Ophiuchus

Before

Before she was even married, Regina had always wanted a daughter. Growing up, she was between three boys. When her mother became pregnant, Regina hoped for a sister, but in turn got two twin brothers instead. When she was fifteen, she met George, a charming and attractive nineteen year old, who had been coaching tennis in his summers at Regina's sports camp. She couldn't help but fall in love with him, afterall he was everything she'd wanted in a prince charming. By the end of that summer, before George had returned to Heidelberg for uni, Regina became pregnant. Her father was angry with her, her mother devastated, and her brothers grew distant. As soon as she'd graduated secondary, She was married off to George with a two and a half year old son. Her life was miserable. Every hope and dream she'd ever had was gone.

She'd vowed she would not have another child, but in four years time, she was pregnant yet again with another boy. She was nineteen, and spent her days alone in a house with a child perched in her lap and another kicking in her stomach, while gazing out a window of lost opportunity. Meanwhile George was off, climbing up the ladder of  success working for an investment company, spending his nights with bottles of champagne and women who were far prettier and younger than her.

Her hopes later resurfaced when she became pregnant a third time and found out she was having a girl.  She could only dream of all the things they would do together, all the things Regina would teach her. At night she would lie awake with a hand on her belly, dreaming of braiding her future daughter's hair and doing her makeup. Teaching her how to ride a bike and how to bake a cake. She'd make sure her daughter was strong, and set herself goals and have hopes and dreams, bigger than her own. She would teach her to be independent and to speak her mind. Her daughter would be everything, everything Regina had wished she could've ever been.

A few weeks before Christmas, Regina found herself sitting at the dining table with her head in her hands. The house was quiet, everyone had gone, Geroge to work, Camille to school, and now she was all alone. There were times like these, where she would feel small in the confines of their home. Life around her felt shattered, the only thing she felt like she could do was watch as the pieces were crushed to smithereens, and swept up into a cloud of dust.

She'd been out of control for a while now. She'd never wanted this life, never. She was unhappily married to a cruel bastard and had kids who rarely ever looked her in the eye- but, who could blame them? She regrets a lot of things, but the thing she regrets most is bringing her kids into the world, only to disappoint them and force them into lives they didn't want for themselves. She knew they hated her, loathed her for never leaving him, for never having protected them, or for a second even considered speaking up. She was a horrible mother, and she knew it deep down to the root of her soul. She would pay the price for the rest of her life. Eventually, time would come for Camille to take her exams and move out to Uni. And with Camille gone, knowing she was safe from her father's brutality, Matthew would move on as well. Daniel will keep moving like he always has, and hopefully one day might find a woman he really loves and marry her and live the life she had always wanted for herself. But Regina will still be here, in this oversized house on this shitty estate with the wolf. She'll be tied to him for the rest of her life, with nowhere to go, no family to shelter her, no money to pay her bills. She'll be living with him until the day she decides she'd had enough. And on that day, she will have a drink, and then another and another. She will drive up the coast and fill her pockets with rocks. And she will walk into the sea and submerge herself in the rushing waters. She will wash herself clean all of her regrets and find peace as the water begins to fill up her lungs. And she too will wash away, as nothing but a remnant of the earth, forgotten and unwanted.

Her head was aching, splitting in half with a migraine. She was tempted to pour herself a drink and fall back asleep, but instead, she makes her way to the kitchen, makes herself a sandwich and pops a few tablets of aspirin under her tongue.

After finishing the sandwich, she dusted the crumbs off of her plate and returned upstairs. She thought about getting dressed and going out for a walk, maybe even doing a bit of shopping, but as she passed by Camille's room, she decided to change her mind.

Regina had never been close to her daughter. Camille had become incredibly withdrawn throughout puberty, she hadn't even told her mother when she'd gotten her first period. Regina had always pictured a perfect life where her daughter would be her best friend and tell her everything. First periods, first kisses, first crushes, first everything. But now, as she stood outside Camille' s room, she realized her own daughter was a stranger to her.

She finds herself opening the door to Camille's bedroom, wandering about the room, admiring the artwork and photographs on the walls, and the small trinkets she'd collected up along the edge of her desk. Pictures hung on the wall of Camille with kids her age Regina had never seen. She hadn't met any of Camille's friends before, and if she had, well she couldn't remember them. In one picture, a boy with dirty blond hair was kissing Camille on the cheek-Regina didn't know if she'd had a boyfriend, perhaps she'd kept him a secret. In another, Camille and two other girls wore matching mini skirts with bottles of what seemed to be vodka hidden behind them. One picture however, stood out to her the most. It was an old picture of Matthew and Camille, in the bathtub together. Her cheeks were rosy pink and there were soap bubbles frothing a top her small head. She must've only been one or two. Regina reaches for the picture and takes it down, holding it close to her chest. Surely, Camille wouldn't notice if Regina had pocketed it for herself.

She lays down onto Camille's bed and runs her hands along the fleece bedspread. She turned her face into one of the pillows and inhaled-it smelled like her, lemons and lavender. She sat up and hugged one of the pillows to her chest as she began opening one of the drawers to her nightstand. She rifled past scrunchies and lip balms and lotions and found something  that made her blush-it was an opened box of condoms. Camille was seventeen now, but she hadn't realized how much she'd grown up. She felt like she'd missed out on a great deal of her daughter's life. Camille hardly ever spoke to her, and perhaps that was mostly her own fault. She was a horrible mother, one that was unreliable and emotionally unstable and usually drunk. She blamed herself for their withdrawn, detached relationship.

But then, Regina had found something that made her whole body go weak. It was a pregnancy test and it read positive. Something within Regina turned, and she realized her daughter needed her. Sure, she hadn't been the best parent, and hadn't been as involved as she should have, but there was no way, no way that she would let Camille ruin her life the way she did when she was her age. Camille did not deserve to give up on her every dream and aspiration this early. Not when she was a smart and dedicated student with such potential. She was going to fight for her daughter to the very end, Camille didn't deserve to go through this alone, no girl does. Part of her wished someone had been by her side all those years ago, but no one had stuck by her. But Regina was  ready to stick up for her daughter.

And for once, stick up for herself.