Lie, Baby, Lie ✔️

chapter twelve- mia

Chapter Twelve

Four years ago...

My mother stood at her mirror, inspecting herself. She uncapped her favorite red lipstick, sliding it across her puckered lips until it was perfect. As always, she wore a full face of makeup. She had always been beautiful, and since I looked just like her, she said I was beautiful too. We had the same soft features, the same dark eyes. She knew how to use it to her advantage too. She and my father were a lethal power couple. He had charisma for days, and she had the seduction they needed to seal a lot of deals.

I was fourteen then, a small girl barely over five feet tall, thin as a twig and too tiny for my own good. I might as well have been helpless in those days, which is probably why they kept me as far away from their empire as possible. This was before I learned how to take care of myself, before I was forced to learn.

"Where are you guys going?" I asked for the millionth time. I repeated myself so many times she was starting to lose her patience with me. I hindsight, I don't blame her. I was reduced to a child, pulling at the hem of her shirt, posing the same questions over and over again.

"The Arizona desert," Mom said, keeping her answer vague. "Don't worry, we'll be back tomorrow afternoon."

"Why do you have to go? My concert is tomorrow." In middle school, I played the violin badly, but for some reason, they cared enough to pay for lessons anyway. It was my first recital, and they had promised they would come. My parents never had time for me anymore, so this was huge and I wanted to savor every second of it.

"Thomas will drive you, but we'll be there to watch," she said, trying to soothe me. "We've been over this, sweetie."

We had. I was hellbent on getting them in that cafeteria if it was the last thing I did. I was an insistent little thing, making my mother's life difficult as if it were my life's mission.

"Who is this guy anyway?" I questioned.

"He's a man who thinks we owe him money. We're trying to bargain with him." She had skimped on the details, but I later learned that Dad had crossed him years before Purgatory grew to be as big as it was. He borrowed money and never paid it. Looking back, I have a feeling he was never planning on it. The negotiation was probably to get the man to settle for less. No wonder it didn't work out. No one likes being undercut.

She turned toward her closet and ran her hand along her rack of clothes before she settled on a black dress. I watched her slip into it and wordlessly zipped it for her. I hated helping her get ready, knowing wherever she was going was probably bad news. She always dressed professionally, as if this were nothing more than your standard desk job.

Dad came into the bathroom at that moment, fastening the sleeves of his button-up with his lucky pair of cufflinks. He grinned when he saw us.

"How are my favorite girls?" he asked, kissing me on the side of my head.

He was always so affectionate. Sometimes, it felt like he was gunning for a dad of the year award. When he could, he even got involved with the school's parent association. For my father, it was easy to play his role. It was probably him who taught Thomas to act.

"Mia's a little worried about us," Mom answered.

Dad slipped an arm around my shoulders. "Oh yeah? Why is that?"

I stayed quiet, shuffling from foot to foot.

"We do this all the time," he said. "Your mom and I have a great operation going, and we have for a while now. There's nothing to worry about, you know that."