𝑪𝑶𝑳𝑫 𝑻𝑹𝑼𝑻𝑯 || 𝑫𝑹𝑨𝑪𝑶 𝑴𝑨𝑳𝑭𝑶𝒀

i

...the dull and painful backstory...

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'I'M GOING TO TOWN,' Kiernan Margaux said to her partially intoxicated father, Alexander Margaux, who lay across the couch with one leg on the ground, keeping his body in place. He did not care much for Margaux or any of her interests, which she could never wrap her head around, but he always liked to feel like he was in charge. He looked at her, using his elbow to purch himself up at a higher level than she had been at.

'Why, it's not like you have anything to buy?' Her father smirked. As he spoke directly into her face, she got whiffs of the strong vodka that he had been drinking way too early in the morning. Not only did she despise the smell that had been wafting around the dump she had to live in, but she despised her father for ostracizing her every chance he got. She never understood what she could have done, in her 15, almost 16, years of living, to make him hate her so much. The poor girl never met her mother, not any memories that she could remember at least, and her father never told her what happened; He refused to talk about her every time that Alice's name was brought up. He thought a name is the least he could give her, not being able to elaborate any further on her mother's 'lifestyle' as he referred to it. So, the girl had to go her whole life without a mother and had no clue what had been the reason for her absence.

'I just want to go and meet my friend, please, I have done everything there is to do in this house and I would really like some fresh air.' Kiernan had never gotten so bold with her father as she asked his permission to leave. In truthfulness, she was quite terrified of the man as he was never really able to control his temper. A person would think it to be easy for a 45 year old man to understand boundaries when it came to disciplining a child, but he knew nothing of the sort. It was true, he had hit her before, countless times; this was only one of the reasons she had feared him so much. She had learned how he truly felt about her on her fifth birthday; nobody came to her birthday party, as she was not allowed to invite others to her home, and he had told her just how much he wished it were her instead of her mother. This is something nobody should ever have to hear, let alone a child on her birthday. After that day, ten whole years to follow it, those words would continue to haunt her. She would wake up, her pillows drenched with tears, because of how much she longed for another to care about her the way she, oddly, knew that her mother would have. She felt connected to her without ever having met her, but she could only dream of what it would feel like to have her mother take care of her after the life she had to endure with her father. This would all come to an end soon.

'Go. bring back some dinner.' Her father groaned as he threw his finger in the air, pointing towards the door. He laid back down on the couch with an exhausted expression painted across his face and almost instantly fell into a deep sleep. Kiernan was all too familiar with her grown father's antics and silently agreed to pick up dinner as she grabbed her long, black knitted scarf and gently draped it over her shoulder. It was not her intention to come back, let alone bring back dinner for her lazy father who had only given her ten pounds to last the week.

Kiernan waved goodbye to her passed out father and headed out the door quickly, with urgency in every step she took. She had remembered to leave her bedroom window open so she could sneak back in to grab her belongings. It would have been way too suspicious if she walked across the living room, lugging a large suitcase behind her, so sneaking in and out seemed like the smartest tactic to use in her situation.

She made her way around the small, sturdy house and found herself right in front of the window that had been sitting wide open, waiting for her. The young girl took off her long scarf and bent down to place it right by her feet to avoid it getting caught on the latch of the window, as it had the last time she tried to sneak out. She then put both of her hands on the seal of her window while swiftly jumping upwards for her feet to gain traction against the wall right below that window. As the girl wiggled her way into her small bedroom, she noticed that the door was still opened and hoped that her father would not wake up from the loud thud her raggedy combat boots left on the hardwood floor and quietly moved to lock the door.