situation even more.

After everyone leaves, Sophia goes looking for her father, more than ready to go home and sit on her bed, crying once again before finally passing out as best as she can.

She eventually finds him in the prayer room but... he isn't praying.

He's screaming, yelling, throwing things around in a viciously sad manner, until he falls to his knees, sobs leaving his shaking body.

Sophia stands in the doorway, body beginning to tremble as she stares at the man who seems to be acting nothing like her father.

As his sobs echo through the room, Sophia slowly closes the door before running out of the building. She sits on the steps at the back of the church and cries until she can cry no more.

* * *

Ever since the day Maria Smith had died, Sophia's father was always a little sadder. The young girl would catch him walking around the house late into the night, eyes brimming with tears and bloodshot. She could hear his cries through their thin walls, despite him trying his best to muffle the sound.

She still heard it.

After that, he started disappearing. Going to church meetings all the time and allowing her to stay home alone. Slowly, she began to lose her dad as well.

Sometimes she couldn't stand the loneliness and would take herself over to the twin's house to stay. But one night, something bad happened to the Awrey family. Sophia was there to witness the splitting of Eithen and Connor's parents, there to watch their mother's screams of hatred before disappearing, there to see the twins grow to hate each other.

She saw it all, and eventually, she lost them too.

On her birthday, Sophia would try to stay happy and enjoy the supposed holiday, but soon enough the joy disappeared and she spent those days sitting at her mother's grave and talking.

She'd tell her mama all that was going on in her life. Little things, like how she wanted to dye her hair someday, how she's been painting more and is almost as good as her mama was, about how dad was doing, about her new crush on a certain twin across the street, and...

And how she wished that she never made those stupid promises.

Because those words only made it harder to let her go...

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Seven long years passed since her death.

The little blonde who invited Sophia to play with her that one day ended up going to the same school as Sophia. She stood up for her in the third grade once she noticed the bullies hitting and taunting her during recess. After that, she never left her side.

Her name was Ema Franks, and the two became best friends.

The twins grew more and more distant from each other and Sophia until neither of them talked to the other. They grew up, but Sophia's crush on a certain brown-eyed twin never seemed to disappear.

Sophia is now fourteen, turning fifteen. She's grown into an unconfident but strong young girl. She's learned the hardships the world has to offer from a young age, but she's also learned to brush them aside and take life on in stride.

She's as happy as she can be.

E.C.