Fake Me To Church

Twelve Years Ago

Part Five

Lane rolled down the passenger-seat window, listening to the wind as it whistled a frostbitten melody. Fallen tree bark crumbled in the leaves spread along the edge of the road. Lane imagined that spiders and ladybugs and all other sorts of disgusting insects were probably hiding, nestling themselves somewhere between all the displaced, rustling twigs.

She glanced at her mother as she drove. Elizabeth Martin's eyes were stony and unflinching. The sallow, lemony locks she called hair were a far cry from Lane's creamy vanilla blond—especially today, of all days.

On a different Monday morning, Lane would have protested such an early waking, but today she had risen before her alarm. Knowing that any other twelve-year-old girl would likely be terrified, Lane had refused.

Instead, she had traipsed whimsically to her bathroom. She had grabbed the fruitiest bottle of body wash she owned and stepped into her shower, lathering up and sprinkling herself in delightful warmth as steamy clouds rose and fogged her mirror. She'd hummed as she lavished on her make up, drawing sparkling gold liner across her lids as a final touch. She had taken a seat on the foot of her bed, then run her pretty pink hairbrush along her hair's luscious waves a thousand times before Elizabeth finally came to her room to tell her it was time to leave.

Lane had tossed her hair nonchalantly before stuffing her hairbrush into the last of her suitcases and sealing it shut. She had followed her mother outside, climbed into the passenger's seat without a word.

It was 7:09 a.m. when Lane and Elizabeth made it to Molding the Way Sanitarium and Correctional Facility.

Lane glanced at her mother again. This is so freaking ridiculous, she thought. But screw her. And screw this entire ball-sucking school! She kept her lips in a thin and indifferent frown as she unlocked the passenger door and stepped out onto the parking lot's uneven asphalt.

Elizabeth looked up at her but stayed seated in the car.

"Coming, Mom?" Lane asked with a trill. "Pretty sure they're gonna want a parent or legal guardian to sign me in." She placed a braceleted hand on her hip and twisted her head sideways so her hair would sway with the wind.

"I already called ahead," Elizabeth answered back lowly. "I gave my consent to your becoming a ward of Molding the Way."

"What the!?—Mom, what does that even mean?"

"It means that you can carry those suitcases yourself, and it means I won't be going into that building with you. I'm sure you're familiar with how to work a door, and I'd rather not start off my day walking hand-in-hand with an airheaded, unrepentant delinquent."

Lane's jaw dropped wide open. "WHAT!? Mom, are you freaking kidding me? There's no way you can just—!"

"What's done is done, Lane," Elizabeth fired back. "And believe me—it is done." She pressed a button on her keys, and the trunk popped open.

Lane was speechless. This was impossible, truly and utterly impossible. Lane stood frozen under the icy morning, unable to believe her mother was honestly abandoning her.

"Fine," Lane managed at last, sauntering to open the trunk and retrieve her belongings. Once she'd dragged out the suitcases and draped her shoe bag's sash over her shoulder, Lane sashayed back to the front of the car and slammed the passenger door shut in rage.

Elizabeth blinked, unbothered, and the sound of the engine roared in Lane's face. Lane stomped her foot as her mother departed the parking lot, her lips arching into an angry scowl as she avoided a puff of exhaust fumes. She stood there and waited in the cold, watched as her mother drove away under the early morning brightness, free at last from her most dreadful child.