Safe House

Prologue

        The happiest day of my life was probably when my mom gave me a name. She was slightly intoxicated at the time, but it made me feel complete. I could finally go around to the other kids, telling them that "My name was Ottilie." Ottilie Hawthorne. For seven years, I had been going by "kiddo" and "buckaroo" and whatever my mom's never-ending stream of boyfriends fancied calling me. I barely went to school, and rather spent my days nursing her hangovers and headaches. I learnt to never answer the door, to never pick up the phone, and of course, to never let myself be known, or else I'd never see my mom again. And being with mom was the best place to be. She had an apartment or a house, depending on the boyfriend, and a beat-up car that we had sleepovers in. The old lady next door to mom's longest-lasting boyfriend would sometimes stop by with a condescending look and a batch of cookies for me, shaking her head at my mother and letting herself out. But besides that, my contact with humankind was limited. Old ladies were to be loved, men were to be feared, and mothers were always right.

        I was at peace with the world. Willing. Happy. This was what I was meant to do, and that was what I liked doing. I was the only one for mom, the one constant. She needed me. More importantly, I needed her.

        But it was all fated to end, and as I watched the apartment burn under the arm of the old lady next door, I decided that then and there would be as good a time as any to restart. I was thirteen. I had received little to no schooling, had no friends, and was stick thin and ragged enough to be homeless. My mother, on the other hand, was disgusting. She was probably always disgusting, but now I could truly see it as she wept and bawled and begged the poor excuse of a boyfriend she had to take us with him.

        No tears were shed by me as I walked away from my mother and the only life I knew.

        No tears were shed by me as I adjusted to life in foster care.

        No tears were shed by me as I was sent to therapist after therapist for my constant "signs of depression".

        No tears were shed by me as I moved from one home to another.

        If this was going to be my "new start", so be it.