Forlot: The Mom Who Lives Next Door - Book Twelve

Chapter Forty

I squinted at her - and burst out laughing. No way was I falling for Kira's lie. I knew who my biological mother was. She was kind, understanding, and had the same features as...Donna.

Donna was my real mom, not Kira, and that was that.

"What is so funny, Jackson?" Dad demanded. He had short, brown hair and was wearing a green, short-sleeved shirt, gray pants, and brown shoes.

"I believe that he is not taking what I said seriously, Bill," Kira explained to him. "He thinks that it is a joke."

"Of course, it is a joke!" I shouted soon after my laughter died down. "What makes you two think that I would take your word? It sounds ridiculous!"

Dad glanced at Kira, and then back at me. "It is ridiculous, Jackson. You are right about that. But just because it is absurd does not mean that it is not true."

I growled at them. "And the fact that it is coming from a dad who does not love his son or his daughter anymore and a woman who turns out to be a serial killer and desires revenge on my real mom!"

Both Kira and Dad were surprised by my outburst. I expected them to scold me or punish me. Or...Kira murdering me right on the spot.

Dad took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. He got on one knee and put his hands on my shoulders.

"Jackson," he said my name. "When you were brought into the world, I could not have been happier. I...always desired to have a son of my own. To play with him. To teach him the important things in life. You were and still are my whole world."

"Huh. Funny that you said that last part. Before the divorce, I heard you telling Mom how she was also your whole world. That certainly did not last."

"Absolutely. She still means the whole world to me. She and you and Amy."

"If that is the case, why did you make her move out of our house? Why did you keep us from seeing her?"

Once again, he looked at Kira, and then back at me. "Kira should tell you."

"That manipulator?!"

"Jackson, please. Listen to her story. If you still do not believe her...us...then you can go and live with your mother, Donna."

I gasped. I had not expected that. "I can?"

"Bill—" Kira started.

Dad interrupted. "I just want you to trust me, Son. Even if it is a little bit."

I thought about it for a moment and agreed. Kira suggested that we go to the living room and sit. So we did. However, I had forgotten that Jade's powers trashed the living room. So when we all walked in...

"What the heck happened here?!" Dad yelled. "Was a tornado in here or something?"

I could see that Jade was full of shame. I opened my mouth to tell them. Not about Jade and her powers. I was going to make something up.

Kira beat me to it.

"Bill, this is not our house. So who cares? Just be glad that we do not have this mess at our home."

We sat in a circle on the carpeted floor. I was sitting between Milo and Jade.

"I will try to tell the story to the best of my ability," Kira said. "I was your mother. I was Donna. Every encouragement that I gave was because of me. Every favor that I did was because of me. Yes, I will agree that I was and still am a pest. I have the tendency to hover over the ones whom I love, but I am not doing it to make their lives miserable. I just...I do not want anything bad to happen to them."

She wiped a tear that had gotten on her cheek and continued.

"That is who your father fell in love with. He truly loved Donna, the woman who always put herself ahead of others. That was me. I was Donna. Until...one day...I started acting weird. Like, really weird. I would black out, and then come back. It is really hard to describe unless you have been in my shoes."

"How can anyone be in your shoes?" Jade asked. "None of us are small enough to fit inside them."

"It is a metaphor. It means that you do not truly know how it feels to go through something unless you have. Anyway, things got weirder and weirder. Creeper and creeper. At one point, I woke up to seeing a dead body next to me! And...I was holding a knife...that was drenched with blood. But I swear! I did not kill him!"

She sniffed, and Dad rubbed her back.

"I did what I thought was best. Letting your father know about what I...Donna did. I kept insisting that I had nothing to do with the murder. I thought that he would not believe me and report me to the police. Surprisingly, he did not. Even he thought that I was out of character, so he forced me to see a special doctor."

She paused, and then continued.

"We eventually met with a doctor. He called himself Dr. Maxwell."

Jade shuddered. "Dr. Hugo Maxwell?"

"Yes. He ran a few tests on me and confirmed that I had a split personality disorder. It is when two or more personalities exist in the same person. I only had one, and it would not have been as bad if my other personality was not a mentally ill person. A person who lives to kill and make others suffer. I was devastated."

"Kira and I asked Dr. Maxwell if there was anything that we could do. He said that we only had two choices. To keep the personalities or split them apart."

"In the end, we chose to split me and Donna apart," Kira explained. "Sadly, it is not over yet."