Going back

3|| Home

A/N: here's chapter 3. Enjoy, people.

Iris thought she was prepared to see her old home.

She really wasn't.

Her arms were locked by her sides, and her breath caught in her throat as she stared at the oppressive place before her- a place she'd once called home.

She could see her and her brothers playing out front in the summer, ghostly shrieks of joy filled her ears. She saw herself, six years old, hiding behind Elijah as her other brothers tried to spray her with the water guns.

"HELP ELI!" Iris squealed, gripping her brother's shirt tightly as a wide smile bloomed across her expression.

Elijah puffed up with pride and shouldered his own water gun, "Don't worry, Riss! I'll protect you!"

But he wasn't able to protect her when it really mattered.

Iris clearly remembered the day David kicked her mother out. She and her brothers had been in the living room, watching a movie, when they heard shouting coming from the hall.

"GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!" David roared, grabbing his wife by the arm harshly.

"Please, David," Elise sobbed, tears streaming down her face, "Let me explain-" It was the first time Iris had seen her mother on her knees.

"Ma, what's going on?" Iris asked and clutched David's free hand, "Dad, please, let go! You're hurting her!"

David turned on his daughter and she flinched from the rage burning in his eyes. Elise immediately jumped between them, arms outstretched, shielding Iris from her father's anger.

"Leave." David said quietly. His hands curled into fists and his chest rose and fell with each laboured breath.

Iris was terrified. She gripped her mother's hand. "No! Don't send Mum away!"

Something inside David snapped. He grabbed both of them and threw them out of the door. "Don't ever come back here again!"

Iris heard her brothers shouting in protest, but it was too late. The heavy brown doors slammed shut on them and the guards dragged them off the property.

"Iris?" Elijah laid a hand on the young girl's shoulder.

She recoiled and shoved his hand away, stepping out of the car and slamming the door shut with more force than needed. The sound echoed through the empty courtyard, disturbing a flurry of birds nearby.

Keep up the act. Iris exhaled and shook her hands out. Fake it until Harry gets here.

"Ready, brother dear?" Iris spat out, sarcasm dripping off each syllable, "I can't wait to meet the family!"

Being inside was worse than outside. Iris stepped over the spot where her mother had begged for a chance to explain. For a while, Iris had asked Elise what she meant, but her mother would get such a sad look in her eye that she stopped asking.

"Where are we going?" Iris's voice remained surprisingly steady as she stood in the foyer. 'I want to burn this place to the ground.'

"The living room." Elijah shut the door and gestured down the hall. "Dad and Lisa- that's our stepmother- are waiting for you."

Iris gave a small nod and followed Elijah, even though she remembered the way as though she had come here yesterday. Taking a deep breath, Iris wiped her sweaty palms on her jeans and, at Elijah's encouraging nod, pushed open the white wooden door.

Immediately, she locked eyes with crystal blue eyes- a carbon copy of her own. Revulsion and malice swirled inside of Iris. She wished she'd gotten her mother's warm brown eyes instead. She didn't want anything to do with the monster that was smiling so kindly at her now.