Aftertaste | J.JK

Don't Be Afraid

I make sure that my mother sees me when I come downstairs, my expression grave and my movements as deadly and silent as a wraith.

I make sure I feel her eyes on my back as I stop in front of the door, and begin typing the password into the digital keypad. 

It's not long before her cold hands wrap around my wrist, slapping my fingers away from the keypad. She drags me to the farthest corner of the room, her eyes wide and furious.

But it isn't so wide and furious anymore when she notices something has changed in my own.

"Elle," She says carefully, looking confused at my blank, dark expression. I'd never put on a face that shadowed, and why I would now confuses her. "What's wrong?"

"You."

Her eyes go wide with realization as the anger pours out of me in dark, deep waves, rage coloring the corners of my gentle eyes.

"How could you lie to me like that," I whisper, angrier than I'd ever been before. It only makes everything so, so much worse when her entire face screams confirmation.

"For seventeen years, mom." I murmur as I point at her stunned face. "Seventeen years I've been lied to. How can I trust you ever again?"

She looks helpless as she bites her lower lip, suddenly looking much smaller than she'd ever been before.

"I did it for you."

My anger explodes when I hear her excuse.

"You did it for me?" I scream, stepping away from the demon I'd called my mother. "You closed me off from the world for seventeen years and you did it for me?"

The words of fury and blame pours out of my lips as I hold up the crumpled piece of paper, waving it furiously in front of her shocked face.

"You shouldn't have gone through my things, Elle."

"That doesn't matter," I hiss, eyes wide and circular with shock that she would even have the nerve to bring that subject up. She'd just been exposed, and she didn't even look even the tiniest bit guilty.

"Elle," My mother whispers, as if pleading for me to calm down. "It was for you, I swear. You have no idea how dangerous the world is— how corrupt. It was good of me to keep you innocent and pure—"

"You're not normal," I shake my head as I step back, tears welling in the corners of my eyes. "Not even a sorry? Not even one genuine apology? All you think about is yourself— you don't care about me."

My mother's face suddenly goes bright red as she tears the paper out of my hands, anger flashing through her skin in crimson splotches.

"I have been the best mother you will ever receive, Elle. If I'd let you out, your innocence would've been stolen."

"You're psychotic." I whisper as I step towards the door. "Do you know how long I've stared out the window, hoping to breathe the same air that all the other kids get to breathe? Do you know how much you've isolated me?"

"Do not talk to me like that, Elle." My mother says, a glint of rage sparkling in her dark eyes. "Everything I've done has been for you, and I won't let you taint that."

"And I won't let you stop me from going outside anymore." I say, and my mother clenches her fist in anger and frustration.

Then the air vibrates.

Jungkook appears out of nowhere as he grips my mother's wrist, his eyes flat and filled with glittering vampire. My mother's mouth drops open as her grip goes entirely slack.

"You were planning to hit her, weren't you?"

"Jungkook?"

My mother's eyes loll back in numb shock as she turns to me furiously. "You know this filthy creature?"

"He's not filthy at all. You are." When I shoot back angrily, she goes so scarlet that I think her head's going to explode any moment.

"You— We'll sort this out later," My mother hisses, giving me a vicious glare. "And get this disgusting vampire out of here!"

"You're not going to sort out anything with her," Jungkook growls as he lets go of my mother's wrist. "If I see you touching her again, then I'll personally make sure you'll die bloodless and pale."

"If you want him to leave, then fine." I hiss back, meeting my mother's stern gaze with a rage of my own.

"But I'm leaving with him."

"Don't you dare," She sputters as Jungkook takes my hand in his. Her eyes dart back to me and our linked hands, furious but knowing she was helpless to do anything.

She'd already made her choice, and now I was going to make mine.

"All my life I've never dared." I purse my lips, and I feel Jungkook's slender fingers tighten around mine. "But you've pushed the limit, mom. I'm not going to live with a person who keeps their daughter in a world that only she thinks it's perfect."

Panic and terror suddenly twists her expression, because she knows that once I disappear with Jungkook— there was no way she had of finding me. And she had absolutely no clue that he resided right next to our house.

And she tries her final plead, desperate to grab any excuse she can find.

"So you're going to leave the mother who birthed you for a bloodsucker? Don't tell me, Elle, that you love him? Tell me anything but that, Elle. Please."

I feel Jungkook's eyes hit my back as I admit the truth that I'd been holding inside since I'd met him outside my window.

"Yes, I love him. More than I will ever love you."

Her mouth drops open, sending pure streaks of satisfaction shooting through my body. She needed a taste of her own medicine- and the nerve to not even apologize after keeping me in the dark for seventeen confined years.

Until she fixed that stubborn idea in her head that everything she believed was right, I would refuse to speak another word to her after this day.

"Elle!"

"Jungkook." I whisper as I grip his sleeve. He nods his consent and the air begins to vibrate, signaling the beginning of my freedom.

I had no clue where I was going to go, nor did I have any clue how I could continue my life. But at that moment, nothing mattered more than escaping this suffocating house filled with lies and deceit.

I'd even choose the streets over living with a liar posing as my mother.

"Elle," Jungkook grips my shoulders comfortingly as electricity begins to tingle violently through my spine. "Don't worry. Don't be afraid."

"I promise I will keep you safe."