Bloom

Undying

"There was a girl. She had caring parents, friends she adored and a mutual love for everyone in her life. She had life balanced on her fingertip.

“But ever since the girl’s seventh birthday, her mother got brain cancer and had to shave her head scarred head. She started to get weirdly jealous of the girl, making her chop her locks in haphazard strips. Frilly dresses were replaced with baggy boys clothes. The girl cried everyday and hated her mother, cursing every saint she’d ever heard of.”

Isadora pauses, eyes misting over. She shakes her head and a thick lock of hair flops into her eyes. She impatiently pushes it away.

“Over time, the mother refused the girl every time she asked to visit a friend. The only time she was allowed out of her mother’s watch was at school. Slowly, the girl lost everyone she ever cared for, as she had been forcibly distanced.

“The girl lay a knife on her stomach, taking a small pleasure in the red that welled in the wound. That blood was the only thing that was still true. Whenever she cried too hard, her father would come in and rub the tears away, murmuring kind things in her ear.

“Slowly, her mother grew sicker as the tumor grew. Everyday the girl wished for her death, so she could be released like a bird from a cage. Yet still, she was kept under close watch.”

Isadora’s voice breaks, and a single tear trails her face.

“One day, her mother lost her battle, and the girl smiled for the first time in years. She was fourteen. Her father bought her pretty clothes again, and let her grow out her hair. She was happy, once more.

“A couple of years later, and the moon was setting and the girl was changing into night clothes, her father slipped into the shadows. Her tackled the girl onto the bed from behind and, with a hand clamped over her mouth, whispered in her ear. ‘Your mother is no longer her to protect you from me. You are all mine now.’”

Isadora looks down at her hands, tears falling freely. I stare numbly at her in shock, desperately praying that she’ll look up with a twinkle in her eye and laugh at me.

She doesn’t.