She sat there, waiting. What was she waiting on? She was waiting on those footsteps; waiting for the sound of the front door slamming as the rain poured down onto the roof of the small three bedroom trailer.
"Hayley?" her mother came thundering into the house. "Hayley, where are you?" this time a little more impatient than the last.
"I'm in here, mom." Hayley spouts feebly, her voice weak from crying and shaking from the cold.
"Where are y.." she trails off as she stumbles into the bathroom, fixing her eyes on her child who is blue in the face and shivering in the bathtub. "What are you doing? What's wrong with you?" She can't seem to understand her daughter's motive for running a freezing bath mid-winter.
"I..I.." Hayley starts, "I thought if I took a cold bath, I wouldn't be cold when I got out." she finishes, solemnly.
"Get out of there," her mother begins, grabbing the worn beige towel from the rack, "you are completely idiotic. I know you can tell that the cold isn't good for your body, Hayley, you're literally blue!" She's really yelling now and Hayley starts to cry.
"I'm sorry mama! Please don't be mad." she's sobbing now, using one hand to hold the towel her mother handed to her around her small frame, she clutches her face in her palm.
"I'm not mad, I just don't understand the logic here, Hayley. You need to get dressed so we can go to dinner. I want to be leaving in about thirty minutes, understand?" her mother responds, walking down the hallway to the master bedroom as she speaks and without a second glance at her frozen daughter, she slams the door behind her.
Hayley stands there for a moment, staring at that ugly, white door. She hates that door or what's behind it anyways. She hates that room, and the house built around it. Most of all, she hates the person living in it. Not her mother, Caren, but the other person who hides behind those walls, and that ugly white door. Caren will never truly know that her daughter was frozen in more ways than one that day, and she may never care to know either.
YOU ARE READING
Man of the House
Non-FictionThis is a novel based on real events. Certain names have been changed to protect the identity of those involved. Follow little Hayley throughout a life filled with unimaginable obstacles. Beware: this is not a story for the weak hearted or weak-stom...
